Well, I did spend a year of high school in Scandinavia, so I saw something of both systems. However, I was in the last year of school there (a junior here–I was 15-16), and the more intellectual students had already gone on to gymnasium, so it was a class of kids who were headed for vocational/office careers (which I must say is much better done over there). Anyway, I was surprised and taken aback at the lack of interest they had in the world. I mean, the Berlin Wall was coming down next door, and no teenagers I knew even cared! I had never heard of critical thinking, but it was definitely missing.
I loved living there, but it pretty much cured me of thinking that European schools were superior to American ones. It’s about the same level of quality overall, really. IME anyway.
Might it be that this assignment is part of how your kid’s teacher teaches critical thinking? This sure seems like a critical thinking assignment to me. She (he?) may expect the students to struggle with the material, then go over it in class to clarify. I’ve certainly had teachers do that to me before, and for some teachers, that works really well.
To answer your question a little more directly, I don’t think it’s totally unreasonable for your kid to struggle with that at 15, especially given the topic and the language. That’s not an easy poem by any means.
What does “critical thinking” “logic” or “analytic” (some of the words mentioned here) have to do with interpreting poetry???
I don’t see this as a “critical thinking” exercise at all. The poem, because it is not current, has to be explained and presented in a historical context. There’s nothing wrong with learning what a poem means from someone who knows.
I always hated “interpretation” of literature or rehashing endlessly what some long dead author meant by this or that, because it was always very subjective, and a modern person’s interpretation is going to be missing something.
English teacher checking in. I agree that’s a pretty tough text to assign a 15-year old; which may be exactly why it is assigned. If you only give readings that they can easily grok, you really aren’t challenging them to learn. The “no pain, no gain” principle applies to mental muscle as well.
In the class I currently teach. the very first assigned reading is one that I know 95% of my students will struggle with. I do this quite intentionally. For one, it serves larger, course-level goals (i.e. makes them realize this class won’t be easy), and moreover the wrestling with it the night before lays the groundwork for my explication of it in class the next day.
From the teacher’s point of view, the assignment is a tool used in furtherance of an educational goal; sometimes it can be useful to make things harder than they expect, or perhaps even harder than they think is fair, if it furthers the larger goals. Plus, sometimes they surprise you. Sometimes they surprise themselves.
In other words, Kobayashi Maru.
And I should point out that the main thrust of the poem is religious; it is taken from Donne’s Holy Sonnets, and is reflective of the idea that Death has no threat to one who think he will live after it. cf 1 Cor 15:54.
Teaching critical thinking is a lot like watching kids play T-ball. What looks insanely easy from a few years perspective can be inexplicibly difficult for a 15 year old, and even “success” looks really pathetic.
This is the problem you face when you give a kid that age a piece like that–you have to choose between giving them the experience of analysis or you can teach them the poem. You can’t do both–if you let them muddle through it on their own, they learn how to think, but they miss so much of what’s actually there. Even when they finally hit the ball, it doesn’t go very far, and it’s hard not to be disappointed. If you work through it with them/for them–if you take the swing, so to speak-- they get a sense of what can be in a piece and they hopefully see some patterns and idea they can use, but in itself it will never be enough.
I try for a balence in my class: I can’t stand to go through transcendentalism without showing them how beautiful and complex it can be, but I wouldn’t be teaching if I didn’t let them wade through “Nature” on their own, even if all they discover in it is that “Nature good. Society bad”. Because they did discover that themselves, they did think critically.
My completely ignorant opinion is that critical thinking is overrated. I’ve been a pretty powerful critical thinker all my life, and it’s gotten me nowhere but on the sidelines wondering “what the fuck?” as my friends, some of which have never even read a poem, are doing stuff like taking apart a carburetor to see how it works, and putting it back together so that the problem is fixed.
This particular kid had failed too many classes his junior year, and dropped out because hes No Damned Good at critical thinking. He was the “dumb” kid, and without any sort of prior knowledge or training he’s able to figure stuff out that would take me a week of study and testing.
Such a high emphasis on critical thinking was a major disservice to my friend, who is one of the most intelligent people I know. Your daughter might be suffering something similar, where her talents in music or art or interpersonal relationships are wilting because too many people are trying to force a priority on critical thinking.
