And now my comics class is over, for real.
Tomorrow: ?
Tomorrow: ?
Showing posts with label end of all things. Show all posts
Showing posts with label end of all things. Show all posts
Friday, December 16, 2011
Friday, December 9, 2011
Earth-Shattering, Face-Melting, Mind-Blowing 100th Post GOTTERDAMMERUNG!!!
Fire up the engines, get your juices flowing, and transcend your outdated paradigms, as we get ready to ACTIVATE DOOMSDAY DEVICE!!!
Hello, friend, and welcome to the 100th blog post. One hundred! It's like a century of blog posts! Did you ever imagine, back when I made my first blog post, that we would reach this point? Okay, so no one read my actual first blog post, which was just a picture of the cover Flex Mentallo #1, but remember my second blog post, which was the real introduction? Ah, good times! I was so young and inexperienced then.
In my introductory post I wrote, "I will be recording my thinking process, and hopefully people out there will chime in with suggestions. In two weeks—two weeks!—class will start, and then I’ll keep a record of how it’s going. My comics class will be your comics class. So let’s get brainstorming." It looks like I expected you folks out there to help plan the class and, I have to be honest, I feel like I ended up doing the vast majority of the work here. I'm not saying I'm disappointed in you, per se, just, you know, putting that out there.
While no one stepped up to plan the class for me, I am very grateful to the people who left comments and gave me useful feedback and/or encouragement. Encouragement is a great thing on those days when you feel like your noble comics experiment is doomed to failure. I would particularly like to thank Jeffrey, Josh, and Kim for their donation of real physical books to the cause. They certainly did not have to do that, but they did, and I can't thank them enough. Thanks again!
Early on I posted my mission statement for the class, which I copied from my original course title proposal, here. Sounds exciting, doesn't it? That version of the proposal met with rejection. The second draft was approved, though they want to cut out the whole "our students are constantly barraged by information" part. I don't blame them; that part was probably more rhetoric than useful description.
And while we're strolling down memory lane, remember the time I had the class read Stardust the Super-Wizard? Good times!
Serendipitously this, the historic 100th blog post, fell on my last regular day of Creative Reading class. Today the students who did not go yesterday gave their presentations. I'm pleased to report that every student, with the exception of a couple of people who were absent and will have to make it up next week, had material prepared and presented to the class. Then I thought I gave a short speech about the import of this, our last (regular, not counting testing week) day of class, which was amazing when I imagined it ahead of time, but didn't come out that great. It's a good thing I have a blog; now I can go on and on and on about this retrospective tomfoolery.
Overall my last (regular, not counting testing week) class was pretty anti-climactic. But after work I went with some friends to Terry's Turf Club, and LO! life was good. I tell you what, that place is MAGIC. A big ol' burger dripping with delicious provided a suitable ending to this noble experiment we call comics class.
Hello, friend, and welcome to the 100th blog post. One hundred! It's like a century of blog posts! Did you ever imagine, back when I made my first blog post, that we would reach this point? Okay, so no one read my actual first blog post, which was just a picture of the cover Flex Mentallo #1, but remember my second blog post, which was the real introduction? Ah, good times! I was so young and inexperienced then.
In my introductory post I wrote, "I will be recording my thinking process, and hopefully people out there will chime in with suggestions. In two weeks—two weeks!—class will start, and then I’ll keep a record of how it’s going. My comics class will be your comics class. So let’s get brainstorming." It looks like I expected you folks out there to help plan the class and, I have to be honest, I feel like I ended up doing the vast majority of the work here. I'm not saying I'm disappointed in you, per se, just, you know, putting that out there.
While no one stepped up to plan the class for me, I am very grateful to the people who left comments and gave me useful feedback and/or encouragement. Encouragement is a great thing on those days when you feel like your noble comics experiment is doomed to failure. I would particularly like to thank Jeffrey, Josh, and Kim for their donation of real physical books to the cause. They certainly did not have to do that, but they did, and I can't thank them enough. Thanks again!
Early on I posted my mission statement for the class, which I copied from my original course title proposal, here. Sounds exciting, doesn't it? That version of the proposal met with rejection. The second draft was approved, though they want to cut out the whole "our students are constantly barraged by information" part. I don't blame them; that part was probably more rhetoric than useful description.
