Cores 1+3:
- Discuss-on: How can words save your life?
- Re-introduce vocabulary books for full life-saving effect.
- Play Vocabulary Basketball with specific life saving sentences.
- Get into three/four teams.
- I will ask you questions about a vocabulary word about synonyms, antonyms, definitions, or parts of speech. You must answer the question and give a sentence that uses the word in life saving situation. For example, “Something within your heart valves is amiss; I must give you CPR now.”
Core 2:
- When I was in late middle school and early high school, my friend Susie and I would e-mail back and forth our most profound ideas, claiming that with each e-mail we were becoming more intelligent and enlightened. Well, at the end of every e-mail we developed this habit of asking each other questions that had only one answer. It was yet another way of being intellectually elitist. We said things like (these are actual quotations from an e-mail sent on February 1, 1998):
- What could be more brutal?
- what could be more refreshing?
- what could be more devastating?
- what could be more absolute?
- what could be more fabulous?
- what could be more exciting?
- what could be more brilliant what could be more clueless?
- what could be more discriminating?
- what could be more opportunistic?
- what could be more sad?
- what could be more amazing?
The answer to these questions was always nothing because what we were talking about were things like truth, change, tradition, hope, and love. As we get ready to go on our second exploration through change, I would like us to take this approach. I would like you to think about change and tradition and ask yourself what both of these are like. Ask yourself, “What could be more…” See which adjectives apply to which abstract concepts.
- Once you have your list of “What could be more…” questions, I would like you to brainstorm what kinds of change and what kinds of tradition you are talking about in each question.
- You can now begin thinking about how tradition and change interact with one another.
- What causes people to change away from tradition?
- What causes people to fear change away from tradition?
- Do tradition and change always have to be at odds?
- What are the absolute truths about change and tradition?
- Fill out the Tradition and Change handout with examples from your own life.
Core 4:
- Introduce Brainstorming: We are going to use a lot of paper and markers and ideas today. Today is going to be about producing the most ideas. We will worry about the best ideas later. You see, volume has its advantages sometimes. When you produce ideas voluminously, there is this thing that happens in your mind. You stop seeing boundaries and you start making connections. When you are constantly worried about getting a right answer, it is hard to see what isn’t obvious. We need to be able to say things that are divergent, that are connected but not not the same. Get into groups of four or five. Make sure that you are with people who you can work well with and not those who will distract you.
- Brainstorm ideas about change and white down ALL responses.
- What ideas come to mind when you think about change?
- What kinds of things change? What is it about them that changes?
- How do you know when something has changed? What evidence do you look for to determine whether a change has occurred?
- Categorize the ideas that were written down, putting them into groups and giving each group a title.
- How could you categorize these ideas into groups?
- What could you call each group? Why?
- Do all of your changes fall into groups? Might some of them belong in more than one group?
- Is there a different way you might categorize your ideas? What other categories might you use?
- What are some of the characteristics of change, based on the ideas you have written?
- Brainstorm a list of things that do not change.
- What are some things that do not change? What are some things that always seem the same or always happen the same way?
- What evidence or proof do you have that these things do not change?
- How might you group the things that do not change? What can you call each of these groups?
- How are the groups of things that do not change similar to or different from the groups of things that do change?
- Think about the following ideas whether they show change: routines or habits, rules and regulations, table manners, laws, customs of cultures. Explain your answers. If they show change, where would they fit into your categories of changes? If they do not, where would they fit into your categories of things that do not change?
- Make generalizations about change.
- A generalization is something that is always or almost always true. What generalizations can you make about change? Use your examples and categories to guide your thinking, and write several statements that are generalizations about change.
- The Five Generalizations/Truths of change.
- Change is linked to time.
- How is change linked to time?
- Are all changes linked to time in the same way?
- How do some of the changes you listed relate to time?
- Change may be positive or negative.
- What is progress?
- Does change always represent progress?
- How might a change be thought of as both positive and negative?
- Change may be perceived as orderly or random.
- Can we predict change?
- Select specific changes from your list, and describe which aspects of them can be predicted and which are unpredictable.
- Even when we know a change will take place, can we always predict exactly how things will turn out?
- Change is everywhere.
- Does change apply to all areas of our world?
- What are some specific changes which are universal, or happen everywhere, and some specific changes that may apply to only a small area at a given time?
- Change may happen naturally or be caused by people.
- What causes change?
- What influence do people have over changes in nature?
- What influence does nature have over the changes people intended?
- Complete the Change handout.
