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Done With The DWM: Part 2, Now What? https://www.rethinkela.com/2018/01/done-with-the-dwm-part-2-now-what/

Done With The DWM: Part 2, Now What?

See on Scoop.it - Teaching Techniques for Inclusivity

The star of Saturday’s team figure skating session was undoubtedly Julia Lipnitskaia, a young Russian who thrilled the crowd with her short program. “The diminutive 15-year-old Russian figure skater positioned herself to become the darling of the Sochi Games,” wrote Kevin Kaduk at Yahoo’s Olympics blog. “This Russian Teen Prodigy’s…

Lisa Purvin Oliner's insight:

An International Historical Teachable Moment: Nonfiction Meets Necessary Themes in the Classics

15-year-old Yulia (Julia) Lipnitskaia is not just a sensation for Russians. Skated to my favorite piece by John Williams’ from Schindler’s List, her routine was undoubtedly the most stunning artistic and athletic feat I’ve witnessed since Nadia Comaneci. However, according to Slate’s Justin Peters, I should be, in fact, appalled by the diminishment of the message the music carried in Spielberg’s film through such commercialization. I would agree if Yulia’s routine were not so powerfully representative of the scope of intellect, strength, and depth of a young girl’s spirit. If she were less talented as an artist and athlete, I might wholeheartedly agree with Peters. 

Once the Olympic routine is made available to present in the secondary classroom, the article by Reporter Peters and others written on Steven Spielberg’s 1993 Holocaust drama Schindler’s List, as well as the pre-holocaust Yiddish folk song, “Oyfn Pripitchik” (translated as “In Front of the Fireplace”), could inform a deep and interesting discussion about themes that resonate across a great number of both fictional and non-fictional print-based texts and multimodal media forms. According to a commenter on the Slate article, Johanna Hecht, Spielberg’s movie actually included the words of the folk lullaby as the music tracks the path of the little girl in the red coat. Johanna even points out that the original song, “addressed by a Rabbi to kids learning to read, is sad as it acknowledges the sadness of Jewish life and struggle in the Old World, even before Hitler”. Hecht ends by saying, “For what it’s worth, I thought Yulia’s skate captured the poignancy of the music quite brilliantly”. Frankly, I was relieved someone else agreed with me because I did not want to appear hyperbolic. Anyway, whether in agreement or opposition, it is in this tension that I see a meaningful lesson that marries all five senses to the intellect of students. 

Finally, with the emphasis placed on nonfiction in many classrooms today, this lesson allows the objectives of Common Core and skills related to state mandated testing to continue to dominate the plan book while the seemingly lost virtues of the classroom may reemerge. As Lucy Calkins, Mary Ehrenworth, and Christopher Lehman, at Teachers College the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project at Columbia University, said, “As challenging as it must have been to write and finesse the adoption of the Common Core State Standards, that accomplishment is nothing compared to the work of teaching in ways that bring all students to these ambitious expectations. The goal is clear. The pathway is not.” It will take extreme creativity to inspire students to care to learn and to take a stand on both local and global issues that will have an effect on them in the future. Perhaps this international teachable moment, and others like it, will resurrect in the teachers’ repertoire lessons that inspire dialogue about that which is so fragile in human experience. It is this interplay of multiple modalities and real-world debate that allows ideologies and power struggles of students to become transparent. After all, why struggle to read and write if it has no purpose or passion behind it?

Does Yulia (Julia) Lipnitskaia’s spirit strengthen the message of the John Williams’ piece used in Schindler’s List, or does it diminish it? 

“Oh No, Russia’s New Olympic Darling Skates to the Theme From Schindler’s List” 

http://www.slate.com/blogs/five_ring_circus/2014/02/08/julia_lipnitskaia_sochi_olympics_why_do_figure_skaters_love_skating_to_the.html via @slate