Even if I’m wrong about all that, I’m definitely willing to challenge any assertion that public schools are placing less emphasis on critical thinking than any other time. That’s practically the only knowledge system our kids are exposed to in schools! Group discussions and essays about stuff like “what would have happened to Southern society and economy if the Confederates had won” are the norm, these days.
Disclaimer: I don’t resonate with the way literature is taught in north american high schools, and never really liked it, so this may be out of left field and not at all relevant. If that’s the case, feel free to ignore me and move on.
Anyway, Cartooniverse, as means of an alternative approach could I recommend you try some really basic logical debate with her? Ignore the poem, for the moment, in fact ignore literature in general. Begin with something that’s extremely simple, and on the surface kind of ridiculous, where she defends a basic thesis and you question it with extremely out-there, easy to defeat challenges. Something along the lines of:
CV: holds up a piece of white paper “Is this paper white?”
CV Daughter: “Um, yes?”
CV: “Alright, fair enough. Does the paper have color?”
CV Daughter: “Yea…”
CV: “Well ‘have color’ could indicate that the paper possesses the generic quality of color in general. If the paper has color this would insinuate that it may at any time possess any color! If it has color, it can’t possibly be white!”
And so forth. I’m translating that particular logic from another language and I don’t think it works quite as well in English, and I suppose something this abstract could turn out to be just as frusterating as the poetry, but the general idea is to trick your kid into teaching herself basic logical analysis by attacking easily defeated points. Once you do that a few times, try getting her to turn said analysis back to literature.
I have no idea if that would work, but it’s an idea.
–jaw drops-- I can’t believe you used that analogy. I’m entirely visual in nature ( being both male and a cameraman ). I used a piece of paper too.
CV: See this sheet of paper?
CVD: Yes, oh wise father.
CV. ( holds up side with writing ) Perhaps Dunne was saying this. " This is your life." ( Turns over sheet to blank back side) " This is eternity after death. ( Holds sheet sideways showing narrow edge) " And, this is death".
I thought that Dunno was taking the wind out of Death’s arrogant omnipotent sails by saying Death, baby, you ain’t nothin’ but a sandwich and a quick meal at that. You bear witness to a singular moment, influencing the life before nor the eternity after not one whit.
My take, anyway.
Frank, always glad to pre-cog your cog.
scotandrsn, it was handed out to be mulled over and parsed the next day- during her English Final. To me, that’s brutal. However, it ain’t third grade. My OP is about the lack of proper prep, not the complexity of the poem though I agree, it’s a rough read. Rather beautiful, though.
CrankyAsAnOldMan, I agree.
TheFury, no offense to your use of spare time, but you might find more intellectually engaging conversations at the Great Books club of Boca Raton instead of at the gym. ( There’s an obnoxiously broad brush I’m using. Hmmm. Sorry, but it’s rough to dedicate mental space and breath to analytical thinking when you’re doing reps. )
Ah great point. I would be “challenging the teacher” by asking what his/her intention was here and I don’t feel the need to do that. But it is a great questions. What WAS the goal of using this poem at this time with this class? And, if it was critical /analytical thinking, could a less complex poem have been chosen? SHOULD a less complex poem have been chosen? At what point are you dumbing down the lesson?
Exactly. I enjoy reading Kevin Drum at The Washington Monthly, and one continuing theme for him is his frustration at the old reliable news stories about how poorly our dumb and befuddled high school students can do X, Y or Z. As he routinely points out, our adults would have at least an equally hard time identifying Oman on a map or applying critical thinking to a John Donne poem.
What in our present culture would suggest to anyone that in the main, adults show good critical thinking skills? Where do you look, to our leadership? Our mass media? Most people you meet on the street?
Besides, I’d suggest that someone who is relying on the afterlife to get one over on death hasn’t really trotted out the critical thinking skills himself.
It could be that we are taught in the ways of the world, and what is scientifically provable, and thought on spiritual issues are degraded along with the people who express such beliefs. She may not want to express the possibilities of beliefs of a afterlife out of fear of ridicule, and needed some encouragement to know that expressing beliefs on that subject is OK.
