RL 3 RL SP Odyssey: Homer's Invocation & RL 4 SP: Odyssey: Sailing from Troy & Lotus Eaters
RL 3 RL SP Odyssey: Homer's Invocation
Aim: How does Homer's invocation establish tone for the beginning of the Odyssey?
At the beginning of class, Mrs.Peterson went over with how the unit is going to look like by explaining the syllabus. She talks about how the syllabus would be the resource we would go to check the materials that we would cover on certain days. She talks furthermore about how we should be responsible in checking the most updated info and the HW, if assigned, to make sure that we are understanding everything that is going to be taught in class.
After that, we placed in our breakout rooms to discuss the new team names that are related to the Odyssey. The team leader was responsible for capturing the different names that our group members have suggested. Point Masters and Managers were responsible for changing the old team names to the ones that the groups have come up with relating to the Odyssey unit. My group came up with “The Lotus Eaters'' and the “Trojan Horse”. Eventually we came to our final decision of “The Lotus Eaters” and as a manager I filled in that name for our group on the Student Jobs & Teams 2021 doc.
Do Now: CLASS DISCUSSION
How do you become inspired? Where does it originate?
For the Do-Now, we discussed as a class about how we get inspired. Since this was a broad question, many of us shared different ideas in the class discussion. Many answers ranged from games to music to nature etc. I personally get inspired by being in nature and listening to music as they help me to get creative and think of many different new ideas. This DoNow is important to the lesson because it relates directly to the idea of the Nine Muses as their purpose is to serve as inspiration for poets and artists.
In Ancient Greek mythology, the Nine Muses were inspirational goddesses in literature, science and the arts. They serve as inspirations to the poets and artists drew inspiration from and were embodied as the original source in their creation of poetry and myths.
The Nine Muses:
Muses serve as inspiration for poets and other artists
In Greek mythology, there were nine goddesses of arts, literature and science that served as muses
One of nine Muses inspired different forms of prose, poetry, drama, rhetoric, or general writing.
Homer’s invocation pays homage (special honor and respect) to these goddesses and to Ancient Greek culture in general
expresses the purpose of the narrative
Incorporates traditions familiar to his specific audience.
After this brief introduction to the Nine Muses and their connection to the
Odyssey, we watched a video on the Nine Muses that further explained its importance in Ancient Greek mythology to gain a better understanding.
Muses: The 9 Inspirational Goddesses of Greek Mythology Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORKCWfbrY8k&ab_channel=SeeUinHistory%2FMythology
For the following slide, we were asked to quickly google the definition of the word “invoke”. The correct definition of the word invoke was “to call on (a deity or spirit) in prayer, as a witness, or for inspiration.”
Homer’s invocation pays homage (special honor and respect) to the goddesses and to Ancient Greek culture in general.
expresses the purpose of the narrative
Incorporates traditions familiar to his specific audience.
After this, we did a bit of spirit reading on Homer's Invocation together as a class and had a class discussion of the following questions.
What is your opinion of Odysseus so far after hearing Homer's invocation to the muses and learning about the Trojan War?
Odysseus was a righteous and heroic person that did everything that he could to try to save those people. He was also seen as the main protagonist because the other people that were with him weren’t capable of surviving and he was the only one that remained alive. He could also be seen as a capable warrior that was able to defeat and plunder Troy.
How does Homer maintain the audience’s interest in the story, knowing that the audience is aware of the outcome from the very beginning?
Homer was able to maintain the audience’s interest by telling the story with an interesting description of an event that would captivate the audience as they want to know more about how the event happened. Another possible answer was that Homer threw the audience straight into the story which would keep the audience’s attention and also how he told the story with the audience knowing the fate of the character before they did.
What does the invocation of the Muse in the opening lines clarify about Odysseus’ culpability (responsibility for a fault or wrong; blame) during his voyage home?
The invocation of the Muse in the opening lines clarify that Odysseus isn’t to blame for what happened. It was the fate of those who feasted on the cattle of Lord Helio to be punished. In the line “by not by will or valor could he save them.” This demonstrates that although Odysseus puts efforts in trying to help his crewmates he was unable to help them as their fate had been decided.
After we finished our class discussion of the questions above, we were instructed to fill out the Anticipation Guide. The link is listed below:
https://forms.gle/yWTqx99ptvjV42f78
RL 4 SP: Odyssey: Sailing from Troy & Lotus Eaters
Aim: How does “Sailing From Troy” and “The Lotus Eaters” (Book IX) establish Odysseus’ role as a leader?
Do Now:
Consider the fact that Odysseus has been trying to return to his home in Ithaca for 10 years. Imagine being away from your home for that long.
What would you miss the most and why?
Why do we have sayings like the ones below?
For the Do-Now, we had a class discussion in which we shared our personal opinion of the questions above. My personal opinion on this is that I would miss the comfort and warmth that would be unique to one’s home.The sayings are all used for one to express their longing for going back to their home. Many of the class were talking about missing the familiarness, safety, comfort in the home because in the outside world you have to thrive on your own and you might not know what to expect of the things that would happen. Many also talked about how they would miss the care that their parents and family would give them as well as in general the people that love and care for them that make it home.
Following the DoNow, we reviewed characterization as a whole class.
