Whale Talk - Day 8

Well, the two chapters I sent home over the weekend provided a little bit of a reprieve from all the intensity that we had read, and that they will read for Wednesday. These two chapters set us up with just a little more reinforcement that Mike and Rich are jerks, TJ is amazing, John is the epitome of a good man, and the other characters provide a rich background to support that. So, our discussion wasn't overly involved today.

Mostly, the kids talked about Andy Mott. We found out in Chapter 12 how he lost his leg, and let me tell you, it's about as tragic and disheartening as anything in this book. I don't want to give much away (because I'm hoping if you haven't already, you'll read this book), but Andy is a hard ass for a reason. The kids in my class were pretty shaken up by the whole thing. They also keep admitting that they don't totally believe that everything in here is plausible. Here are the reasons why they find this novel hard to believe sometimes (in their words):

1. Every character has a major life problem.
2. There is too much abuse in it.
3. The characters are too different to actually get along with each other so well.
4. People don't really open up and bond the way the Mermen have.

At the end of our discussion today, I addressed several of these "concerns" along with others. Here are my rebuttals, as well as a summation:

1. Jackie, Simet, Georgia, and even Simon don't have off-the-wall problems.
2. I didn't directly address this.
3. Sometimes people bring out the best in each other because they are so different.
4. I talked about this one in a previous class/post.

Summation: It's called fiction. In order to believe any work of fiction we have to suspend reality (I explained this further to them as being able to accept the far fetched). In this book, we don't even have to suspend reality that much. When we did our opening activity, the majority of the class said they wouldn't give Andy Mott the time of day. Is that still true? (They said no, FYI). Well, that's the point that Crutcher is making here. For instance, I could pull a slacker, jock, special education student, and loner aside in Old Town High School, and if I got to know them, I would learn something. That's what makes this believable - that we have to look beyond the surface level in order to really see people. We all make judgements - I know I do - and that's human nature, but we also have to be willing to take another look.

Then, because I admitted to being judgemental sometimes, they wanted to know what judgements I made when I first met them. I told them, but really, that should be dealt with in another entry altogether.

Some kids have finished the novel, and are dying to talk it out, because the end is rather shocking. You can see SOMETHING coming, but not what does, and boy-oh-boy, even I can't wait until Wednesday to see what they think.