As we find ourselves in the last week of the semester before final exams, it’s the season of so many things:
- The season of Christmas Bureau as we rush to get last minute gifts, wrapping paper, and boxes.
- The season of students getting in those last assignments before preparing for a weekend of study sessions.
- The season of teachers trying to finish up as much quarter grading as possible before receiving a tall pile of exams next week.
And if you had walked into my English 10 classroom on Monday or Tuesday, you would have seen that it is the season for campaigning! This year in English 10 we brought back a summative project we did for the first time two years ago right before the pandemic hit; this is the Lord of the Flies’ Campaign Project.
If you’re unfamiliar with Lord of the Flies by William Golding, it tells the story of a group of boys that crash land on a deserted island during WWII. No adults survive this plane crash, and the boys are left to fend for themselves. One of the first things they do together as a group is vote for someone as chief of the group. While one character is initially elected, there soon are power struggles in which other potential leaders emerge. This ultimately results in many conflicts since the leaders have very different priorities and personalities.
For the project, students worked in small groups and were assigned a main character from Lord of the Flies. After finishing the novel, students created a speech from that character’s perspective and a visual advertisement as part of a campaign platform supporting why this character should be chief of the island. Through this, they analyzed the characters’ strengths and weaknesses, and we were able to see how we can be influenced by a variety of things when it comes to electing our leaders. This project always helps us to finish the semester strong and on a positive note as students typically approach it with energy and enthusiasm, taking on the persona of their candidates and truly bringing them to life in creative ways.
Sarah Behrendt,
English Teacher