Quotes (PDF)
Quotes from the novel
More quotes from the novel
Images from the movie

Ning Space
Google Page Creator

Discussion Schedule (have the reading finished by these dates)

Tuesday, May 14 (1-47)
Monday, May 19 (48-63)
Thursday, May 22 (64-79)
Wednesday, May 28 (80-95)
Monday, May 30 & June 2 (96-104)

Writing and Performance Assignment Schedule (late work not accepted)

“Where I’m From” poem due May 20
“Character Sketch” due May 23
“Essay of Place” due May 29
Oral Poetry Slam June 4
“Persuasive Essay” due June 6
Finished Google Web site June 6

Essential Questions

What is “the chief end of man"--or, in other words, what is the purpose of life?
Why can we never leave our youth and childhood behind?
Can fly fishing, or any art, take the place of religion in a person’s life?
In what ways do men and women tend to differ? In what ways are they the same?
What should the relation between men and women be?
What is place? What role does it play in our lives?
What is “it” in “a river runs through it.”

Discussion Questions

A River Runs Through It, like Huckleberry Finn, features a river as a central image. In what ways are the rivers in these two novels similar? In what ways do they differ?
What does Norman get from fishing? Why does it matter to him?

Overview

First, write a “Where I’m From” poem to use in the personal profile of your Ning page.

Then, create a Web page with four quotations from the book and four photographs that illustrate the quotations. These quotations each communicate a different piece of information about the novel:

• a quotation that shows the importance of place (the setting) in the novel
• a quotation that shows the relationship between two characters (e.g., for A River Runs Through It, the two brothers)
• a quotation that helps establish a metaphor explored in the book (e.g., for A River Runs Through It, the river or fly-fishing is a metaphor for life)
• the quote from the novel, the one passage or quotation that captures the essence, the true meaning, of the novel for you

Next, write three hyperlinked pieces: an essay of place, a character sketch and a persuasive essay explaining the quotation you’ve chosen as the quotation of the book

While you’re reading, keep a response reading journal that collects quotations from your readings. Include these details for each journal entry:

• Date.
• Two significant quotations from the day’s reading and the page number that they appeared on.
• Personal connections between your own life and events in the day’s reading.
• Two interesting questions you want to discuss further in class.

Assignment Guide Sheet

Assignment 1: “Where I’m From” poem (May 20)

Put this poem on your Ning page as your personal profile. Here’s a template to use in writing the poem.

This blog post has a list of links to student “Where I’m From” poems

Assignment 2: Four quotations on your home page (using Google Page Creator) with explanatory paragraphs

Choose quotes from the novel and four photographs that illustrate the quotations. These quotations each communicate a different piece of information about the novel:

* a quotation that shows the importance of place (the setting) in the novel
* a quotation that shows the relationship between two characters (e.g., for A River Runs Through It, the two brothers)
* a quotation that helps establish the metaphor explored in the book (e.g., for A River Runs Through It, the river or fly-fishing is a metaphor for life)
* the quote of the novel, the one passage or quotation that captures the essence, the true meaning, of the novel for you

Write a paragraph giving a “close reading” of each quote and post this below the quote.
Assignment sheet for quotations

Assignment 3: Character Sketch (May 23)

Write a character sketch of someone who has had some special meaning in your life. Provide specific details about the person and your relationship, and explain how this person helped form you into who you are today.

Publish your character sketch on your Ning blog. Later, you will move it to your Google web site, and at that time you should make a link to the quotation that youve chosen from your novel which shows the relationship between two characters.  If possible, include a photograph (recent or historical).

Gathering thoughts for a character sketch

Respond to the following prompts, allowing several minutes for writing answers to each question, to begin gathering details and ideas for their character sketches:

1. Think about the person you want to write about--why is this person important to you? why do you want to tell someone else about him or her?
2. Now that you have a particular person in mind, focus on giving your readers a strong image of the person. First, what do you see when you look at the person? How does the person dress? Describe the person’s gestures or facial expressions.
3. Next, talk about how the person talks. What topics does the person talk about? What kind of words does the person use? What makes you recognize this persons voice?
4. What values are important to this person? What does the person care most about, and how can you tell?
5. Think of a specific time you were with this person. Briefly tell the story of your time together--just get your ideas down. You can expand on them later.
6. What kind of emotional reaction do you want your reader to have to this person? How do you want your reader to feel after reading about him or her?

