Séance 1: Description d'image / Expression Orale
Après avoir fait la correction du Devoir précédent, annonce du début d'un nouveau Chapter et distribution d'une copie de l'image ci-dessous:
Après avoir laissé le temps aux élèves de regarder le document, ne dire que: SO?
Normalement, ils doivent avoir les habitudes nécessaires pour appliquer la démarche suivante:
- type de document / Auteur
- description
- interprétation
Dans le cas contraire, il conviendra de leur rappeler que l'on commence par parler du document dans son ensemble avant d'entrer dans le détail de la description.
This document is a book cover. The book is a collection of short stories. It is entitled What we Talk about when we Talk about Love and was written by Raymond Carver. On this cover, we can see a woman, in her nightgown, who is sitting on her bed. She's smoking and reading a letter.She looks thoughtful, preoccupied. / She seems to be impassive, expressionless.She may be thinking about her ex. He might have died or he might have left her / dumped her.In your opinion, what is this book about?
It must be about love. We can imagine that it contains sad stories (contemporaries? si cela n'est pas proposé, pas très grave)
Devoirs Maison: Leçon + Who was Carver? What about his writing?
Séance 2: Culture, Reading and speaking
Synthèse des DMs
Raymond Carver was born in 1938 in Oregon (which is in the North West of the USA) and he died of a lung cancer in 1988. He wrote mainly short stories but he also published poems. He was an alcoholic and got married twice. His writing is characterized by minimalism, which means he said / conveyed / a lot in few words and by dirty realism. It reveals that he was interested in everyday life and more particularly in problems like alcoholism, death, unfaithfulness, adultery, divorce... He wrote, for example: "A Small Good Thing", "Tell the Women we are going", "Put Yourself in my Shoes", "So much Water so Close to Home"... (leur expliquer oralement par exemple ce que la nouvelle "A Samll Good Thing" raconte.)
Distribution de la première partie de la nouvelle "Will you Please Be Quiet, Please!", tirée du recueil Short Cuts. Consigne: Read + answer the 3 Ws
I. Global Understanding
- Characters / Narrator - Places - Time references
This short story is about Ralph and Marian, who considered themselves a happy couple. They had two children. The story is told by an omniscient narrator, yet we are only told about Ralph's feelings and thoughts, so we can say that Ralph is the 'stream of consciousness' (he is the centre, the focal point of the story). This way, the reader can put himself in Ralph's shoes. In this extract, we are told about the past of this couple. First, they had met at university / at college, in a Chaucer class. They had started dating each other and had got married. For their honeymoon, they had been to Guadalajara, in Mexico and then they had established as teachers. Now, they were at home on a Sunday night in November.
Pause Réflexive: Pourquoi a-ton employé des Had + p.p.?
Idée que ces actions sont passées, certes, mais qu'elles sont présentées comme antérieures à un point dans le passé qui est le "Sunday night in November". En remarque contrastive, il est possible de dire que Had + participe passé est un peu l'équivalent de notre plus que parfait français.
Comment ça marche?
Affirmation: S + HAD + P.P. + C. Négation: S + HADN'T + P.P. + C. Question: (WH) + HAD + S + P.P. + (C)?
Pour faire manipuler, une petite traduction que j'aime bien... "J'avais dessiné sur le sable, son doux visage qui me souriait. Puis il a plu..."
Devoirs Maison: Leçon + Who was Chaucer? What does it tell us about Ralph?
Séance 3: Going into details / preparing for the writing
Synthèse des DMs et élargissement culturel.
Geoffrey Chaucer is often considered the father of English literature. He lived in the 14th century. His masterpiece was 'The Canterbury Tales'. (Les élèves ayant cherché sur internet auront sûrement trouvé: 'the first author to demonstrate the artistic legitimacy of the vernacular English language, rather than French or Latin' ==> en profiter pour leur expliquer qu'à l'époque l'anglais par rapport au français et au latin n'avait pas le même rayonnement et n'était pas codifié, donc moins prestigieux).
Si cela n'a été trouvé: "Like John Milton, who wrote 'Paradise Lost', Geoffrey Chaucer was a Puritan." Pour faire comprendre ce que cela implique, passer par le film SEVEN dans lequel un tueur en série assassine les Sinners. Dans ce film, le héros lit les Canterbury Tales et Paradise Lost pour comprendre l'assassin. Un puritain est donc une personne qui suit à la lettre les principes de sa religion et s'y soumet complètement.
The characters might be Puritans and Carver used Chaucer as a hint for the reader (si ce n'est pas formulé ainsi, pas bien grave)
Consigne pour aller entrer dans une compréhension plus fine du passage:
Now, find examples in the text which confirm Ralph's Puritanism.
"he believed he almost had a breakdown; he was in a fraternity (expliquer en passant par les lettres grecques que les élèves connaissent) and he got drunk every night. He drank so much that he acquired a reputation..."
This isn't about Puritanism, but about some sort of alcoholism in his teen, but his judgement on this period is interesting: "his lowest ebb as he referred to it later".
