Here is the Journal Reflection assignment description and rubric if you lose the one I've provided you.
1. 1/8: Who needs a little Socrates in their life? Whose beliefs and values need to be called into question?
2. 1/9: What value is there in philosophy (asking why, critically examining ideas of others, questioning beliefs/values, investigating cause and effects)? What might it add to your life? Based on what we read in Apology, how would Plato answer that question? Do you agree with him?
3. 1/10: If Plato and David Foster Wallace texted each other about thinking/how to live life/value of philosophy, how would that conversation go?
4. 1/13: Why do people live in community beyond familial ties? Which is better – living in community or living in solitude?
5. 1/15: What factors about a human being determine his/her likelihood to be successful in a community? Why are poor people poor and rich people rich?
6. 1/21: “All I'm saying is simply this, that all life is interrelated, that somehow we're caught in an inescapable network of mutuality tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly. For some strange reason, I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be. You can never be what you ought to be until I am what I ought to be. This is the interrelated structure of reality.” Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
What is justice? Describe a just community. Describe a just person.
7. 1/27: If the machine of government is of such a nature that it requires you to be the agent of injustice to another, then, I say, break the law. – Henry David Thoreau “Resistance to Civil Government”
Pull out your copy of the (excerpts from the) essay. What challenges you? Which ideas do you embrace? Which ideas do you reject? What do you wonder about? What are you reminded of?
8. 1/30: What do you personally believe to be true about human nature?
9. 2/5: I showed you ten scenarios of potential cheating in high schools. I asked you to think about what you would do and what the right thing to do is in each scenario?
10. 2/13: Look back at what you wrote on 2/5. Evaluate yourself using Kantian and Utilitarian ethics. How does that evaluation make you feel?
11. 2/25: Choose one statement from Jay Smooth’s TED talk. What challenges you? What do you embrace and/or reject? Why?
12. 2/26: Do you care where your food comes from in terms of growers, processors, distributors, etc.? Why or why not?
13. 3/3: What is the purpose of education (formal or otherwise)? What is the purpose of teachers? How do people best learn?
14. 3/5: Fill in the blank. In order to be successful today everyone should know ______. Defend your choice.
15. 3/7: We watched a video of a high schooler expressing his problem with Common Core to his school board, and then I asked: What’s your problem with education? Who would you address your problem to?
16. 3/17: Say something philosophical about your spring break.
17. 3/25: What’s Plato saying with the Allegory of the Cave. Read Hedges thoughts on the Allegory. Do you agree with his interpretation of it?
18. 3/26: We looked at a slide show of images (Van Gogh’s was one of them). What are you seeing? How does what you are seeing change as I change the slides?
19. 3/27: You brought an object/image you thought was worth seeing. What do you hope people will see when they look at your piece?
20. 3/28: Think about a movie/book/play/TV show/game that you love/hate because of the plot. What is so great/awful about the plot?
21. 4/4: What do you think of Duchamp’s Fountain?
22. 4/7: What do you know about street art?
23. 4/14: Describe the kinds of/features of music you like.
24. 4/21: What makes a person beautiful?
25. 4/23: Think about all the pictures you’d never bring to the class to show. What’s wrong with those pictures?
1. 1/8: Who needs a little Socrates in their life? Whose beliefs and values need to be called into question?
2. 1/9: What value is there in philosophy (asking why, critically examining ideas of others, questioning beliefs/values, investigating cause and effects)? What might it add to your life? Based on what we read in Apology, how would Plato answer that question? Do you agree with him?
3. 1/10: If Plato and David Foster Wallace texted each other about thinking/how to live life/value of philosophy, how would that conversation go?
4. 1/13: Why do people live in community beyond familial ties? Which is better – living in community or living in solitude?
5. 1/15: What factors about a human being determine his/her likelihood to be successful in a community? Why are poor people poor and rich people rich?
6. 1/21: “All I'm saying is simply this, that all life is interrelated, that somehow we're caught in an inescapable network of mutuality tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly. For some strange reason, I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be. You can never be what you ought to be until I am what I ought to be. This is the interrelated structure of reality.” Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
What is justice? Describe a just community. Describe a just person.
7. 1/27: If the machine of government is of such a nature that it requires you to be the agent of injustice to another, then, I say, break the law. – Henry David Thoreau “Resistance to Civil Government”
Pull out your copy of the (excerpts from the) essay. What challenges you? Which ideas do you embrace? Which ideas do you reject? What do you wonder about? What are you reminded of?
8. 1/30: What do you personally believe to be true about human nature?
9. 2/5: I showed you ten scenarios of potential cheating in high schools. I asked you to think about what you would do and what the right thing to do is in each scenario?
10. 2/13: Look back at what you wrote on 2/5. Evaluate yourself using Kantian and Utilitarian ethics. How does that evaluation make you feel?
11. 2/25: Choose one statement from Jay Smooth’s TED talk. What challenges you? What do you embrace and/or reject? Why?
12. 2/26: Do you care where your food comes from in terms of growers, processors, distributors, etc.? Why or why not?
13. 3/3: What is the purpose of education (formal or otherwise)? What is the purpose of teachers? How do people best learn?
14. 3/5: Fill in the blank. In order to be successful today everyone should know ______. Defend your choice.
15. 3/7: We watched a video of a high schooler expressing his problem with Common Core to his school board, and then I asked: What’s your problem with education? Who would you address your problem to?
16. 3/17: Say something philosophical about your spring break.
17. 3/25: What’s Plato saying with the Allegory of the Cave. Read Hedges thoughts on the Allegory. Do you agree with his interpretation of it?
18. 3/26: We looked at a slide show of images (Van Gogh’s was one of them). What are you seeing? How does what you are seeing change as I change the slides?
19. 3/27: You brought an object/image you thought was worth seeing. What do you hope people will see when they look at your piece?
20. 3/28: Think about a movie/book/play/TV show/game that you love/hate because of the plot. What is so great/awful about the plot?
21. 4/4: What do you think of Duchamp’s Fountain?
22. 4/7: What do you know about street art?
23. 4/14: Describe the kinds of/features of music you like.
24. 4/21: What makes a person beautiful?
25. 4/23: Think about all the pictures you’d never bring to the class to show. What’s wrong with those pictures?