1492
b. Listen to the music again while watching this clip:
2015 - Click here to watch the clip, answer the questions
and write a text which describes Columbus voyage to the
new world (answering the questions will help you write the text) :
Columbus' first voyage to America
e .Click here to learn about the Jews expulsion from Spain and about Columbus's journey.
2. Basic Understanding stage:
1492
Thou two-faced year, Mother of Change and Fate,
Didst weep when Spain cast forth with flaming sword,
The children of the prophets of the Lord,
Prince, priest, and people, spurned by zealot hate.
Hounded from sea to sea, from state to state,
The West refused them, and the East abhorred.
No anchorage the known world could afford,
Close-locked was every port, barred every gate.
Then smiling, thou unveil'dst, O two-faced year,
A virgin world where doors of sunset part,
Saying, "Ho, all who weary, enter here!
There falls each ancient barrier that the art
Of race or creed or rank devised, to rear
Grim bulwarked hatred between heart and heart!"
Emma Lazarus
3. Analysis and interpretation:
Analysis:
“1492” is a poem built on contradictory historical events that occurred in the year
1492. The speaker bemoans the expulsion of Jews from Spain in 1492 and glories in the
discovery of the new world in the same year, a discovery which eventually will lead to a
haven for persecuted Jews. Thus the year is ironic in Jewish history, and it is the
opposing, almost simultaneous nature of the events that makes the year a fitting subject
for a poem. For the speaker, the contradictory year becomes a “two-faced year”; it is a
year that engenders (mothers) great change, and it is a fateful (or pivotal) year.
The first quatrain addresses the year as if it is a person. The speaker personifies
the year when she writes: “Thou . . . Didst weep when Spain cast forth with flaming
sword/The children of the prophets of the Lord” (the Jews). Echoing the image of a
flaming sword which expelled Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden, the speaker indicates that all Jews in
Spain (“Prince, priest, and people”) suffered because of the Spaniards’ hate.
Afterwards, the expelled Jews were chased “from sea to sea, from state to state.”
No one gave them refuge. “The West (nations in the western hemisphere) refused to
accept them, and the East (eastern nations) abhorred, or hated, them even more than did
the Spaniards. Indeed, all nations of the known world rejected the refugees and kept
them from their ports and border gates.
But then the poem takes a turn when the speaker says the year smiles and
uncovers (“unveil’dst”) a new, or “virgin,” world. It is a world where the refugees are
welcomed at the “doors of sunset,” or the doors of a continent west of Europe.
The last lines say that the doors of the new world are open to people of all races,
beliefs, and social classes, in other words, the new world defies all restrictions created by
the skill (“art”) of a humankind motivated by hate.
Through repetition, the poem focuses on antagonism (“hate,” “abhorred,”
“hatred”) and on obstacles to human contact (“port,” “gate,” “barrier,” “bulwarked”).
But significantly, the poem ends on a hopeful note with its focus on a new world that is
innocent of hate and that welcomes the despised.
http://www.wingate.edu/matthews/uploads/cms/file/sample%20explication.pdf
HOTS - Parts and whole.
2015:
Click here to explicitly study the HOTS.
2012:
While learning this HOTS we watched a movie about Sherlock Holmes.
Our pupil Amit Yofe became a fan and even visited his house in London in 2012! (see what HOTS can do to you ....)
2013:
In April 2013 Gaya Shiloah followed Sherlock Holmes and visited his house in London:
2014:
In July 2014 Tamar Shapira and Yuval Shteinfeld visited Sherlock Holmes at his house:
2014:
In the summer of 2014, finally, Orit visited the famous house at 221b Baker Street.
4. Bridging text and context (for 10th graders):
Watch this clip on youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynbhkK0PQaI
After watching and listening to the clip, fill out the worksheet your teacher gave you.
4. Bridging text and context (for 11th graders):
Read about Emma Lazarus's life (from a reliable source online).
Answer: After reading her biography, what made her write this poem?
4. Bridging text and context (9th grade 2014)
Watch the clip about Ellis Island
Click here to fill in a worksheet
5. Post reading:
Watch this clip about the tragic voyage St. Louis:
Read this source of information, print it out, add it to your folder and bring it with you to class for the quiz.
גם פורטוגל אישרה: אזרחות ליהודים-ספרדים
אחרי מדריד, אישרה הממשלה בליסבון תיקונים לחוק שיקנו זכויות אזרחות כפולה ליהודים ממוצא ספרדי-פורטוגזי שיוכיחו "קשר מסורתי"
AP
פורסם: 29.01.15 , 16:55