When Marian and Ralph started dating each other, "they never let their going out together interfere with their studies"
"both sets of parents eventually gave their approval"
"They had held hands the night before their wedding and pledged to preserve forever the excitement and mystery of marriage" (waow)
"For their honeymoon... they both enjoyed visiting decayed churches..."
"Ralph was secretly appaled by the squalor and open lust he saw"
While he was watching Marian (page 48) "the whole incident put Ralph in mind of something from a film, an intensely dramatic moment in which Marian could be fitted but he couldn't"
In fact, despite an alcoholic teen age, Ralph is a true Puritan. Marian might not be as Puritan as he is...
Puis lancer, "So, what happened? What Ralph thought had happened?"
Ralph "had taken into his mind that his wife had once betrayed him with a man named Mitchell Anderson".
Right, and where were they now, what were they doing?
Marian was ironing and Ralph was working. When he appeared in the doorway, she said finished love.
DMs:
Cours suivant: leçon, être capable de parler un peu plus en détail de ces gens qui "considered themselves a happy couple"
Séance 4
Comme d'habitude: recap (ici, remettre l'histoire et la psychologie des personnages en place)
Puis écrire au tableau:
"So, in your opinion, what is going to happen next?"
Accepter tout et n'importe quoi.
He's going to ask her questions / to try to make her confess.
She's going to pretend she never betrayed him / cheated on him / had an affair
She is going to try to make him think he's wrong and she wasn't unfaithful to him.
He's going to shout and hit her and she's going to throw the iron into his face...
Then, they will divorce / He will be so desperate that he will kill himself / She will leave him to live with Mitchell Anderson (attention à live et leave)
Pause réflexive
Parler de l'avenir
I. BE GOING TO + V
Be + V-ing: on situe S dans une action (on disait autrefois: "il est en train de..."
GO TO: idée que le sujet se dirige quelque part
==> Be Going to + V: le Sujet, dans sa tête ou parce que c'est une conséquence logique, ou parce qu'il y a des signes avants-coureurs, est déjà en train de se diriger vers l'action.
Ex: I am going to kill you (je suis tellement énervé que ça va se produire, je l'ai déjà en tête cette raclée que je vais te mettre)
Ex2: It's going to rain (je vois des juages qui m'annoncent l'arrrivée imminente de la pluie)
==> Idée d'un futur proche pas complètement idiote
WILL + V
Plus lointain? Pas faux.
==> Degré de certitude le plus haut ==> Prédiction (astrologie par exemple)
==> Volition / Trace de volonté (cf l'allemand)
==> (en jalon car pas évident ici) Caractéristique du S
D'autres formes d'à venir (à l'oral)
Be + V-ing (très proche, comme si c'était fait. Nécessite un marqueur de temps)
V-0-s (il y a un 'schedule', le train ou l'avion part à cette heure là. Nécessite un marqueur de temps aussi.)
DM: Pour dans deux heures, écrire la suite du passage en un minimum de 150 mots
Fin de l'heure et heure suivante (Séance 5):
Méthodologie. Ecrire une suite. (voir fiche méthodologique)
Séance 6
Ramassage des DMs
Distribution des Pages 49 à 55 du recueil.
1) Lecture jusqu'à la page 53.
Anticipation : Recap de "what's going to happen?"
Donc, trois attentes devraient être créées qui ne seront peut-être pas formulées comme suit mais devraient être dans le même ordre d'idée
==> Ralph's role in this passage
==> Marian's role in the passage
==> What we learn about 'that' night...
1) Ralph's role
He wants to know the truth. He tries to make Marian confess. He asks questions, but not only. He uses different means:
"He kissed you that night after all, didn't he? I mean, I knew he did. He did try to kiss you, or didn't he?"
"Well he did, didn't he?"
Pause réflexive: Le role de l'auxiliaire.
1) les question tags
A quoi ça sert / Comment ça marche. + quelques phrases pour manipuler aux différentes formes verbales étudiées au cours de l'année.
2) La surassertion
He did kiss you after all. -> Ajout de l'auxiliaire alors qu'il n'est pas nécessaire afin d'insiter sur la portée du verbe.
3) Valeur centrale de l'auxiliaire
L'auxiliaire contient P (le verbe et ses arguments)
2) Marian's role
She's the one who brings up the subject / She brings up the subject.
But then, she tries to skip the subject. She doesn't really answer Ralph's questions and she unveils the story by bits.
Pause: Réflexion littéraire (rapide)
In fact, with this type of writing, the reader is in Ralph's shoes and Marian represents Raymond Carver. We learn the story through Ralph's eyes. (stream of consciousness).
So, the reader is supposed to sympathize with Ralph.
DM: Lesson + What we learn about that night. (Explain in your own words what happened and justify by using quotes from the text.)
Séance 7:
Synthèse des DMs
Préparation du DS de l'heure suivante.
Préparation de l'évaluation orale: Interaction
2 personnages: un homme et une femme.
La femme découvre que son mari a eu une aventure d'un soir (a one night stand).
