I know...that is not what TS Eliot said in the beginning of his epic poem "The Wasteland." What he said was:
| APRIL is the cruellest month, breeding | |
| Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing | |
| Memory and desire, stirring | |
| Dull roots with spring rain. |
But I say it has become, for us here in the high schools of the great state of Illinois, the choppiest month, displacing the previous contenders, January, November and February, for a variety of reasons.
February, a former champion, lost its title years ago when the state made acceptable the celebration of either Presidents' Day or Lincoln's Birthday and then removed the mandatory day off from the first weekend of March as well for Pulaski Day. November, home to two four-day weekends (Thanksgiving and the Veterans' Day/Parent Conference Combo) is always in the running, but there just seems to be a sense of urgency about the month, with the year still young but the semester waning and all. Things get done.
January probably should take itself out of the running. It's truly unfair as competition. With winter break and exams and MLK Day, January hardly even exists. And for our purposes here, I'm just assuming that it doesn't. (Besides, a year without a January gets to spring faster, and that has to be a plus.)
All of which takes me back to my thesis: April has become the choppiest school month of the year, quite a feat for a month which, just a decade or so ago, joined forces with May to form an impenetrable block of eight consecutive five-day school weeks following spring break. But now...
Well, let's begin with the aforementioned break, which as we know can get us back to school anywhere from around April 3 to April 7. Follow that with the not insignificant number of students who return 1-3 days late from that break and you have added to the choppiness (not to mention those whose families opt for a completely separate vacation week altogether to accommodate a different school or work schedule). This is usually followed almost immediately by a four-day week for Easter. Then there is the -two-day week we are in right now for testing, and the month is essentially over before it has really gotten started!
These days, only September and May remain as unbroken scholastic stalwarts, bookended by the year-framing holidays of Labor Day and Memorial Day, but otherwise unblemished. Perhaps the calendar gods know that this sort of thing can only be tolerated in the post-MTV generation when the month in question lies contiguous to summer.
:-)
There will be 80's this weekend...
E3H: With an eye toward the remaining weeks, we need to begin our final Writing Workshop project. Check out the ESC paper on the E3H page. begin brainstorming ideas for yours. Email me if you'd like. You may (if you'd like) begin pursuing this piece this weekend. Remember: this is a thoroughly workshopped piece, but when it is done, there is no more writing workshop...ever.
E2H: Um...
Do you know where your portfolio is?That and whatever random Catcher posting might get done make up your weekend assignment...
Drama: OK, so here is the bit: Over the weekend, you need to select either one of the monologues that you have already done or a new short monologue from a movie or play and apply the Stanislavski System to it for performance next week. Doing so, you should write out what you discover in the system steps (enumerated below) and turn this in either in your journal or separately. If it is a monologue for which you have already scored the script, note any changes you make to the original scoring. And one very specific requirement of this project: apply a noticeable external (or more than one) to your character.
System Steps:
- Given Circumstances
- Magic If
- Super Objective
- Through-Line of Actions
- Scoring the Script
- Endowment
- Sensory and Emotional Recall
- Thinking in Images
- Externals
- The Creative State
If the video does not load, click the link below.
j: regrets only
music: let's regret this in advance/st. mary's of regret--susan werner
--kt
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