Character Sketch Assignment Sheet (1 page PDF)
Example of a character sketch
Character Sketch: Sample sentences

Assignment 4: Essay of Place (May 29)

Write a descriptive essay about a place that has had some special meaning in your life--a place that is still a part of you. Provide specific physical details about the place, and explain how this place helped form you into the person you are today.

As you get started, take a few minutes to think about how you want to order your essay: What will you summarize? What will you dramatize? Will you use chronological order or flashback?

Publish your essay of place on Ning then solicit comments on it. When it is finished, post a copy on your Google web page along with at least one photograph. Link the page to the quotation of place that you’ve chosen from your novel.

Here’s a complete unit I wrote for “Writing an Essay of Place.” It’s a larger process than I’m asking you to do, but it’s a good source of ideas.

Essay of Place Assignment Sheet (2 page PDF)
Essays of Place written by Montana high school students

The hunger for place is a hunger for orientation in a universe that cannot be known. Think of the consummate folly of attempting to go away from here when the constant endeavor should be to get nearer and nearer here.

Here are all the friends I ever had or shall have, and as friendly as ever. . .A man dwells in his native valley like a corolla in its calyx, like an acorn in its cup.

Here, of course, is all that you love, all that you expect, all that you are.

Henry David Thoreau

Assignment 5: Persuasive essay arguing for your view of A River Runs Through It and including what you think is the quotation that best gets to the heart of the novel. (June 6)

If you really want to get better at this sort of writing, read this little essay, ”Writing about an idea or a theme in a literary work,” very carefully. Underline things and think about them.

Assignment 6: Turn in your reading journal. It should include at least 5 entries, and each entry should include the following:

date
2 quotations with page number
notations making personal connections
2 interesting questions you want to discuss further in class

Assignment 7: Participate meaningfully in class seminars on the novel, focusing on close reading of passages in the novel. Come prepared with your reading journal and with questions to discuss. These discussion may take place orally or they may take place online, using the Ning Forum.

Extra Credit:

1. Poetry Slam: Oral reading of your “Where I’m From Poem” suitable for uploading to You Tube
2. Original photography illustrating your “essay of place” and character sketch.
3. Best 3 Google Web pages: 40 bonus points (completeness, thoughtfulness and beauty)

Handouts and Notes

“Close Reading” from the Atlantic Monthly

Poem: “A Ritual to be Read to Each Other” by William Stafford

Planning sheet
Essays will be scored using this rubric

It’s tricky to get photos to school, since they’re blocked in email and flickr is also blocked. Try to insert your photos at home. If you can’t do this, you can upload photos to Mosaic, then download them at school so you can insert them into your webpage. See me for a demonstration.

From NCTE

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2. As a Scot and a Presbyterian, my father believed that man by nature was a mess and had fallen from an original state of grace. Somehow, I early developed the notion that he had done this by falling from a tree. As for my father, I never knew whether he believed God was a mathematician but he certainly believed God could count and that only by picking up God’s rhythms were we able to regain power and beauty. Unlike many Presbyterians, he often used the world “beautiful.” (2)

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3. My father was very sure about certain matters pertaining to the universe. To him, all good things--trout as well as eternal salvation--come by grace and grace comes by art and art does not come easy. (4)

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4. Paul was too young to swing an axe or pull a saw all day, and besides he had decided this early that he had two major purposes in life: to fish and not to work, at least not allow work to interfere with fishing. In his teens, then, he got a summer job as a lifeguard at the municipal swimming pool, so in the early days he could look over girls in bathing suits and date them up for the late evenings. . .Early, then, he had come close to realizing life’s purposes, which did not conflict in his mind from those given in answer to the first question in the Westminster Catechism. (6-7)
("Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever.")

