Simple Key Skill #3: Patterning
Sometimes very simple lessons can unlock whole new ways of seeing. In the first simple lesson I proposed there was power in richly describing elements rather than simply naming them. In the second, I proposed that images and other texts could be opened up richly for exploration by considering their individual elements out of context, and then putting them back in the context of the full text. In this third lesson, I propose that we teach students to search for patterns in texts. Exploring for patterns is particularly useful as a next step to all of the describing and isolating that students may have done through the first two lessons.
Start simply by giving students a really easy patterning task such as this grocery list. What patterns might we find in this list?
milk
eggs
yogurt
butter
flour
orange juice
tomatoes
low sodium soy sauce
onions
garlic
bacon
stamps
maple syrup
ground beef
light bulbs
AAA batteries
thin linguine
So while there are a few obvious ones that might come up first - breakfast, dairy, meat, italian food, there isn’t any one pattern or set of patterns that is correct. Just keep going, showing kids that there can be multiple and overlapping patterns to things. Note that having butter in the pattern of dairy doesn’t mean it can’t also be in the pattern of breakfast. Note that some items may not clearly fit into any patterns, like the stamps. Note that some patterns are objective such as “meat” or “vegetables” while others are culturally constructed like “breakfast” which we might assume includes bacon and not linguine but that could look very different for someone else. A simple grocery list here opens up a wide ranging discussion of strong and weak patterns, overlapping patterns, and exceptions to patterns.
Having established that a single work can have multiple overlapping patterns, and having established that some of these patterns are more objective, some more subjective, students can turn to a text. There are two general approaches you might use, depending on your students and on your text.
GIVE THEM PATTERNS TO TEST - One of my favorite images to teach from is this very famous portrait of the poet Li Bai (shown whole on the left and then zooming in on the face). Here are two patterns I might ask students to detail and to test. Can they build lists for each? Do the titles or boundaries of the patterns stand up to the test of objectivity? What areas create uncertainty in terms of managing or fulfilling these patterns?
Pattern 1: Elements that are depicted / present in the image
Pattern 2: Elements that are not depicted / absent from image
ASK THEM TO FIND PATTERNS - Usually a more advanced move, asking students to find real and useful patterns in a text is a great way to approach a text without biasing them one way or another. Rather than say something like “what does this image tell us about social class distinctions?” just ask them to find patterns and see what happens. Here are two poems I’ve used in wrapping up a study of World War I. I asked students to find patterns in these and we could have worked with what they found for three days. Generally a good idea to start with one item, flesh out some interesting pattern possibilities, remembering that nothing need be settled one way or the other. Then give them a second and watch the fireworks.
POEM 1: England to Free Men by John Galsworthy
MEN of my blood, you English men!
From misty hill and misty fen,
From cot, and town, and plough, and moor,
Come in—before I shut the door!
Into my courtyard paved with stones
That keep the names, that keep the bones,
Of none but English men who came
Free of their lives, to guard my fame.
I am your native land who bred
No driven heart, no driven head;
I fly a flag in every sea
Round the old Earth, of Liberty!
I am the Land that boasts a crown;
The sun comes up, the sun goes down—
And never men may say of me,
Mine is a breed that is not free.
I have a wreath! My forehead wears
A hundred leaves—a hundred years
I never knew the words: “You must!”
And shall my wreath return to dust?
Freemen! The door is yet ajar;
From northern star to southern star,
O ye who count and ye who delve,
Come in—before my clock strikes twelve!
POEM 2: Dulce et Decorum Est by Wilfred Owen
Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind.
Gas! Gas! Quick, boys!—An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound’ring like a man in fire or lime...
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,—
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.
Here the patterning exercise is amplified by a comparison / contrast exercise to reveal questions of nationalism and identity, notions of war and citizenship, the modern, and all manner of other possible interesting explorations.
The greatest rewards come when students discover patterns that are strong - that is, clearly present and integral to the work - but that don’t fit with each other exactly. Patterns that clash or resonate against each other in interesting ways, even as you test them, are gold in terms of analysis. Establishing these contrasting patterns as the basis for a claim will be my next discussion.
