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Inmaculada Garca Millas Universidad Camilo Jos Cela

LITERATURE FOR CHILDREN: TASK 2.

ALICE IN WONDERLAND; CHESHIRE CATs first scene.

LIST OF CONTENTS

1. INTRODUCTION.

2. CONTEXT.

3. JUSTIFICATION.

3.1. The story Alice in Wonderland.

3.2. Chosen scene and the reason to work on it.

4. SKILLS TO DEVELOP.

5. LESSON PLAN (With alternatives).

6. ATTENTION TO DIVERSITY

7. EVALUATION.

8. BIBLIOGRAPHIC REFERENCES.

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1. INTRODUCTION.

The author of this book, Lewis Carroll states that everything is a dream, and it is not to be
revealed till the end. He plays between vagueness and vividness, and illustrates that nothing
remains the same for long. He writes like describing a dream and even words start to blur into
each other. His story pulls apart the world around himself and reassembled it in a crazily
jumbled form.

Alice in Wonderland is a childrens non-sense tale with twelve chapters on a girl named Alice
and her journey to an imaginary and fantastic world with people, animals and anthropomorphic
objects. It has had a considerable social, psychological and mathematic influence from the
Victorian period.

The first part of the book is focused on Alices disorientation in life. The following meetings are
described always as difficult relationships, like the one I have chosen where the Cheshire cat
appears and disappears when he wants to. The book mixes oneiric contents, localisms, social
caricatures and logic and linguistic games.

Alices attitudes reflect the mockery to society and the customs of the period. Her logic is the
most traditional or classic, and bumps into Carrolls world to show this last one as absurd. But
Carrolls logic always answers to correct inference patterns: craziness in Wonderland is rational;
surrealism comes from sceneries in which it is produced: a dream. Nevertheless, Alice is open-
minded to understand what she goes through the tale, what does not usually happen with
adults.

The inverse language in the book is language that is literal and nominalist. This curious
mixture produces an only level of interpretation, and at the same time, extreme freedom to
create each meaning.

2. CONTEXT.

The school is bilingual. The activities are designed for sixth grade, because of the
abstractness of the meaning I want to work with. We are taking into account some
reinforcements and extensions for a slight difference in pupils competences. This mini-project
will be carried on in the middle of the third term, since children would be already prepared to
progress in the abilities specified. The timing of the activities is a week, encompassing five
lessons of forty-five minutes each. The resources are video scenes, worksheets, and audio and
video recorders and recordings.

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3. JUSTIFICATION.

3.1. THE STORY ALICE IN WONDERLAND.

Following Lurie, A. (1990) childrens literature should be taken seriously because it is


sometimes subversive (with an imaginative, unconventional, non-commercial view of the world
in its simplest and purest form). In her words, this genre appeals to the questioning and
rebellious part within all of us, and constitutes a motto for natural and dynamic change, and as
Rogers, T. states to reinterpret ourselves reach a dialogic justice through negotiation of
meaning. Alice in Wonderland can be used in the way described by Burns, M. (2001) to
address mathematical concepts.

3.2. CHOSEN SCENE AND THE REASON TO WORK ON IT.

I have chosen the Cheshire cats scene because of his vitality represented by his permanent
smile. He says: You will always arrive to some place if you walk enough. I like his paradoxical
conversations with philosophic hints and his nihilist snide humour when he is logic when the rest
are not. He smiles and howls to get other characters angry. I like that he is a joker to be
considered seriously. When he laughs at everything shows his own superiority but not over
other, bout over oneselfs nature. Moreover, there is a reference at the end of the book that
deals with the dilemma to cut his head, under the orders of the Queen (and the King), that
poses critical thinking to authority without foundations.

4. SKILLS TO DEVELOP.

To answer comprehension questions about the text.


To read and discuss this part of the story and check predictions.
To perform part of the story in English.
To record own work.
To listen carefully.
To think about language.
To learn and peer teach new vocabulary.
To gain a deeper understanding and perspective of the particular characters
psychology, ethics and motivation through the questions and answers.
To verbalize own thoughts by asking questions and interacting with the text, themes
and characters being studied.
To re-create images of poetry and work in teams.

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5. LESSON PLAN (With alternatives).

FIRST LESSON
To start with the story we watch this link: https://youtu.be/_EIGBq6klEI.
To introduce the book to the pupils I will start with some hints on the author and the
story with a prezi presentation about what I have described in the introduction.
I will briefly explain the students the scene. Then we will watch the scene of the
cartoon movie of Disney (with English subtitles) once I have explained them there is a
poem (Jabberwocky) the Cheshire Cat sings that is completely non-sense and
scrambles words.
Thus, we will work on the lexis: key words and some unusual lexical groups
(memory games).

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Key words: to wonder, to mean, to notice, in that direction, curious.

TO WONDER TO MEAN TO NOTICE

IN THAT CURIOUS
DIRECTION

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Unusual lexical groups: get the knack of, ought to, depends on, as long as,; to go among,
cant help.

TO GET
TO OUGHT TO TO DEPEND ON
THE KNACK OF

AS LONG AS TO GO AMONG CANT HELP

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Structure: if I were looking for..., Id ask...

IF I WERE LOOKING FOR..., ID ASK...

PING-PONG POEM.

GROUP A NARRATOR GROUP B


I wonder if Ill ever get the knack of it
I wonder which way I ought to go
I mean You mean She/He means
I just wanted to ask you which way I ought to go
That depends on where you want to get to

We perform sentences of the scene, but the pupils have to invent a poem with them.
We eventually re-create an exciting ping pong match.

The class is divided into two groups. Group A read one side words and group B the
other. The teacher is the narrator or referee. After reading through several times, the
pupils move their heads as if following the ping pong ball in the game. They mime the
action as the teams speak.

