1. Nearly forty years ago when Sally was fifteen years old, she skipped school and smoked weed and dropped acid with a boy named Eddie and out poured her story about the abuse she suffered at the hands of her predatory step-father and Eddie listened and held her and told her it didn't have to be that way and the two youngsters made love, and Sally learned that sexual union could touch her soul. Eddie and Sally played Iron Butterfly's "In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida" during this turning point in her life. Sally read a paper about this experience to our class today with "In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida" playing quietly at the same time. The class exploded in applause when she finished, especially when they learned that her young relationship with Eddie emboldened Sally to report her step-father to the police. He was prosecuted.
2. My student Priscilla gave me the book Blue Like Jazz, and wrote a note of gratitude about our writing class that reminded me how much students long for the opportunity to write honestly, without prefabricated structures, and free of pressure to resolve. I think she, like many students, longed to write jazz.
3. I met in conference today with Asuka. Asuka learned, from reading Martin Luther King's "Letter from Birmingham Jail", a new dimension of understanding English that took her beyond reading superficially and transported her into the world of how her second language, English, can express feelings, conviction, intelligence, and outrage. I was as happy for her as I've ever been for a student. As she watched me reading her paper describing this breakthrough, she smiled broadly, with animation.
2 comments:
Thanks for giving us a small view of your classroom. It makes me want to come to Eugene and take a class from my big brother. You have obviously created a sense of trust and community in your classes for the students to share such deep and moving material. You can tell these stories are changing these student's lives for the better. I am so proud of you!!!
In-a-gadda-da-vida= in the garden of eden!! I hear through the grape vine he was sooooo drunk that it came out sounding the way it is said to day so they kept it!! Interesting!!
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