Hey it's Paige and I just woke up realizing I didn't write in the blog!!!!
So yesterday we first had all of our research questions and issues dealt with by Mr. Laz. Next we went over who their AP test already payed for through duel credit. Then Mr. Laz shared his story about how Mr. Mcdermott tackled him over Hayakawa.
Next we launched into our discussion on the Star Spangled Banner. Grace talked about how during health they had to play kickball and repeatedly a large flag on the wall was hit during the game. Mr. Laz asked us about how we would feel changing the anthem and Jasmine thought it would be difficult to adopt a new son. Amy discussed how the anthem has been adopted recently, and Allison mentioned how the words of the anthem mean different things to different people.
Ashley talked about how the lyrics are important, and that the national anthem promotes violence. Mr. Laz told us about a latino artist who translated the anthem into spanish and it was played on the radio which caused huge amounts of controversy. Donna then discussed how a lot of people don't know the words of the anthem and if they do it's because of repetition not because of a sense of patriotism. Ian said that the anthem is poorly written and doesn't mention values of USA today. Ben then discussed the whole other three verses that people don't know. Arka said that if anyone wanted to change the anthem they would actually be advocating something else. For example if someone was angry about the anthen being translated to spanish they were actually angry about illegal immigration. He also mentioned how the act of singing together is powerful. Deirdre said that our anthem has a lot of violent lyrics, and doesn't think that the anthem should avocate the thing that no one likes. Allison thinks that even though there are violent lyrics people don't take them to heart, and Grace replied that even if people don't know the song it doesn't justify the violent lyrics. Steph said that the anthem was meant to keep up the morale during the war and since it was wartime of course it was going to be violent. Brendan added that the song was more about surviving the battle. Cristy also mentioned that we're still fighting the enemies of democracy.
All in all it was a great discussion, good work team! (Sorry this is late)