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SECOND LESSON

WATCHING THE SCENE AGAIN with English subtitles.


SCRIPT READING.
The teacher reads the scene.

Alice: Goodness I wonder if Ill ever get the knack of it. There, thats much better. Hmmm
I better save these. Now lets see, where was I? Hmmm, I wonder which way I ought to go

Cheshire Cat: Twas brillig, and the slithy toves, did gyre and gimble in the wabe. All mimsy
were the borogoves, and the momeraths outgrabe.
Alice: Now where in the world do you suppose that

Cheshire Cat: Uh lose something?

Alice: Oh! Hehe, Oh uhhh hehe I- I was no, no, I- I- I- I mean, I uhh I was just
wondering

Cheshire Cat: Oh uhh, thats quite all right! Oh, hrmm, one moment please Oh! Second
chorus Twas brilllig, and the slithy toves, did gyre and gimble in the wabe
Alice: Why, why youre a cat!

Cheshire Cat: A Cheshire Cat. All mimsy were the borogoves


Alice: Oh, wait! Dont go, please!

Cheshire Cat: Very well. Third chorus

Alice: Oh no no no thank you, but- but I just wanted to ask you which way I ought to go.

Cheshire Cat: Well, that depends on where you want to get to.

Alice: Oh, it really doesnt matter, as long as I g

Cheshire Cat: Then it really doesnt matter which way you go! Ah-hmm and the momeraths
outgrabe Oh, by the way, if youd really like to know, he went that way.
Alice: Who did?

Cheshire Cat: The white rabbit.

Alice: He did?

Cheshire Cat: He did what?

Alice: Went that way?

Cheshire Cat: Who did?

Alice: The white rabbit!

Cheshire Cat: What rabbit?

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Alice: But didnt you just say I mean oh dear!

Cheshire Cat: Can you stand on your head?

Alice: Oh!

Cheshire Cat: However, if I were looking for a white rabbit, Id ask the Mad Hatter.

Alice: The Mad Hatter? Uh no, no, I dont- I dont

Cheshire Cat: Or, theres the March Hare. In that direction.

Alice: Oh, thank you. I- I think I shall visit him.

Cheshire Cat: Of course, hes mad too.

Alice: But I dont want to go among mad people!

Cheshire Cat: Oh, you cant help that. Almost everyone is mad here. Ha ha ha ha ha ha! You
may have noticed that Im not all there myself. hahaha and the momeraths outgrabe
Alice: Goodness. If the people here are like that, I- I must try not to upset them. How very
curious!

Then, the pupils will read the script in pairs. They change roles.

I hand out the work-sheet for the students to fill in the frames with brief narrative
or dialogued summaries of the scene for each picture. They also have to match
Alices picture, and describe her mood, attitude, beliefs,... for each frame. There
are some extra ones.

Afterwards, they reorganize the sequence of the story by matching those scenes
with the paragraphs related. They will do it with their owns and with their
partners one.

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1 2

3 4

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5 6

7 8

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9 10

11 12

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BEGINNING, MIDDLE, END STORY CLOCK

The pupils write the most important for the plot.

Beginning

Middle

End

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THIRD LESSON

TASK ON OXYMORONS.

Oxymoron 1:

Alice: I just wanted to ask you which way I ought to go.

Cheshire Cat: Well, that depends on where you want to get to.

Alice: Oh, it really doesnt matter, as long as I g

Cheshire Cat: Then it really doesnt matter which way you go!

Oxymoron 2:

Cheshire Cat: If youd really like to know, he went that way.


Alice: Who did?

Cheshire Cat: The white rabbit.

Alice: He did?

Cheshire Cat: He did what?

Alice: Went that way?

Cheshire Cat: Who did?

Alice: The white rabbit!

Cheshire Cat: What rabbit?

Alice: But didnt you just say I mean oh dear!

ROLING SEAT. A pupil sits on a chair in front of the class to perform Alices or
Cheshire Cats role. His or her classmates ask questions to be answered in the
characters shoes.
ROLE-PLAY. On the selected short script excerpts for students to perform.

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FOURTH LESSON. (ICT Room)

WATCHING THE SCENE AGAIN with English subtitles.


INTERACTIVE http://www.readwritethink.org/files/resources/interactives/storymap/
ROLE PLAY. They review the scene with visual support from the previous lesson to
perform the selected scene.
STORY MAP to sum up (Scholastic).

6. ATTENTION TO DIVERSITY. Reinforcements and Extensions. MINI-BOOKS.

7. EVALUATION. A small contribution to a LITERATURE JOURNAL for the class. The pupils
reflect on the task, they compare their predictions with the outcome in the story, and also
describe the way Alice has changed and what she has learned. They also can think about
personal experiences similar to Alices.

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8. BIBLIOGRAPHIC REFERENCES.

Burns, M. (2001).Cara Bafile Education World


Douglas-Fairhurst, R. Alice in Wonderland what does it all mean? (Friday 20 March
2015 11.00 GMT) http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/mar/20/alice-in-wonderland-
what-does-it-all-mean
Lurie, A. February 25, 1990. A Childs Garden of Subversion. New York Times Books
section.
Rogers, T. Literary theory and children's literature: interpreting ourselves and our
worlds.
Rogers, T. Theory into Practice, v. 38 no3 (Summer 1999) p. 138-46.
http://www.significados.com/las-aventuras-de-alicia-en-el-pais-de-las-maravillas/
Significados: Significado de Las Aventuras de Alicia en el Pas de las Maravillas
http://filosofia.about.com/od/Filosofia-Y-Literatura/a/El-Nominalismo-En-La-Obra-De-
Lewis-Carroll.htm

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