The tribes projects is a project were we introduce ourselves to our classmates by talking and learning about each other and then making poems about them. We also read a book called The Absolutely True Dairy of a Part-Time Indian written by Sherman Alexie and we wrote and presented poems based after the book, such as: Tribes that we belong to, "The Unspoken rules of" and skits of the book. We started this project by forming into groups of five and we read a chapter of House on Mango Street and afterwards we tried to in-cooperate sounds into the chapter we read. (Below you can see my team and I preparing for the performance)
(Below you can see my group performing in front of the class)
We then presented this to the class and saw each other's performances, this was the first step of the project which led into the I sing to you poems. We started the I sing to you poems by interviewing and learning about a fellow classmates, we interview them for about twenty minutes than they interviewed us for an other twenty minutes. After talking to them we had to take all the info they gave us about themselves and turn it into a poem. After our first draft our "customer" looked through and highlighted the poem by if or if not it describes him as you can see he agreed with most of it. After re visioning the poem to sound more like him, we need to get it critique by eighth graders. We also went to critique their work at the same time, after giving my opinion and hearing his, I improved and finalized my poem.
(Top document is highlight by Dany, Right document is the final draft and the corner one is my first draft)
The two documents are exact but that's because I used one to make changes and one as the final one, but the big difference is that Dany highlighted parts based on colors on one of them, based if they describe him or not. I wanted to inform you in case your wondering. During the project we read articles about belonging but it was different than belonging to society it was the opposite. We read articles about why one would join terrorist groups such as the neo-Nazi or ISIS, the article I read said how people who are extremist and/or don't believe in an ideology tend to be more likely to join those groups. If you want to read the article that I read Click Here. |
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To make the poems look more professional and nicer we decided to make a self portraits, the reason I choose this place and this pose was because it made me look completely evil. Although I might not be evil (or at least no ones knows yet) I took the shot and used it as my self portrait. I decide to make my sweater look more like a cape because capes are more evil looking.
For our exhibition we had to be in pairs or groups and write about what we learned throughout the project such as who we are, the tribes we belong to and the unspoken rules. A friend and I decided to combine the I sing to poems that was written by the same people we wrote about. We made a few minor changes so it sounds more connected to each other. After rehearsing and remember the lines we were ready to present on exhibition day. Before the exhibition we noticed that we were first to go after the introduction which made me more nervous but besides that everything smooth as the wind.
(Alex and I performing our I sing to you poems in front of a big audience)
(Alex and I performing our I sing to you poems in front of a big audience)
Reflection
After this project I learned more about who I am and where I belong, I learned yes I do belong to the tribe of geeks but I also belong to other tribes like the tribe of over achievers and talkative people, etc. At the beginning of the school year I thought that I belong to a small group of people and that's it but in reality I belong to more than I thought. I learned that writing a poem or just trying to please someone is super difficult and this is something that will always happen even outside of school. During the I sing to you part of the project I learned that people can give you little info and expect you to have big results, when I had to interview Dany(the person who I wrote the poem for) he hardly gave me any information about himself and his life. My big take away from it is to patient and try to get the most info out of them. During the project we learned better ways to use descriptive writing during the poem I learned that not only does it make the poem sound better but can make other writings sound better as well, I will try to use more descriptive writing next project. During the project I had to collaborate with many people such as: the teachers, exhibition partners/groups and our "client" but out of all those the exhibition partner was the most memorable cooperating moment because we got along and help each other out with the lines and the performance so for the next project I have I want to help people out with the project and hopefully they help me back. The one moment that I will always stick with me was reading The Absolutely True Dairy of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie, the reason is because not only was it a good book but it helped me start liking reading. The Absolutely True Dairy of a Part-Time Indian is about a Native American boy name Junior who lives in a reservation filled with people in poverty, Junior decide to move to a nearby by school outside of his reservation and have to fit in and discover who he is. This whole project wouldn't really have happened if it wasn't that we all read that book and for that it is the reason I'll remember this project.
After this project I learned more about who I am and where I belong, I learned yes I do belong to the tribe of geeks but I also belong to other tribes like the tribe of over achievers and talkative people, etc. At the beginning of the school year I thought that I belong to a small group of people and that's it but in reality I belong to more than I thought. I learned that writing a poem or just trying to please someone is super difficult and this is something that will always happen even outside of school. During the I sing to you part of the project I learned that people can give you little info and expect you to have big results, when I had to interview Dany(the person who I wrote the poem for) he hardly gave me any information about himself and his life. My big take away from it is to patient and try to get the most info out of them. During the project we learned better ways to use descriptive writing during the poem I learned that not only does it make the poem sound better but can make other writings sound better as well, I will try to use more descriptive writing next project. During the project I had to collaborate with many people such as: the teachers, exhibition partners/groups and our "client" but out of all those the exhibition partner was the most memorable cooperating moment because we got along and help each other out with the lines and the performance so for the next project I have I want to help people out with the project and hopefully they help me back. The one moment that I will always stick with me was reading The Absolutely True Dairy of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie, the reason is because not only was it a good book but it helped me start liking reading. The Absolutely True Dairy of a Part-Time Indian is about a Native American boy name Junior who lives in a reservation filled with people in poverty, Junior decide to move to a nearby by school outside of his reservation and have to fit in and discover who he is. This whole project wouldn't really have happened if it wasn't that we all read that book and for that it is the reason I'll remember this project.