Death Be Not Proud: Flipped Classroom

The Flipped Classroom model of teaching is really neat. I mostly use it when I have a lot of content I want to get through, or if I want to do something special which requires content.

Essentially, we can assign readings or other materials outside of the classroom so that you can do a hands-on activity in the classroom. I certainly did not come up with this myself; check out the following link for more information: http://www.knewton.com/flipped-classroom/

In this example, I wanted to get some comprehensive concepts out of the way so that we could spend time doing a debate [My students' response to five minute memos: "more time for debate!"]

These questions are not brilliant. In fact, they would induce blunt force trauma with how subtle they aren't. But there is more to it than just the questions ...

Holy Sonnet 10

Death, be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so;
For those, whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleep, which but thy picture[s] be,
Much pleasure, then from thee much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee do go,
Rest of their bones, and soul's delivery.
Thou'rt slave to Fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell,
And poppy, or charms can make us sleep as well,
And better than thy stroke; why swell'st thou then?
One short sleep past, we wake eternally,
And Death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die.

Hey, folks!

Please answer the following questions to prepare for class tomorrow (they are pretty simple):

1)      Who is the speaker in the poem talking to? (What is the technical word for how the object of the poem is being expressed here? Hint: the word begins with a “p”)

2)      What does the following line mean? “From rest and sleep, which but thy picture[s] be, /
Much pleasure, then from thee much more must flow”

3)      Which line of the sonnet sounds a heck of a lot like the title of this song by Billy Joel? (“Only the good die young” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhjNm20XbXw)

4)      Who is death a “slave” to?

5)      What does the word “swell’st” mean here?

6)      What does it mean to “wake eternally”?

7)      As an intangible object, Death cannot die; so what is the speaker really saying?

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All of this was in aid of the following activity: 

At which point, there is a debate.

And then, because the professor has been mentioning "for whom the bell tolls" all week in class without showing them the primary source, I decide to show it to them. 

There is Simon.

There is Garfunkel.

There is Metallica. 

(I earned some fans that day)