Thursday, January 21. 2016

Today's schedule is D-AG-C-B-A


D Block Geography 12 - Today we will watch the rest of the movie Home that we started yesterday. We'll talk about the things you can do to address the problems / issues that the movie raises. Think about the title. What is our collective home? Now think about the statement from the beginning of the film...

Listen to me, please. You're like me, a homo sapiens. A wise human. Life; a miracle in the universe appeared around 4 billion years ago and we humans only 200,000 years ago, yet we have succeeded in disrupting the balance so essential to life. Listen carefully to this extraordinary story, which is yours, and decide what you want to do with it.

C Block Crime, Media and Society 12 - Yesterday we talked about the tropes of: "Police are Useless"; "The Only One"; and "Bad Cop/Incompetent Cop". In yesterday's episode of Lie to Me, called "Moral Waiver", Dr. Cal Lightman and Ria Torres investigate the case of a female soldier who claims to be the victim of sexual assault by her commanding officer. At the same time, Dr. Gillian Foster and Eli Loker work on the case of a college basketball player who is accused of accepting a bribe from his university. In both cases the Lightman group employees are experts who are hired by authority figures (the US Army or a University Ombudsman) to do the work that they themselves can't quite get done...notice any tropes/themes here?

Today let's continue. We'll watch an episode of Elementary from season one called "The Deductionist". From IMDb.com:

A convicted killer who is supposed to donate a kidney to his sister ends up killing the surgical staff before escaping. Holmes is forced to work with a profiler (whom he can't stand) because she supposedly can predict what he will do next. 

The "Great Detective" trope is based on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes. In this version (Elementary), Sherlock Holmes was a consultant for Scotland Yard in England, before "hitting bottom" and ending up in rehabilitation. Joan Watson has been hired by Holmes' father to be his sober companion, to help him adjust from rehab back to everyday life. Holmes has come up with an interesting post-rehab regimen to keep himself busy-resuming his role as a consultant, this time for the New York police. Watson finds herself coming along for the ride. Of course the BBC did a modern version where Sherlock (Benedict Cumberbatch) solves crimes through sheer intellect and his Sherlock Scan, but is a (self-proclaimed) "high-functioning sociopath" barely kept in check by his friend Dr. John Watson (Martin Freeman).

In both modern versions Holmes has what can only be described as high functioning personality disorders but supreme intellect that assuredly saves the day for the police who clearly can't do their job properly without his help. Hmmm...sound familiar? Remember Dr. Cal Lightman in Lie to Me? 

In Elementary, following the tradition of depictions of Sherlock, his brain literally seems to work differently than other people. He has a lot of common personality traits with Asperger Syndrome - socially awkward and extremely gifted within a certain area (in his case detective work), straightforward and with a lot of brutal honesty, often oblivious to others' feelings but not lacking in empathy. He also has certain physical tics like the way he stands hunched in on himself sometimes, his jerking head movements and the way he grips his hands which are also consistent with someone who has Aspergers or Autism. So he's an insufferably awkward loner of a genius who is "the Only One" who can help the NYPD because "Police are Useless".

A Block Social Studies 10 - Today we are in the library for the last day of research/work on your family history assignment. Remember, your task is to research your family history, which includes learning how to conduct academic research, making critical evaluations regarding sources, and managing information. Use the primary documents and stories you find to uncover what daily life might have been like for your relatives. Also do not forget that you have a self-reflection piece to cover as well...

1. What did you learn about daily life in past generations here in Canada?
2. What did you learn about immigration (including the reasons people came to Canada or moved within Canada), the experience of traveling in generations past and the struggle to adjust to life in Canada?
3. What did you learn about diversity in Canada (including ethnicity, religion, race and gender)?
4. What did you learn about the differences between Canada now and in generations past?
5. What did you learn about geography through genealogy?
6. How was your family's experience similar to or different from others?
7. What skills did you develop through this project?