A Discourse Approach in Reading Week 4

26   January   2016 

Narratives continued

We read about the second part of the story 'Secrets' by Tim Winton and did exercises.

A summary of the first part of the story 
Kylie feels lefr out from her mother and Philip's activities. She becomes interested in the chickens in the yard. Somehow her secret helps her to feel less lonely. She finds a second egg and then finds out where others are being laid by an unhealthy-looking hen.  She was happy sharing the secret with hen. Philip tells her that not to open the lid of the bore well but she does. She looks on her photo album, misses her father and wants to live with him.

A summary of the second part of the story in the exercise C 
- Kylie watched the hen sitting on ten eggs
- She takes the lid off the well
- She starts to go down the well with her photo album every day
- She watches Philip and her mother and wonder why her father is not with them
- Philip discovers her in the well and hits her
- Kylie throws the chicks down the well
- Kylie hits the hen and throws it down the well
- She chooses one special photo which makes her feel good
- Kylie cuts off her head from the special photo and throws it away

A summary of the second part of the story in my opinion
Kylie took care the hen and the eggs and looked for what would happen after the hen sitting on them. She decided to lift the lid of the well. She climbed down and discovered her special place. She went down the well with her photo album every day. On night she watched Philip and her mother and wondered why her father and mother did not live together with her. She went back to her room and chose one picture that stopped her from feeling lonely. A Sunday afternoon Kylie was not prepared when Philip decided to weed the garden. He caught her down on the well, he hit her and told her he was buying a padlock in the morning. The chicks hatched, Kylie threw the chicks and the hen down the well then she slumped down on the lid and began to cry. Kylie took her photograph,cut off her head and poked it through a hole in the flyscreen of the window



Teacher asked us  to think about why Kylie chased the hen and the chicks and why she cut off her head from the special photo.

Why did Kylie chase the hen and the chicks?
In my opinion she felt so unloved by her mother and  her happiness was destroyed, she wanted the hen and the chicks to feel the same pain that she felt.

Why did she cut off her head from the special photo?
I think she gave up and was sad. Her happiness that are her secret,special place were destroyed and at the moment only thing that she has was a photograph. She think it was not help her to feel better anymore because everything has gone


Exercise D we chose one of the verbs to make sentences about 3 people in this story

I feel sorry for Kylie because she feel hurt and exclude from her mother and Philip.

I dislike Kylie's mother beacause she doesn't take care her daughter.
I dislike Philip because he hits and abuses Kylie.

Then we did exercise E : What do you feel about the story? and choose the three which you think are most important of the themes in this story.

I feel very sorry to Kylie, She felt lonely and was neglect by her mother. It's a big problem of a little child.

The three themes that I chose are
- Neglect
- Loneliness
- Problems associated with contemporary family life

The three themes that we voted are
- Neglect
- Conflict between different generations
- Loneliness


Discussing the story's symbol
The eggs - Kylie's secret, hope and power
The well - The special place of Kylie
The photos - Her memories and misses her father
Kylie's cutting of the photo - everything was destroyed

Do you feel that they suggest something about Kylie herself?

Kylie listen to me, You should love yourself first you are lucky more than the children who don't have parents. You don't pay attention to your bad feeling, when you feel bad you can do some activities likes go out with friends, play some instruments. I want to see your smile. You’ll get through this. Be strong!!

What did you find easy? 
I can answer the question that ask about my opinion.

What did you find difficult?
I can't understand all the story some sentence it's not clear and some vocabularies are hard.

What did you solve the problem?
I searched in Google to find more information and ask my friends.

What are your attitudes towards the lesson?
I think this story tell me about neglect and problems associated with contemporary family life and what should we solve this problem?, How can we help Kylie?, Why is Kylie behaving like this?

A Discourse Approach in Reading Week 3

 19   January   2016 

Narratives

the new lesson was Narratives that are to entertain, i.e. to gain and hold the reader's interest in a story, to nourish and extend the reader's imagination. 

We put a cross on line in the circle, at an appropriate point, to show how we felt as a child. The scale goes from 0(not at all) - 6(very much).The sentences are from the Secrets by Tim Winton and I showed you that how I felt.

I was sensitive to smells. = 3
I felt close to my mother. = 5
I was often left alone. = 2
I felt excluded from the world of adults. = 4
I like having secrets. = 3
I was always curious to know things. = 3
I did as I was told. = 4
I liked being by myself in special places of my own. = 6
I felt close to my father. = 4
My parents and I did lots of things together. = 3
I noticed small details of people appearance. = 1
I often did things that now seem to me to be cruel. = 2

Tim Winton

After that, we read the secrets story part one. Paragraph 1 is an orientation, we found who, what, when, where and summarize this paragraph by 3 sentenses.

