Lately, you may have noticed that tempers are flaring in the meeting house during our journey to Salem in 1692. Abby has accused practically every good soul in town of being a witch; Parris believes her every move because of the fact that her fame makes him famous by proxy. At the end of Act III, we see that Mary Warren, who knows the truth about Abby's lies, has come to court to speak against Abby, but fails to do so because she is terrified that Abby will manipulate the court into thinking that Mary herself is a witch. Instead of speaking against Abigail, Mary ends up telling everyone that Abby is correct and that John Proctor is a liar who forced her to come to court to further his own evil purposes.
Yeesh! What a crazy atmosphere!! Why do you think Arthur Miller tells us this story? What can we learn about society and humanity from this text? If you answer this question online before we return from Thanksgiving break, I will give you ten points on any assignment or quiz in marking period 2. REMINDER: I will not be in class next Tuesday. During this time, you will read as much of Act IV as you can in class. I will not give you homework over the break, but you should be ready for a review QUIZ on Monday when we return. Have a great weekend! -Mrs. Coller
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Did you get the story so far? There are some pieces that may be confusing, so let me clarify.
Upcoming Events: *Monday's Homework = Vocabulary List #2 (Click for a printable Word document.) *Tuesday = Act II QUIZ You will be allowed to use your homework, as you are using vocabulary words to answer the quiz questions. Know your stuff. -Miss White Yesterday we played a game that BASICALLY explains the concept of Marxist Communism. When the game was done, the many laborers had a few cents each, while the one or two masters had much more money. In a perfect world, this system would work because everyone would have as much as they needed and no more or less. Unfortunately, in our greedy world, this system will not work because people cheat and lie and take from others. That is similar to Marxist Communism - the idea is that everyone should share in the work and the profit, but in reality, people get swindled.
The reason for studying this is that our next author, Arthur Miller, was accused of being a communist in America in the 1950s. This was a terrible thing back then and he was brought to court for it. He was convicted and lost everything; Miller lost his good reputation and many of his writings over the next few years (after the accusation) failed. Because of this incident in his life, Miller chose to write a story about another time in history when people were accused of something and then lost everything for it - the Salem Witch Trials. We will read that book, called The Crucible. Open the attached link in Microsoft Word if you need the notes from today's class. Arthur Miller Notes See you tomorrow. -Miss White |
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