And while we're strolling down memory lane, remember the time I had the class read Stardust the Super-Wizard? Good times!
Serendipitously this, the historic 100th blog post, fell on my last regular day of Creative Reading class. Today the students who did not go yesterday gave their presentations. I'm pleased to report that every student, with the exception of a couple of people who were absent and will have to make it up next week, had material prepared and presented to the class. Then I thought I gave a short speech about the import of this, our last (regular, not counting testing week) day of class, which was amazing when I imagined it ahead of time, but didn't come out that great. It's a good thing I have a blog; now I can go on and on and on about this retrospective tomfoolery.
Overall my last (regular, not counting testing week) class was pretty anti-climactic. But after work I went with some friends to Terry's Turf Club, and LO! life was good. I tell you what, that place is MAGIC. A big ol' burger dripping with delicious provided a suitable ending to this noble experiment we call comics class.
Thursday, December 8, 2011
Presentation ESCHATON!
Ka-Zam! After four days of research and preparation, the students presented their findings on important comics creators.
For the presentation, students were to:
They tended to focus too much on the biographical information, but that's expected. They are young, and they place way more emphasis than I do on where someone went to high school. Do I know where Steve Ditko went to high school? I do not, nor do I care. What's important about Steve Ditko is all the great comics he drew.
Anyway, presentations went pretty well. In addition to Steve Ditko we heard about Steve Gerber, Stan Lee, Art Spiegleman, Osamu Tezuka, Alan Moore, Herge, Chris Ware, Dwayne Macduffie, Bob Kane, Marjane Satrapi, Gil Kane, Carl Barks, and Dave Sim. What a fine mix.
Tomorrow: More presentations!
Also tomorrow: Blog post #100! It will be epic!
For the presentation, students were to:
- Give biographical information on the creator
- Describe the creator's most important works and art/writing style
- Describe the reaction to the creator's work, then and now
- Explain why the creator is important/influential
- Show examples of the creator's work/use visual aides
They tended to focus too much on the biographical information, but that's expected. They are young, and they place way more emphasis than I do on where someone went to high school. Do I know where Steve Ditko went to high school? I do not, nor do I care. What's important about Steve Ditko is all the great comics he drew.
Anyway, presentations went pretty well. In addition to Steve Ditko we heard about Steve Gerber, Stan Lee, Art Spiegleman, Osamu Tezuka, Alan Moore, Herge, Chris Ware, Dwayne Macduffie, Bob Kane, Marjane Satrapi, Gil Kane, Carl Barks, and Dave Sim. What a fine mix.
Tomorrow: More presentations!
Also tomorrow: Blog post #100! It will be epic!
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
The Apocalypse Gambit
All went according to plan today and, as mentioned yesterday, we watched the rest of the Persepolis movie. Also, as mentioned yesterday, it's a good movie. The students were engaged and watched the movie without much nagging, which makes me feel guardedly optimistic about the future.
What does movie watching have to do with the future? Only everything, my friends. Creative Reading class is a ticking time bomb that will erupt into fiery shards of nothingness in a little over a week, to be replaced next semester by Film Studies. Film Studies . . . I know, nowhere near as interesting as comic book class, right? I mean, other high schools in the district have film classes. It is not as magically unique. Also, while I could lecture on randomly chosen comics-related topics with one arm tied behind my back and while under the influence of a powerful sedative, I really don't have much more than a casual interest in movies. I mean, I like movies, but I don't know the history of cinema in any real depth. Or the mechanics; I'm not entirely sure what a tracking shot is, for instance. Or a key grip. And I always forget the difference between panning and zooming . . . wait, you zoom in, and you pan out, so never mind, I remember.
Some of the students are excited about the idea of Film Studies class. "We're just going to watch movies?" they ask, their eyes lit up with glee.
"Don't worry," I tell them, "I will find a way to make it hard and boring." It is important that you establish early on that your class will be based on rigorous academic standards, not just hours and hours of slasher films.