Characterization: The method by which an author creates the personality and appearance of their character
There are two categories of characterization:
Direct characterization: Direct statements about the character(can be revealed c through a narrator OR through another character in the story). The author is telling the reader what they want them to know.
Indirect characterization: indirectly stated from character's actions, choices they make, dialogue/relationships with others, thoughts, feelings. The reader would infer about the character from what the author shows to the reader.
After we reviewed characteristics, we were introduced to the acronym STEAL to help us to identify indirect characterization.
SPEECH
What does the character say?
How does the character speak?
THOUGHTS -
What is revealed through the character’s private thoughts and feelings?
EFFECTS
What is revealed through the character’s effect on other people?
How do other characters feel or behave in reaction to the character?
ACTIONS
What does the character do?
How does the character behave?
LOOKS
What does the character look like?
How does the character dress?
Since we were running out of time, we didn’t get to watch the video that demonstrates indirect characteristics further through the characters from the popular movie Frozen. This was an enrichment activity that we could do at home after class. The link for the video is listed below:
Characterization Lesson | Using Disney's Frozen: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ZnD0AGqQ7I
Afterwards, we moved onward to spirit reading of both the Sailing from Troy and Lotus Eaters.
Sailing from Troy & Lotus Eaters: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Db2LMqE9jPc2KWYqU-w6nlXJHnEVoqBB/view
We didn’t manage to answer the questions on the slides that came with the reading of Sailing from Troy and Lotus Eaters since we were running short on time.
However, from the reading of Sailing from Troy especially, lines 28 to 37, we could see that Odysseus desperately wanted to go back home to Ithaca. He shows a deep attachment to his homeland and would continue to persevere in his efforts to go on with his journey back home. Even with Calypso who he states to be the loveliest among goddesses wasn’t able to hold back his deep desire to go back home. This could be connected back to the Do-Now question in which many of us stated similar opinions about how great one’s home is to them.
From the reading of Lotus Eater, we see that Odysseus is on the journey back home with difficulty sailing on sea by the storm that Zeus sweeped. He and his crew were on the sea for nine days before bringing them to the coastlines of the Lotus Eaters. Feeling hungry from the hard long journey at sea, they were offered the sweet Lotus. Those men who ate the fruit changed and refused to leave the island. Odysseus concluded that the fruit was supposed to make the men lose hope of returning home and warned the others to not accept the offer of the fruit. The lotus eaters lived in a land that was abundant with lotus fruits as stated in the text. The people that lived there all seem to be people on the sea who came upon the island and ate the fruit resulting in their loss of hope of ever returning home. The Lotus Eaters live a peaceful life depending solely on the lotus fruits and are also very nice by offering the lotus fruits. Those that ate the flower seem to be brainwashed into believing they couldn’t return back home to be stranded at this island forever. The land of the Lotus-eaters was a veritable paradise because the island seemed to be super suspiciously good as everything wasn’t how reality works like. This is negative for Odyseuss and his crew because it’s one of the trials that is trying to stop Odysseus and his crew from returning to home. Odyseusss is shown to be a leader as he assures that all his crew gets on the ship as well as warning them about the dangers of the lotus flowers. He shows that he is a really good leader by showing concern for his crewmate. My opinion of him hasn’t changed as he is seen as a righteous and powerful leader with great perseverance and concern for his crewmate. He is shown to constantly push through the challenges that are thrown his ways and eventually making his goals come true.
Reflection
In the first lesson, I learned about the Nine Muses that served as inspiration for the Ancient Greeks and their importance to Homer’s invocation in the beginning of the Odyssey. The Muses were the sources of inspiration that allowed Homer to tell the tales of the heroic character of Odysseus. This knowledge of the Muses allowed me to have a better understanding of how the Odyssey came to be and other types of art. Reading Homer’s invocation also was a good introduction in learning of the adventure of Odysseus. I was able to be introduced to his character and I would want to read further on to learn more about his hero journey. In the second lesson, I learned more about the characteristics of Odysseus through the readings of Sailing from Troy and Lotus Eater. I learned about the two types of characterization, indirect characterization and direct characterization, that helped me to understand and identify the character of Odysseus. Using the STEAL method and searching for what the author directly stated in the two readings I was able to identify Odysseus’s leadership qualities of which he showed concern and command to his fellow crewmates. I also get to see how Odysseus has the qualities of a hero as he is a person of action and perseverance throughout the trials and tribulations that were thrown his way. Lastly, I was able to see how he was ambitious in his effort in bringing himself and his crewmate back home. I learned about these things because it would help me to gain a better understanding in the following readings of the Odyssey. Learning about the Nine Muse,I’m able to learn of an important component of Ancient Greek mythology that would help me to have a better understanding of the Odyssey which is based on Ancient Greek mythology. The STEAL method would allow me to be able to apply what I have learned in the following readings to identify and understand how the character of Odysseus would change in the upcoming obstacles that would come his way. I would be able to use both my knowledge of the Nine Muses and the STEAL method shortly. Knowing about the Nine Muses, I would be able to have prior knowledge to gain a better understanding when examining other types of art in its origin and inspiration. The STEAL method would be an extremely useful tool that would help to identify character developments in other literatures.
No comments:
Post a Comment