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5. [Florence, Norman’s mother-in-law] She knew how to clean fish when the men forgot to, and she knew how to cook them, and, most important, she knew always to peer into the fisherman’s basket and exclaim “My, my!” so she knew all that any woman of her time knew about fishing, although it is also true that she knew absolutely nothing about fishing.

“I would like very much to think of Neal with him and you,” she concluded, no doubt hoping that we would improve his morals even more than his casting. In our town, Paul and I were known as “the preacher’s kids,” and most mothers refrained from pointing us out to their children, but to this Scottish woman we were “the pastor’s sons,” and besides as fly fishermen we would be waist deep in cold water all day, where immorality is faced with some real but, as it turned out, not insurmountable problems.

“Poor boy,” she said, adding as many Scottish r’s as she could to “poor.” More than most mothers, Scottish mothers have had to accustom themselves to migration and sin, and to them all sons were prodigal and welcome home. Scotsmen, however, are much more reserved about welcoming returning male relatives, and do so largely under the powerful influence of their women.

“Sure I will,” Paul said, “if Florence wants me to.” And I knew that, having been given his word, I would never get another kick out of him.” (11)

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6. Even though Paul must have had three or four fish by now, I took my time walking down the trail, trying with each step to leave the world behind. Something within fishermen tries to make fishing into a world perfect and apart. I don’t know what it is or where, because sometimes it is in my arms and sometimes in my throat and sometimes nowhere in particular except somewhere deep. Many of us would probably be better fishermen if we did not spend so much time watching and waiting for the world to be better. (37)

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7. Fishing is a world apart from all others, and inside it are special worlds of their own--one is fishing for big fish in small water where there is not enough world and water to accommodate a fish and a fisherman, and the willows on the side of the creek are all against the fisherman. (40)

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8. I suppose he took my rod so I wouldn’t think that the cast into the bushes could be done only by his rod. It was in this way that I came to know that my rod can be made to cast into bushes, but the truth is I have never mastered the cast, probably because I still flinch from the prospect of losing flies that I don’t have to pay for.

I had no choice now but to cast into the willows if I wanted to know why fish were jumping in the water all around me except in this hole, and I still wanted to know, because it is not fly fishing if you are not looking for answers to questions. (42)

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9. When we were silent we could hear the needles falling like dry leaves. Suddenly the needles stopped. “I should leave Montana,” he [Paul] said. “I should go to the West Coast.”

I had thought that, too, but I asked, “Why?”

“Here,” he said, “I cover local sports and personal items and the police blotter. I don’t have anything to do. Here I will never have anything to do.”

“Except hunt and fish,” I told him.

“And get into trouble,” he added. (57)

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10. As the heat mirages on the river in front of me danced with and through each other, I could feel patterns from m own life joining with them. It was here, while waiting for my brother, that I started this story, although, of course, at the time I did not know that stories of life are often more like rivers than books. But I knew a story had begun, perhaps long ago near the sound of water. And I sensed that ahead I would meet something that would never erode so there would be a sharp turn, deep circles, a deposit, and quietness.

The fisherman even has a phrase to describe what he does when he studies the pattern of a river. He says he is “reading the water,” and perhaps to tell his stories he has to do much the same thing. Then one of his biggest problems is to decide where and at what time of day life lies ready to be taken as a joke. And to guess whether it is going to be a little or a big joke.

For all of us, though, it is much easier to read the waters of tragedy (63-64)

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11. He knew I was being blamed for Neal, and he may well have thought my marriage was breaking up. He had heard me called a bastard, and he was out of the house when I and the three Scottish women publicly declared our love for each other, given the restrictions that Scots put on such public declarations. Actually, I was feeling lordly with love and several times broke into laughter that I can’t explain otherwise, but he could have thought I was trying to be brave about having made a mess of my life. I don’t really know what he thought, but he was as tender as I usually tried to be to him. (78)

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12. “Help,” he said, “is giving part of yourself to somebody who comes to accept it willingly and needs it badly.