Who - Kylie
What - She found an egg in the yard and she kept the secret
When - No detail
Where - The yard at the back of the new house

 A summary of paragraph 1 
1.She moved to live with her mother but she want to live with her father.
2.She found an egg in the yard
3.She kept the secret

 Then we read the story in part one with teacher until finished. She assigned us to complete this smmary of the first part of the story by adding three fairly short sentences.

 A summary of the first part of the story 
Kylie feels lefr out from her mother and Philip's activities. She becomes interested in the chickens in the yard. Somehow her secret helps her to feel less lonely. She finds a second egg and then finds out where others are being laid by an unhealthy-looking hen .............................................

1.She was happy sharing the secret with hen.
2.Philip tells her that not to open the lid of the bore well but she does.
3.She looks on her photo album, misses her father and wants to live with him.

Teacher gave questions to us ,and assigned us to answer in our blog. 

 Why did Kylie feel lonely? 
- Because she felt left out from her mother and Philip's activities.
 Why did she keep the eggs as her secret? 
- Because it can help her to feel less lonely.
 Why didn't she live with her father? 
- The story doesn't has the reason that why she didn't live with her father maybe because her father had gone or divorced with her mother.
 What did she do in the bore well in the back yard? 
- She tried to open the lid of the bore well in the back yard
 Why did Kylie always look at the photos? 
- Because she missed her father and wanted to live with him.
 Why wasn't her father in the photos? 
- Because her father had been the photographer in the family.



What did you find easy?
I can answer the question about myself and finding the orientation in paragraph 1 was easy for me.

What did you find difficult?
In my opinion, some vocabularies were hard and the story was long.

What did you solve the problem?
Teacher helped us to translate the story and I guessed the meaning of words from context .

What are your attitudes towards the lesson?
I think narrative lesson helps students read more because there are many types and they are typically imaginary but can be factual. All of this makes students are interested in a story.

A Discourse Approach in Reading Week 2

 12    January   2016 

  Recount continued  

First teacher reviewed the lesson from last week about 'Recount'. It made us understood the text clearly that who was involded, where it happened, when it happened. We highlighted the action verbs/past tense, linking words to do with time and specific participants. Last week I didn't understand that we highlighted and found it for what? But now I know that already because it help us to find the answer quickly.

We read 'My Grandpa's Funeral in Toraja' again and answered the question that teacher assigned from last week.

A series of events 'My Grandpa's Funeral in Toraja'
- Gathered together with relatives in the ceremony
- Grandpa's body was dressed in a fine wearing and kept in the tongkonan
- Slaughtered the pigs and buffaloes
- Moved the corpse to face north
- The corpse was placed in a sandal wood coffin
- Brought it out of the house and placed on an open platform beneath the granary
- prepared the lakian and held it in this place
- The grandpa's coffin wad lowered from the funeral tower and brought up to the mountain side family graveyard
- Installed the wooden puppet on a high balcony
Next, we read 'An Excursion to the Botanic Garden' We analyzed what orientation,events and reorientation are and highlighted on language features. Then we chose the correct answer and answered the questions very quickly because we did it already before.

 After that teacher told us to write vocabularies about police report on the board. It was very difficult, I didn't know many words, I took a photo and found the meaning later.
 

Teacher gave a new sheet for us. it was news report about five Vietnamese nationals were arrested for stealing cash. Teacher ask me to answer 'What do you think about this incident?' in Webblog
 

http://www.nationmultimedia.com/national/5-Vietnamese-held-for-stealing-30276018.html

What do you think about this incident?

I think this news is very important, now ASEAN is opened already. The member of ASEAN can come to our country easily for work or travel. In my opinion it's not only foreigners become thieves but also Thai people. Everyone should be careful and protect youself all the time.


Last text that we read was 'Investigation report', it was about the couple was stopped by the policeman because they were exceeding the speed limit on the Dumbarton highway in a truck but finally, they escaped.

We didn't have enough time to do this exercise, teacher assigned it to be our homework.


What did you find easy?
I answered questions very quickly if I highlighted an orientation that are what,who,when,where.

What did you find difficult?
Absolutely I had a problem with my vocabularies. Every week that I studied have new vocabularies which I should learn and remember more. The vocabularies about police report was the hardest for this week.

