Multicultural Book Review: Japanese

Genre:  Folktale

Culture:  Japanese

Book:  Schroeder, Alan.  (1994). Lily and the Wooden Bowl.  New York: Bantam Doubleday Dell Books.

Level/Age:  Children (up to age 12)

Synopsis:  Lily’s grandmother gives her three items to watch over her when she dies: a rice paddle, a folded paper crane, and a large bowl to wear atop her head to hide her beauty.  A wealthy farmer named Yamoto then takes her to his house to nurse his ailing wife, Matsu, back to health.  Kumaso, the farmer’s son, and Lily fall in love.  But Matsu is a treacherous, vile woman and will stop at nothing to keep her son and Lily apart.  Matsu tries to trick Lily, and even uses evil she learned from a sorceress, but Lily triumphs and after intervention from Yamoto, she and Kumaso are married.  

Comparisons/Contrasts with traditional American/Western Culture:  Enryo, the Japanese value of respect and modesty is a driving theme of this folktale.  It is the reason Lily’s grandmother makes her promise to always wear a large bowl atop her head—to hide her beauty, which would tempt men and spoil her innocence.  Amae, the Japanese emphasis on interdependence in preference to individualism, is apparent in Lily caring for her grandmother, and then nursing Matsu back to health.  It is also evident when Yamoto rescues Lily.  Locke writes (p. 107), “Many Japanese believe that suffering and hard work are necessary ingredients of character building.”  This is clear as Lily becomes a field worker in order to survive after the death of her grandmother, and then as she suffers greatly at the hands of Matsu.  These values are in contrast with the traditional Western cultural values of individual self-realization, high verbal participation (Lily barely speaks), female assertiveness (Lily never fights back), and challenge of authority (Lily never disobeys Matsu).

Response:  I enjoyed reading this, my first Japanese folktale.  I took from it the lesson of perseverance in adverse circumstances.  I felt that Lily was a strong female protagonist, shown by her graceful endurance of hardships and triumph in the end.  Lily shows girls that physical beauty is not as important as strength, grace, and a beautiful personality.  There’s also a lot to be said of the male character, Kumaso, who falls in love with Lily even when he doesn’t see her face because of the bowl.

Suggested Extension Activities:  I look forward to doing a storytelling of this folktale in my library—especially during May, which is Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month.  I would also recommend this folktale for study in a Civics unit on Japanese culture.

My First Game

I used Scratch to make an easy one-minute game.  I hope you enjoy it. 

These are the game mechanics:

·         The player will use the arrow keys to extinguish as many emerging fires as s/he can in sixty seconds

o   The player “extinguishes” a fire by touching it with the fire hose

o   The fire instantly disappears when touched

·         The movement of the fire hose will be controlled to stay within the confines of the forest (i.e., fires will not erupt in the lake)

·         The game will last for exactly sixty seconds

·         At which point, the player will be informed that “The forest is saved!”

o   This message will last for five seconds

o   Then the player will be returned to the main menu

·         The main menu will appear at the start of the game, and after the player saves the forest

o   The menu will include simple instructions

o   The game will start automatically after five seconds

 http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/15161088/#player

Multicultural Book Review: Latino

Genre:  Poetry

Culture:  Latino

Book:  Carlson, L. M. (Ed.).  (1994). Cool Salsa: Bilingual Poems on Growing Up Latino in the United States.  New York:  Fawcett Juniper.

Level/Age:  YA (ages 12-20)

Synopsis:  This is a collection of thirty-six poems covering all aspects of growing up Latino in America.  Some poems convey the first-generation immigrant’s frustration at not being able to speak English, others the universal desire of adolescents to belong, and still others depict the simple joys in life—a memory or a moment.  They are written by a plethora of poets, from the famous to the lesser-known, including Ana Castillo, Sandra Cisneros, and Gary Soto.  Each poem is presented in both English and Spanish, with only a couple of exceptions, where the poem was originally written in both languages, and/or the full translation of it would lose something.  They are divided into sections, under the titles:  School Days, Home and Homeland, Memories, Hard Times, Time to Party, and A Promising Future.  The reader is left with a feeling for the hardships encountered and endured by immigrants and subsequent generations, but also with a feeling for the hopefulness, pride, and diversity of the Latino culture.