“So it is,” he said, using an old homiletic transition, “that we can seldom help anybody. Either we don’t know what part to give or maybe we don’t like to give any part of ourselves. Then, more often than not, the part that is needed is not wanted. And even more often, we do not have the part that is needed.” (81)

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13. They weren’t the biggest or most spectacular fish I ever caught, but they were three fish I caught because my brother waded across the river to give the fly that would catch them and because they were the last fish I ever caught fishing with him. (94)

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14. Then he told me, “In the part I was reading it says the Word was in the beginning, and that’s right. I used to think water was first, but if you listen carefully you will hear that the words are underneath the water.”

“That’s because you are a preacher first and then a fisherman,” I told him. “If you ask Paul, he will tell you the words are formed out of water.”

“No,” my father said, “you are not listening carefully. The water runs over the words. Paul will tell you the same thing.” (95-96)

[In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. John 1:1]

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15. “He is beautiful,” my father said. . .(100)

At the end of this day, then, I remember him both as a distant abstraction in artistry and as a closeup in water and laughter. (101)

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16. A river, though, has so many things to say that it is hard to know what it says to each of us. As we were packing our tackle and fish in the car, Paul repeated, “Just give me three more years.” At the time, I was surprised at the repetition, but later I realized that the river somewhere, sometime, must have told me, too, that he would receive no such gift. (102)

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17. “If you push me far enough, all I really know is that he was a fine fisherman.”

“You know more than that,” my father said. “He was beautiful.”

“Yes,” I said, “he was beautiful. He should have been--you taught him.” (103)

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18. “After you have finished your true stories sometime, why don’t you make up a story and the people to go with it?

“Only then will you understand what happened and why.” (104)

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19. Eventually, all things merge into one, and a river runs through it. The river was cut by the world’s great flood and runs over rocks from the basement of time. On some of the rocks are timeless raindrops. Under the rocks are the words, and some of the words are theirs.

I am haunted by waters. (104)

Friday, May 9 1-14
Monday, May 12 (15-32)
Tuesday, May 14 (33-47)
Monday, May 19 (48-63)
Thursday, May 22 (64-79)
Wednesday, May 28 (80-95)
Monday, May 30 & June 2 (96-104)

Writing and Performance Assignment Schedule

“Where I’m From” poem due May 20
“Character Sketch” due May 23
“Essay of Place” due May 29
Oral Poetry Slam June 4
“Persuasive Essay” due June 6
Finished Google Web site June 6

“If you don’t know where you’re from, you’ll have a hard time saying where you’re going.” Wendell Berry, among others, has voiced this idea that we need to understand our roots to know our place in the world.

Give it a try. The prompts have a way of drawing out memories of the smells of attics and bottom-drawer keepsakes; the faces of long-departed kin, the sound of their voices you still hold some deep place in memory. You’ll be surprised that, when you’re done, you will have said things about the sources of your unique you-ness that you’d never considered before. What’s more, you will have created something of yourself to share--with your children, spouse, siblings--that will be very unique, very personal and a very special gift.

Brainstorm a list

Brainstorm a list of places that stick in your mind.
Next, go beyond places. Describe colors, people, and objects
Then, try to remember sayings from parents/friends
Keep going:

Items from around the house
Items from the yard
Items found in the neighborhood
Names of relatives
Names of foods, dishes that recall family gatherings

Organize some of them into a form, starting with the WHERE I’M FROM Template:

1. I am from _______ (specific ordinary item), from _______ (product name) and _______.
2. I am from the _______ (home description… adjective, adjective, sensory detail).
3. I am from the _______ (plant, flower, natural item), the _______ (plant, flower, natural detail)
4. I am from _______ (family tradition) and _______ (family trait), from _______ (name of family member) and _______ (another family name) and _______ (family name).
5. I am from the _______ (description of family tendency) and _______ (another one).
6. From _______ (something you were told as a child) and _______ (another).
7. I am from (representation of religion, or lack of it). Further description.
8. I’m from _______ (place of birth and family ancestry), _______ (two food items representing your family).
9. From the _______ (specific family story about a specific person and detail), the _______ (another detail, and the _______ (another detail about another family member).
10. I am from _______ (location of family pictures, mementos, archives and several more lines indicating their worth).