I don’t think you did her homework for her, you let her know that it is OK to openly discuss such things.
Yes, but in my experience you didn’t need to think critically to pass essays like that. The teacher would have already gone over the subject in class, and so one would only need to remember what s/he had already told you. Admittedly I didn’t go to the best high school, but I do know I had a huge ‘oh, shit’ moment when I got to university and that wasn’t good enough anymore.
Huh, weird! I made the paper bit up off the top of my head, too. When I first heard this kind of demonstration it used the color white, but since I don’t remember what they were using (a notebook, I think) paper seemed like a fairly good choice.
[hijack]
Incidentally, Tibetan is a LOT better for this kind of thing. (that’s the language I learned that particular exchange in.)
My English version:
The original Tibetan version: (Q = questioner, D = defendant)
Q: points “Karpo, dugei?” (“It’s white, isn’t it?”)
D: “Dod.” (“I accept.”)
Q: “Karpo tsa, repai?” (“White is a color, isn’t it?”)
D: “Dod.” (“I accept.”)
Q: “Tsa, tsa kya!” (“As a color it can’t be specified [as a single color]!”)
The whole crux of this logic trick has to do with the fact that the Tibetan word for color doesn’t have a definite (versus indefinite) meaning: you can’t use “tsa” to specify which color something is, you can just use it to reply to the existential property of having a color. When you use it in debate you just hope that the fellow you’re asking doesn’t notice this, and give you a smartass answer like “No, it isn’t a color. It’s white.”
[/hijack]
It’s important to have a balence between difficult and accessible: If you only give them things they can get “entirely”, that they can really learn the poem, not the skill, you will never get to challenge them with anything really complex and they will never see the might and majesty of literature: there is a reason we put a T ball on a stick: if we pitched it everytime they’d miss and miss and miss and eventually get bored and wander off. If we just let them throw the ball, they’d have a grand ole time but never get better. In the happy medium, they are challenged and have the opportunity to occasionally hit the ball out of the park, exceeding your and their every expectation.
You also have to let go of the emotional sense that they MUST learn the poem entirely, that somehow something precious and rare will be lost if they ever walk away from a piece of literature without “really” understanding it. There are thousands of rich and meaningful poems she will never read. There are thousands I have never read. If her understanding of a handful is flawed and inadequate, that’s ok, as long as the process of grappling with it taught her something.
Just for reference, this is more or less where her teacher is presumbably headed–Robert Penn Warren’s [Evening Hawk](http://www.poets.org/viewme dia.php/prmMID/15312) was on the AP Lit test last year–that’s a test where they are expected to, if not knock it out of the park, at least get a good grip on what’s really going on in a very short period of time–two hours for three essays. Students were asked to “write a well-organized essay in which you analyze how the poet uses language to describe the scene and to convey mood and meaning”. That’s the AP Lit test, which is typically the senior AP class: I teach AP Language, which is a non-fiction course and a very different animal. It’s typically taught junior year, though all AP Lang teachers secretly believe it to be more sophisticated and more of a challenge than the AP Lit.
I like it. I call it the “messing with their heads” method for teaching kids how to think articulately. This kind of thing is the reason I’m going to make sure my kid reads books like Alice in Wonderland.* That book performs exactly the function of the kind of conversation you mentioned.**
-FrL-
*They’re going to think it was all their idea, of course. They will have “just found it” laying around.
**Of course, I may end up reading it to them before they can read for themselves, if it turns out to seem right for me to do so.
Good examples of this kind of specious reasoning can be found in Plato’s dialogues. (Usually in Socrates’ interlocutors, but sometimes, unfortunately, in Socrates himself!) Not saying you should necessarily read Socrates to your kid (though maybe you should!) but parents interested in this approach might look to Plato’s dialogues for inspiration. Amongst other sources, of course.
I should probably provide examples, but as you can see, I’m not doing so.
( There’s an obnoxiously broad brush I’m using. Hmmm. Sorry, but it’s rough to dedicate mental space and breath to analytical thinking when you’re doing reps. )