Comparisons/Contrasts with traditional American/Western Culture:  This collection touches upon a variety of areas, including the prejudice and stereotypes faced by Latinos.  In “A Puerto Rican Girl’s Sentimental Education,” author Johanna Vega depicts a young girl as she struggles not only with acquisition of a new language, but with dyslexia as well, writing lines such as:  “systematic, elementary school oppression” and “A low-income prodigy child caught in the American cross fire between SATs and insular-community vocabulary.”  Immigrants must struggle with acculturation, while trying to maintain their own traditions and pass their language and culture down to new generations.  This is conveyed vividly in the poems in the “Memories” section.  For example, in “There’s an Orange Tree Out There,” author Alfonso Quijada Urias tells of an orange tree that’s out there—at the family’s old house, in their old country, old life.  “An Unexpected Conversion” by Carolina Hospital, tells of immigrant parents who fully embraced acculturation, rejecting their native culture—only to retire thirty years later and go back, wholeheartedly re-embracing their original culture, and leaving their children perplexed.

Response:  I gained a new appreciation for the Latino culture from this collection of poems.  They helped me understand that Latinos are a heterogeneous people, and their diversity should be respected.  I also now see their common struggles, from language acquisition to prejudice and acculturation.  Lastly, I see their common strengths of cultural pride, perseverance, and hard work.

Suggested Extension Activities:  This collection could be used in a Social Studies class in a unit on Latino cultures, a Language Arts class in a cultural poetry unit, or in a Civics class in a unit on diversity and cultural oppression.  I will feature it in my library media center during Hispanic Heritage Month and during National Poetry Month (April).  It would also make a good book study for anti-bullying campaigns, especially the poems in the “Hard Times” section, such as “Race Politics” by Luis J. Rodriguez. 

Editing HTML: Tables

Attribute	Avg. Yrly. Transactions
Female	8
Male	9.5
Free Lunch	9.5
Reduced Lunch	8.5
Full-Price	7.5
FCAT Reading Level 1	10
FCAT Reading Level 2	11.5
FCAT Reading Level 3	8.25
FCAT Reading Level 4	6.5
FCAT Reading Level 5	8

Exploring Virtual Spaces: World of Warcraft

I have explored World of Warcraft, an online role-playing game from Blizzard Entertainment, Inc.  It is rated T for Teen because of:

Blood and Gore
Crude Humor
Mild Language
Suggestive Themes
Use of Alcohol
Violence

I kept a "travel journal" while playing, and took lots of screen shots.  I have put this together in the following video, which I hope gives others a true sense of what the game is like.  I conclude that it is excellent interactive storytelling, with great audio-visual aspects.  It also has a large fan base, with guilds and other social opportunities.  There are many, many storylines to choose from.  The one I chose was "Mists of Pandaria" and it's plot description is as follows (from http://us.battle.net/wow/en/game/the-story-of-warcraft/chapter23):


Mists of Pandaria

Released in September 2012 World of Warcraft Expansion Set

With Deathwing's menace ended, Warchief Garrosh Hellscream seized the opportunity to strike at the Alliance and expand the Horde's territory on Kalimdor. His assault completely obliterated the human city of Theramore, causing world-wide violence between the factions to erupt anew. A destructive naval skirmish left Alliance and Horde forces washed ashore on the fog-shrouded island of Pandaria, which had appeared in the open sea, defying modern maps and charts. As both warring factions established footholds on the resource-rich continent, they made contact with the noble pandaren, one of its most prolific peoples. This ancient race worked with the Alliance and Horde in the hopes of dispersing the Sha: dark, ephemeral beings roused from beneath Pandaria by the bloody conflict.

I hope you find my virtual travel journal informative:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PFjPlYosZq4&feature=youtu.be