Every year, I read Christmas in the Trenches by John McCutcheon, a moving tribute to the power of the human spirit to unite people even in times of battle, which is based on an actual event from World War I. Given that I serve a multi-cultural, multi-religious population (like, what teacher doesnt), I preface the reading with emphasis on this being an historic event, and like the story, focus on the meaning of the event not the particular religion of the participants. So, you can imagine my delight when a beautiful advert video was made that used this unique historic event as a back drop to promote the sale of one of its products. Its a controversial piece for that reason, yet, to me is captures the feel and texture of the story. In a world where technology is toted as a preferred teaching tool, yet our schools block everything that one tries to incorporate into a lesson, Im not sure Ill be able to pull this in, but...oh, my, it would be a perfect text-to-text reference!! Some of the complaints Ive read about this video is that is made war look beautiful. Really? Its art; its film, for God sakes! Have we not seen countless films that manage to romanticize war scenes...even in their bleakness? Especially when love or brotherhood is experienced? Please! And when you think of the false world that so many children live and sleep in, sitting on their couches playing video war games, with no fear or awareness of the horrors of real war; certainly a depiction of a war scene as it may have really been, cant corrupt what is already corrupted. So they are selling candy bars, who isnt selling something? Whats important is the idea of sharing that they have beautifully incorporated into this piece. Whether I can share it with my students or not, I think its a lovely piece...and coupled with the book, something in which any child would learn a valuable lesson about the human spirit. https://youtube/watch?v=NWF2JBb1bvM
Posted on: Sat, 06 Dec 2014 04:44:23 +0000
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