In an earlier post, I described some of the difficulties with showing students movies. Sometimes they just won't pay attention. But today they watched Persepolis, so maybe . . . just maybe . . . they'll sit quietly and watch Citizen Kane. Or The Matrix, or The Incredible Mr. Limpet . . . I'm not really sure what to open the semester with.
What does movie watching have to do with the future? Only everything, my friends. Creative Reading class is a ticking time bomb that will erupt into fiery shards of nothingness in a little over a week, to be replaced next semester by Film Studies. Film Studies . . . I know, nowhere near as interesting as comic book class, right? I mean, other high schools in the district have film classes. It is not as magically unique. Also, while I could lecture on randomly chosen comics-related topics with one arm tied behind my back and while under the influence of a powerful sedative, I really don't have much more than a casual interest in movies. I mean, I like movies, but I don't know the history of cinema in any real depth. Or the mechanics; I'm not entirely sure what a tracking shot is, for instance. Or a key grip. And I always forget the difference between panning and zooming . . . wait, you zoom in, and you pan out, so never mind, I remember.
Some of the students are excited about the idea of Film Studies class. "We're just going to watch movies?" they ask, their eyes lit up with glee.
"Don't worry," I tell them, "I will find a way to make it hard and boring." It is important that you establish early on that your class will be based on rigorous academic standards, not just hours and hours of slasher films.
In an earlier post, I described some of the difficulties with showing students movies. Sometimes they just won't pay attention. But today they watched Persepolis, so maybe . . . just maybe . . . they'll sit quietly and watch Citizen Kane. Or The Matrix, or The Incredible Mr. Limpet . . . I'm not really sure what to open the semester with.
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Countdown to ANNIHILATION!
As I mentioned yesterday, the end is nigh! The doomsday clock is ticking, and when the alarm sounds, it's the END OF COMICS CLASS!!!
Today we read the last chapter of Persepolis, and started watching the rest of the movie (we previously watched the first 23 minutes). There are two Persepolis books, Persepolis and Persepolis 2, and the movie adapts both of them. So the second half of the movie is material the students haven't seen before. We didn't have time to read the second book, but I'm glad they get to find out what happens next.
What happens next? Well, Persepolis is subtitled "The Story of a Childhood." Through the course of the book we watch Marjane grow up, from a cute little girl to an outspoken 14 year-old. At the end, [SPOILER WARNING!] Marjane's parents are worried she'll say or do something that will get her into serious trouble with the fundamentalist regime, so they send her to live in Austria. The book ends with her at the airport, leaving Iran.
The second book, "The Story of a Return," tells about her time in Austria, her teenage years, and, as you might guess from the title, her eventual return to Iran. So far the students seem to be enjoying part 2, since it's full of adolescent rebellion and poor choices. If you're at all curious about the books, but don't want to commit to reading them, you should watch the movie, because it's good in its own right. If you like that, there's plenty of material in the books that's not in the movie.
Tomorrow: we finish the movie! We review! We prepare for the inevitable END OF ALL THINGS!!!
Today we read the last chapter of Persepolis, and started watching the rest of the movie (we previously watched the first 23 minutes). There are two Persepolis books, Persepolis and Persepolis 2, and the movie adapts both of them. So the second half of the movie is material the students haven't seen before. We didn't have time to read the second book, but I'm glad they get to find out what happens next.
What happens next? Well, Persepolis is subtitled "The Story of a Childhood." Through the course of the book we watch Marjane grow up, from a cute little girl to an outspoken 14 year-old. At the end, [SPOILER WARNING!] Marjane's parents are worried she'll say or do something that will get her into serious trouble with the fundamentalist regime, so they send her to live in Austria. The book ends with her at the airport, leaving Iran.
The second book, "The Story of a Return," tells about her time in Austria, her teenage years, and, as you might guess from the title, her eventual return to Iran. So far the students seem to be enjoying part 2, since it's full of adolescent rebellion and poor choices. If you're at all curious about the books, but don't want to commit to reading them, you should watch the movie, because it's good in its own right. If you like that, there's plenty of material in the books that's not in the movie.
Tomorrow: we finish the movie! We review! We prepare for the inevitable END OF ALL THINGS!!!
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