Pre Activities - (Let the River Go - What's Your Ambition? - A Home For Many)

INSTRUCTOR NOTES - STUDENT ACTIVITY

WHAT’S YOUR AMBITION?
Instructor Notes

Topic/Keywords
narrative account, prewriting, description, imagination, ambition, first person, "transient ambition"

Grade Level
6-8

Time Considerations
Instructor Preparation: 20 minutes
Student Activity: two 50-minute periods

Objective
Given chapter four from Life on the Mississippi, students should be able to:
· understand descriptive techniques and demonstrate them through a written narrative account describing his/her ambitions
· identify highlighted words and understand them in relationship to the rest of the text

Teacher Notes for Discussion
For an electronic copy of Life on the Mississippi visit the Mining Company Guide to Mark Twain at <http://marktwain.miningco.com/mlibrary.htm>.

For many years, the steamboat maintained its supremacy on the Mississippi Rivers, and on inland waters everywhere. It maneuvered easily in shallow waters, and its paddle wheels could operate equally efficiently going ahead or astern.

In 1830, nearly 200 steamboats operated on the Mississippi River. By that time, the river steamboat had developed its characteristic configuration: straight-sided, flat-bottomed, with a shallow draft that led skippers to boast that they could navigate anywhere, even on a "heavy dew."

For almost 50 years, the river steamboat was the main mover of goods—primarily, cotton and sugar and people—in the central U.S. Steamboats began to make regular visits to the docks of small river towns creating thriving cities. By the 1870s, however, railroads had supplanted the steamboat on most of the major routes, and the paddle wheeler eventually disappeared from U.S. waters.

Discuss the facts about steamboats and Twain’s portrayed image of them. Talk about Mark Twain’s narrative style in this piece and how he draws the reader into the story with colorful descriptions. He compares and contrasts the excitement of the steamboat’s arrival to the otherwise humdrum life in Hannibal. Point out some of the more descriptive passages. Discuss ambition and the idea expressed in the excerpt that ambitions change quite often throughout childhood.

Learn the Lingo
drayman: The one who drives a dray or a strong low cart for carrying heavy loads.

freight pile: In this context, the cargo, mail, and parcels waiting to be loaded on the packet boat.

gauge-cocks: Primitive devices used to determine water levels in the boiler. Steam issued from the cocks above the water level, hot water from the cocks below.

gingerbread: Applied by sailors to the carved and guilded decorations of a ship; especially of a gaudy type resembling frosting on such cookies.

jack-staff: The forwardmost mast where the Navy Jack flag is flown.

labboard: ‘Larboard’, former nautical usage for ‘port’ (left) side of the ship, abandoned because of frequent confusion with ‘starboard’ (right).

levee: An embankment to protect low-lying lands from flooding; a dike.
mud clerks: Assistant to the purser; the lowliest of clerical positions on a steamboat.

packet: Short for "packet boat", a boat that usually carried mail.

shingle-shavings: The product of whittling on a wooden shingle.
skids: Planks or beams of wood placed in parallel lines (like railroad tracks) to facilitate the moving of cargo.

texas: The next to the highest part on a steamboat, located immediately below the pilot house and used by the pilots for their living quarters. The texas was perched on the hurricane deck, which surmounted the boiler deck, which was above the main deck. Separated thus from the main body of the boat, it seems to have been associated with what is now the state of Texas, which for many years was disputed territory, settled by U.S. citizens but administered as independent (‘Lone Star’) from 1836 until it was officially annexed by the U.S. in 1845. The ‘texas’, similarly, was at once a part of yet independent from the rest of the steamboat.

WHAT’S YOUR AMBITION?
Student Activity

Understand Your Mission
Mark Twain’s descriptive style allows you to experience the way life was on the Mississippi River. After reading chapter four from Life on the Mississippi, discuss your ambitions with classmates and relate the excerpt to your own life. After discussion with your classmates, write a narrative about your ambitions.

Learn The Lingo
drayman gingerbread levee shingle-shavings
freight pile jack-staff mud clerks skids
gauge-cocks labboard packet texas

Gather Your Supplies
Mark Twain’s Life on the Mississippi or chapter four excerpt

Chart a Course for Exploration
1) Read chapter four: "The Boy’s Ambition" from Life on the Mississippi, note Twain’s narrative and descriptive style.
2) After reading, get together in groups of three to talk about your answers to the pre-writing questions listed below. Record your responses.
· Mark Twain wanted to be a steamboatman. What is your ambition? Is there a particular field or career that you have always been interested in? Is this a popular ambition among your comrades?
· Was there a defining a moment when you knew your ambition? Describe that moment.
· Picture yourself acting out your ambition. How are you dressed? How do you act? What activities are you engaged in from day to day?
· Do you admire other people who are engaged in that activity? Who are these people? Describe them.
· Ask one of the people in your group to picture you doing this job. What activities do they see you engaged in?
· Mark Twain tells us he had "transient ambitions." What were your ambitions five years ago? Have they changed? What factors contributed to the change?
· Have you had a chance to meet anyone who does this work? Have you been able to indulge your ambition?
3) Use your answers to the prewriting activity to write the first draft of a descriptive story about your ambitions. Imagine you are engaged in your ambition. The story should be in the first person. Use your experiences from the past and ideas for the future. Remember descriptive details, knowledge about the subject, and your imagination will make your story more interesting.
4) Get together with a different group of three and read each of your classmates’ stories twice. The first time you read it, look for surface errors, grammatical errors, and awkward sentences. The second time you read it, evaluate the content.
· Does the story make sense?
· What stands out?
· Is it descriptive?
· Did you enjoy the story?
· What questions are left in your mind after reading the story?
· What other constructive suggestions can you make?
5) Using the feedback obtained from your peers, rewrite your story incorporating any necessary changes. Revise to a final draft.

Go Beyond
Read all of Life on the Mississippi and write a critique. Would you recommend this book to your friends? Is it topical today or is it out of fashion?