Tuesday, October 21, 2014

All Boys, All Blogged: October 21, 2014

Focus: How can asking good questions deepen our understanding of characters and conflicts?

If you have not yet signed up for your fishbowl dates or your book talk, please do so now.

1. Warming up with HAPPY TUESDAY!

2. Reviewing Level 1 and Level 2 questions and forming sample fishbowl questions

Sample Level 1 and 2 Questions:

  • What happened to Amir's mother?
  • How does the way Amir's mother died impact Amir's relationship with his father?  
  • What was happening politically in Afghanistan in the 1970s?
  • How does the political unrest of Afghanistan mirror the inner turmoil of Amir's family?

To prepare for our sample fishbowl today, please prepare FIVE questions with your assigned partner on Chapters 4, 5, and 6 (look to your journals and sticky notes for help).  At least FOUR of them should be Level 2 questions, but feel free to ask a Level 1 question about anything that's confusing you.

Wondering what to do on the outer circle?  Click HERE to see a sample fishbowl blog.

3. Trying out fishbowl discussion in fifteen minute intervals so that you get to try out at least two of the roles

4. Debriefing what worked well and what didn't work so well in today's practice fishbowl

HW:
1. Please finish making flashcards for Chapters 1-6 Kite Runner vocabulary by tomorrow; I suggest that you use www.quizlet.com, but if you have another app, that's fine.  You only need to make flashcards for the words you don't know.  Vocabulary quiz this Friday.

2. Read Chapters 7 and 8 for Thursday.  It's going to be a rough read.  Very sad.  Please prepare five annotations for this reading assignment (journal entries or sticky notes).

3. If you'd like to read another independent reading book, please bring it to class on Friday.

47 comments:

  1. In chapter 3 Baba states that theft is the only sin, and every other sin is a variation of theft. What does he mean by this and why isnt anything else a sin?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The definition of theft is to take something away from another. When you kill someone you, you steal their life, when you rape someone, you steal their chastity, when you destroy someone's toy or job, you take away their ability to enjoy it or make money.

      Delete
    2. This is showing how different people think. Nothing else is a sin because this is how these people believe and he is passing it on to others.

      Delete
    3. I don't think Baba is saying that theft/stealing is the only sin I think he is saying that everything bad has to do with theft. For example, if you murder someone then you steal their life away from them

      Delete
    4. Every sin has to do with theft or stealing from someone else. For example if you kill someone, you are responsible for stealing that persons life. Baba explains his reasoning on page 18, "When you kill a man, you steal a life...When you lie, you steal someone's right to know the truth.

      Delete
    5. But there are other sins that may not include stealing or theft. Such as drinking whiskey? Whats that have to do with theft?

      Delete
    6. Killing is stealing someone's life. Lying is stealing someone's trust.

      Delete
  2. What does the bully represent?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The bully, Assef, represents all that is evil. When he *spoiler* Hassan, he destroys his good qualities. He represents all the evil and how it destroys good. He even supports, "Hitler. Now, there was a leader. A great leader."

      Delete
  3. What is holding back Amir’s father from interacting with him?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I think the death of Amir's mother is the main cause of the distance between Amir and his father.

      Delete
    2. I believe that Amir's Father is not interacting with Amir because Amir technically killed his wife.

      Delete
    3. Baba also said that if he hadn't seen Amir come from his mother he wouldn't think Amir was his son.

      Delete
    4. Amir's father wishes to see his son as himself. I think that Baba is disappointed with the way Amir turned out to be. Baba wishes to see his son as himself, athletic, smart, and brave.

      Delete
    5. I think that Amir's father has a hard time interacting with Amir because everytime he looks at Amir he sees his wife and it is hard to talk to Amir because he reminds him of his wife.

      Delete
    6. Amir's father sees him as the person who stole his wife's life away. That created a barrier that made it so he wouldn't interact with Amir.

      Delete
  4. When Baba says, “Real men don’t read poetry” why is he saying that, is it because his wife loved poetry and it makes him remember her which is sad?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Amir's father most likely feels that men shouldn't be writing about their feelings, but they should be doing sports or solving their problems like "men".

      Delete
    2. I think that you are right, he may have also had another bad past experience, It adds to the whole mystery of his fathers character.

      Delete
  5. How do you think that Amir could and might try to win over his fathers respect

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I think that Amir is going to try and be a good kite runner to impress his father.

      Delete
    2. In the following chapters he will try to impress him and it might end badly.

      Delete
    3. I was just about to ask that, I was wondering that same thing! Maybe Amir could win the kite-running competition considering that is a pretty big thing, if Amir would win that I think some respect would be restored.

      Delete
    4. I think the only way to earn back his fathers respect is through the kite competition. If Amir happened to win the competition, I think Baba would take his respect to a higher level.

      Delete
    5. I think Amir could win over his fathers respect by stop writing and start to doing things and play sports like his father likes. I think he wants to win over his fathers respect but not change much.

      Delete
  6. The definition of theft is to take something away from another. When you kill someone you, you steal their life, when you rape someone, you steal their chastity, when you destroy someone's toy or job, you take away their ability to enjoy it or make money.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. But there are other sins that don't have to do with theft such as Baba drinking Whiskey. The religious teacher said that was theft but its not really?

      Delete
    2. However, drinking is a temptation, temptations are believed to be caused by evil, so evil is stealing your goodness by tempting you with something you like.

      Delete
  7. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Why is Baba worried about Amir standing up for himself?

    ReplyDelete
  9. Baba seems to very full of opinions that seem like fact to amir so from amirs point of view Baba is always right.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I have also noticed that, this might cause problems for Amir in the future because his father has strong opinions that may get Amir in trouble with some people.

      Delete
  10. Can Amir really stand up for himself since he doesn't have a lot of foundation such as a strong family?

    ReplyDelete
  11. On page 42, Hassan defends Amir from Assef by threatening to blind Assef, and yet Amir doesn't think of Hassan as a friend. What does that say about Amir and Hassan's relationship?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I think Amir and Hassan have a very bad relationship because the relationship is affected by their social standing and Amirs jealousy.

      Delete
    2. This shows that Amir probably takes advantage of their relationship, and he might not realize how special his relationship with Hassan is. Also, he might feel a little embarrassed by Hassan because he is lower than he is.

      Delete
  12. What does winter mean in the story? Winter is cold and dark. Does that mean the story is going to turn cold and dark?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I think the change is foreshadowing something bad that is going to happen soon.

      Delete
  13. Why doesn't Baba try to interact with Amir?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I feel it is because he thinks about Amir's mother and how she died giving birth to him. I feel when Baba looks at Amir it reminds him to much of his mother.

      Delete
  14. How does Amir and Hassan's friendship change throughout the book so far?

    ReplyDelete
  15. It would seem that Baba would want to abandon Amir, but what is holding Baba back, what is his motive???

    ReplyDelete
  16. When Amir says “Baba would buy it for me- but then he would buy it for Hassan too. Sometimes I wish he wouldn’t do that. Wish he’d let me be the favorite.” (pg 51) Why do you think Amir gets mad when Hassan gets the same treatment from Baba?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Baba seems more proud of someone else's son. This is probably disheartening to Amir.

      Delete
  17. On page 47 what is Amir implying about Hassan and how he’ll stop smiling? What foreshadow?

    ReplyDelete
  18. Baba wants Amir to be like himself and he wants him to be a succesful athlete and person.

    ReplyDelete
  19. How does the death of Baba's parents affect the way he raises Amir?

    ReplyDelete