Day+4

Lesson Plans

 * 1) Opening Journal Prompt (revisit): //How does a "civilized" person behave? Look like? What about a "savage" person?//
 * 2) Socratic Seminar on "The Most Dangerous Game"--students come prepared with at least five questions following format outlined on Day 3.
 * 3) Closing: Peer Edit first drafts of Feather Circle piece.

Socratic Seminar Procedures
Seminar rules: Participants in the seminar are expected to respond to one another in a respectful manner without bias or prejudice. You are also expected to listen carefully without interrupting. You must make direct eye contact with others and must use each other's names.

**Guidelines for Participants in a Socratic Seminar**

 * 1) Refer to the text when needed during the discussion. A seminar is not a test of memory. You are not "learning a subject"; your goal is to understand the ideas, issues, and values reflected in the text.
 * 2) It's okay to "pass" when asked to contribute.
 * 3) Do not participate if you are not prepared.
 * 4) Do not stay confused; ask for clarification.
 * 5) Stick to the point currently under discussion; make notes about ideas you want to come back to.
 * 6) Don't raise hands; take turns speaking.
 * 7) Listen carefully.
 * 8) Speak up so that all can hear you.
 * 9) Talk to each other, not just to the leader or teacher.
 * 10) Discuss ideas rather than each other's opinions.
 * 11) You are responsible for the seminar, even if you don't know it or admit it.

Dialogue in the Seminar is characterized by:

 * suspending judgment
 * examining our own work without defensiveness
 * exposing our reasoning and looking for limits to it
 * communicating our underlying assumptions
 * exploring our underlying assumptions
 * exploring viewpoints more broadly and deeply
 * approaching someone who sees a problem differently not as an adversary, but as a colleague in common pursuit of a better solution

Peer Editing of Feather Circle Pieces
With this draft, consider the idea of purpose and audience:
 * What does the writer hope to accomplish?
 * Who are the readers with whom they hope to communicate?
 * What questions would the reader come up with when reading the piece?

For each piece, complete the following: 1. Communicate verbally with the writer 2. On your peer's paper, physically make any changes needed from the following list:
 * What works? What is the best part? The most interesting?
 * What is NOT working? What parts are confusing or difficult to understand? Is there a better, more concise way of wording something?
 * Does the piece have "heart"? Has the writer been honest and open with his or her reader?
 * Does the writer connect the notion of "survival" in some way in the piece? Is the connection clear or ambiguous?
 * Notice the word choice the writer is using. Do they have fitting connotative and denotative meanings? Are they appropriate to the tone of the overall piece?
 * Check for grammatical errors: punctuation, capitalization, verb tense, subject-verb agreement, etc.
 * Are there any sentences that aren't "doing their job" in the piece? In other words, are there any parts to the piece that are unnecessary or useless toward the reader's full understanding of the experience?