READ THIS ARTICLE: Gatsby’s Green Light Beckons a New Set of Strivers

"Gatsby’s Green Light Beckons a New Set of Strivers"
Go to The NewYork Times link provided to read how and students from a variety of backgrounds are approaching Gatsby in today's world...http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/17/education/17gatsby.html?scp=1&sq=gatsby&st=nyt
~Nicole

For gender lesson

Chapter 6

For me, chapter 6 is the turning point of the book. Gatsby seems to become human in that chapter. We learn about his motives. "Can't repeat the past? Why, of course you can!" he says to Nick. It shows how a man who seemingly has everything can still feel empty. He is not content with his lavish parties or phony friends. He is striving for something that money can't buy.

Brian

Gatsby and the pedestal

Nicole and I talked about the idea that Gatsby puts Daisy on such a high pedestal that she can't possibly live up to his expectations. We thought that this might be a good way for students to relate to this text. Why do people do this? Why does Gatsby do this? What dies he have to gain by building her up to be more perfect than she could ever be? When it comes to Gatsby and high school, I think that relationships are a theme that has to be brought up. This angle is one that I think students would have some strong opinions on, and maybe even be able to share some of their own experiences.

Brian

Supplemental Texts for Gatsby

As of late, I have been thinking about supplemental materials that are connected to The Great Gatsby. Since our group has been discussing the theme of the American Dream at length, I wanted to search for poetry related to this idea. Here is one poem titled so fittingly:

"The American Dream"
Robert Creeley

Edges and disjuncts, shattered, bitter planes,
a wedge of disconsolate memories to echo fame,
fear of the past, a future still to blame--

Multiple heavens, hells, nothing is straight.
You earn your money, then you wait
for so-called life to see that you get paid.

Tilt! Again it's all gone wrong.
This is a heartless, hopeless song.
This is an empty, useless song.

As a reader, what are your reactions to this poem?
As a teacher, is this something you would use in your classroom in conjunction with Gatsby?

I also found an interesting tidbit that connects Gatsby to a famed author. The link below will take you to an article on the CBC News website (and you have to copy and paste it; for some reason, I'm not able to link it directly to our page). The article discusses author Sylvia Plath, and how a graduate student stumbled upon one of Plath's unpublished poems. This poem supposedly "riffs off" Fitzgerald's work in Gatsby. Is this a potentially interesting avenue to explore with students? I think it could be...
http://www.cbc.ca/news/story/2006/10/31/plath-poem.html

-Liza

American Dream- 512 offers some great stories

Those of us who took 512 with Miller last semester had a dose of the American Dream. The books we used provided some great supplemental texts that could be used and they vary in voices. From immigrants to diverse gender and what the American Dream is or what they thought it was....I think many of those stories could be used.....I'll have to go through my books and get back to you with some specifics.

myspaces

http://www.myspace.com/dagreatgat


http://www.myspace.com/drwine20


Some student made myspaces....pretty cute : )

Gatsby & The 1920s Links

Click the following link and visit the 1920s era to get a greater grasp on our setting.

http://schools.tdsb.on.ca/donmillsci/library/lessons/great_gatsby.htm

Some of the links within the site are down or will redirect you to the new location of the information, but the others can give you an idea of the types of clothes Daisy would have worn and some info about prohibition, sports, and entertainment.

Try this link to listen to music from the 1920s:
http://www.authentichistory.com/1920s/music/index.html. The first song on the list is actually the one Gatsby makes Klipspringer play on the piano for Daisy.

These links were created by students for a Gatsby Project: http://www.fcps.edu/westspringfieldhs/academic/english/1project/99gg/99gg2/introdu.htm
http://www.fcps.edu/westspringfieldhs/academic/english/1project/99gg/99gg2/clothe2.htm

Enjoy!
~Nicole

Nick as Narrator and Gatsby's Friend

On page 172, Nick says, "...it grew upon me that I was responsible, because no one else was interested..." He is speaking in reference to the responsibility that he feels arranging a gathering for Gatsby's funeral, but in the big picture, is Nick some how responsible for the outcome of this plot? He agreed to arrange the initial meeting between Daisy and Gatsby, fully aware of Gatsby's intentions. Maybe he agreed to Gatsby's plan because Nick had a serious distaste for Tom. Speaking of Nick's character, he notes that he is the only honest person he knows. How much of this text can we take at face value? Has the outcome affected how he presents himself to the reader? At one point he says that he never fully trusted Gatsby, but by the end, he says, "...I began to have a feeling of defiance, of scornful solidarity between Gatsby and me against them all" (p. 173). When Gatsby's father asks how Nick knew "Jimmy," Nick replies that they were very best friends. Were they?
Is Nick as trustworthy as he seems or is honesty supposed to separate him from Gatsby, Daisy, Tom, Jordan, and Myrtle who have all seemed to be corrupted by the east? I don't know if that can be answered because the only text we have is through his perspective, but it is just something to think about.
~Nicole

Eyes and Windows

I've noticed that Nick is always using descriptions of character's eyes to describe their thoughts, and the eyes of T.J. Eckleburg are always watching in a "persistent stare." Wilson forces Myrtle to the window saying that God is always watching, but he is pointing to the eyes on the billboard. And speaking of windows, widows are also mentioned often. I was wondering if Fitzgerald just really likes windows or if the eyes can be said to be windows to the soul in this text. Gatsby stands outside Daisy's window waiting for her to signal, but she turns out the lights and goes to sleep the night of the accident. Any thoughts?
~Nicole

YouTube Gatsby

Here are some YouTube videos on The Great Gatsby. Perhaps we could comment on them as multimodality is a great point of emphasis in today's ELA classroom, not to mention an essential theme in our graduate classes.

Gatsby World of Warcraft style. This is apropos given our discussion on graphic novels this semester.

Student response project on Gatsby and the theme of "the American Dream."

Another student project on Gatsby. This is in the form of a movie trailer.

The first few pages...

I started reading Chapter One of Gatsby today, and I had forgotten how difficult it was to get through the first two pages. Maybe I skipped over it when I read it the first time around many moons ago because it was simply too confusing. I can better understand now why students would be quick to give up on the reading if it was simply assigned as an individual endeavor. I really value in class reading, where the teacher can model the tone of the narrator in the beginning and allow students to take over. Reading the first few chapters of the NCTE book helped me to realize how very important it is to provide students with enough background of the time period information using a variety of modes to create a jumping point into the text. When you already have some of this knowledge under your belt, when it is encountered in the text, it will be a little less daunting, allowing you to focus on the bigger ideas being conveyed.