What did you solve the problem? 
I paid attention to listen to my teacher what she said and jot them down to my sheet.

What are your attitudes towards the lesson?
In my opinion this lesson is very hard for me because I didn't like to read the long text in English and the text wasn't interesting but I tried to did it and I can understand more than I think.

A Discourse Approach in Reading Week 1

 5    January   2016 

  Recount  

The first day of studying in this course 'A Discourse Approach in Reading'.Today before we studied, teacher had told us about manners in the class. This is 6 rules that teacher told us again in this semester.
1. Be punctual
2. Pay attention to the lesson
3. Do not use cell phones in the classroom
4.Do not cheat
5. Follow dress code policy
6. Listen while others are speaking or sharing


The first lesson of this semester was 'Recount' that is a text that retells a story about past events or experiences in the order they happened.

Purpose : to tell what happened.

Types : 1.Personal Recount ( e.g. diary entry)
              2.Factual recount (e.g. news report)
              3.Imaginative Recount (e.g.a day in life of Roman slave; how I invented...).

Text organization
The recount generally begins with an orientation giving the reader/listener the background information needed to understand the text (i. e. who, where, when, what)
Then the Recount unfolds with a series of events ordered in a chronological sequence. At various stages there may be some personal comment on the incident.



Generic Structure of Recount

1. Orientation: Introducing the participants, place and time

2. Events: Describing series of event that happened in the past

3. Reorientation: It is optional. Stating personal comment of the writer to the story

3. Language Feature of Recount

    • Introducing personal participant; I, my group, etc

    • Using chronological connection; then, first, etc

    • Using linking verb; was, were, saw, heard, etc

    • Using action verb; look, go, change, etc

    • Using simple past tense

After that, she gave us to do the exercise in order to understand about recount by completing the text and finding the language features of this text.

Then, we studied "My Grandpa's Funeral in Toraja" it is about the funeral in Toraja, Indonesia. I also knew that the funeral is performed in two phases. First, they slaughter the pigs and buffaloes, and then move the corpse to face north. After that, the corpse is placed in a sandal wood coffin. Then, it is brought out of the house and placed on an open platform beneath the granary. The next phase of the ceremony is held in this place. The coffin is borne from the house and placed in the lakian. During the day, there are also buffaloes matches. In the night, we are feasting, chanting, and dancing.

The teacher assigned us to find the information about the funeral in Thailand in order to compare with Indonesia.

Thailand's Funeral

In Thailand, we believe that by cremation we are sending the body up to Heaven. After death, the body is returned home, where it remains on display for either three or seven days. There will be monks in attendance, chanting in Pali (the language of the Lord Buddha). The family provides food for the villagers (usually with the neighbors’ help). Close family members pour water from silver cups over the deceased. Important people may be embalmed, and put on display for longer periods, some indefinitely.

When the cremation time approaches, the body is placed on a cart, in a white thin wooden coffin with gold filigree. The coffin is surrounded by a thin wood-and-paper mock-up of a Thai temple, brightly colored. Many flowers are placed on the cart, and a large picture of the deceased is prominently displayed. Using a long, thick rope, and led by a group of monks, friends and family pull the cart to the cremation ground. Everyone at the funeral wears black, or black and white.

At the cremation ground, the coffin is placed on the stone platform. The spectators are offered soft drinks and light refreshments. Following a final incantation from the monks, the coffin and mock-up temple are set on fire. This is often done in quite a spectacular way. The coffin is first drenched in gasoline. A thin wire runs from the viewing area to the coffin.

A different funeral between Thailand and Indonesia

- Thai people believe that the cremation, we are sending the body up to heaven after death
- Thai funeral didn't have dancing in ceremony.
- Thai people always make up on the face's corpse.
- Thai close family members pour water from silver cups over the deceased.
- Thai corpse have to funeral at the temple but Indonesia's corpse brought up to the mountain side family graveyard.
- Indonesia ceremony they will slaughtered the pigs and buffaloes.
- Indonesia's people installed the wooden puppet on a high balcony where other puppets representing the members of a whole family were already there. 

 

What did you find easy?
The purpose of recount is easy for me because its purpose is to tell what happened


What did you find difficult?
In my opinion, I think that recount is difficult a little bit because I feel confused about Language Feature and Text Organization

What did you solve the problem?
I tried to pay attention in the classroom and wrote down the things that I got from the classroom on my sheet.

What are your attitudes towards the lesson?
I think that this course is harder than last course. The text was harder and made me more confused.