“Where I’m From” - the original poem
Audio of George Alyon reading “Where I’m From”

A River Runs Through It

Friday, May 9 1-14

Monday, May 12 15-32
Tuesday, May 13 33-47
Wednesday, May 14 48-63
Thursday, May 15 64-79
Friday, May 16 80-95

Monday, May 19 96-104

Wind From an Enemy Sky

May 19 Hand out books, read first 2 chapters

May 20 Chap 1-2 (1-25)
May 21 Chap 3-4 (26-39)
May 22 Chap 5-6 (40-52)
May 23 Chap 7-10 (53-85)

May 26 Memorial Day No School
May 27 Chap 11-12 (86-100)
May 28 Chap 13-14 (101-111)
May 29 Chap 15-16 (112 - 128)
May 30 Chap 17-18 (129-151)

June 2 Chap 18-20 (152-173)
June 3 Chap 21-22 (174-187)
June 4 Chap 23-24 (188-198)
June 5 Chap 25-26 (199-215)
June 6 Chap 27-28 (216-226)

June 9 Chap 29-30 (227-241)
June 10 Chap 31-32 (242-258)
June 11 Quarter Final Exam (Chosen, River, Wind)
June 12 Last Day / Checkout

Chapter 1

1. What are Bull and his grandson doing at the beginning of the book? What does this beginning lead you to believe this story may be about?

2. Where has the boy (Antoine) been and what was his experience like?

3. What does Bull do when he sees the Dam? How does his reaction affect Antoine? What insight does this give you into their relationship?

4. Compare what Bull believes his grandson is thinking at the dam with what Antoine was really thinking. What does this show about their relationship?

5. What detail about Bull do you remember most vividly from this chapter? Why does this stand out? What other person does he remind you of (if you had to pick someone)? What are the similarities?

Chapter 2

6. How/ where did the government men want Bull to live? Why do you think they want this?

7. Find at least one detail about both Basil and Louis. Explain how the men are related to Antoine, in both the white and tribal relationship. 

8. Who is Two Sleeps and where did he come from?

9. Who is the man who comes into the camp at night singing? Why has he come and how do the other men in the circle feel about him?

10. It has been 30 years since Bull and his brother have talked. Why? How has the land changed since the men’s earlier years when they got along?

11. What is Henry Jim’s plan and how does Bull feel about it? How would you feel in Bull’s position?

Chapter 3

12.  Compare Bull and Henry Jim. Which character is more interesting to you? Why? Which would you rather spend time with?

13.  Who is Toby Rafferty and why has Henry Jim come to see him?

14.  What are four of the things the “men from afar countries, from somewhere east of the mountains” tell the Indians to do? What effect did these things have on the Indian families?

Chapter 4

15.  How would you rate Toby Raferty’s effectiveness on the Little Elk Reservation? Explain.

16.  How does the Indian tradition of the “midsummer dances” affect their farming? What would you do about this dilemma if you worked for the BIA?

17.  Who is Edwards and what kind of person is he?

18.  What is Rafertys opinion of the training Washington DC gives the people they send to work with the Indians?

19.  Compare Raferty’s description of Henry Jim with the earlier description about him from the book? What is similar? Different? What do you think accounts for the variance?

Chapter 5

20. How are Pock Face and Theobold described? After being introduced, do you like these men or not? Explain.

21. What do Pock Face & Theobold do in this chapter and how do they pull Bull into their actions? Do you think their actions are justifiable?

Chapter 6

22.  How is Wells involved with the medicine bundle and how does he think the Little Elk people would’ve acted differently if they had never lost the bundle? Do you agree with his speculation? Why or why not?

23.  What involvement did Henry Jim have with the bundle 30 years ago?

24.  Why won’t Wells help Raferty get the bundle back? What is the right thing to do?

Chapter 7

25. Where is Henry Jim going on Red Son at the beginning of the chapter? Why?

26.  How do all Henry Jims kinsmen react to the message he is bringing them?

27.  Why is Henry Jimand then everyone elseחsinging?

28.  Why won’t the US Marshall let the group of Indians inside the agency?

29.  Who is already inside the agency?

Chapter 8

30.  What does Two Sleeps tell the women when he’s ask to decide what should be done about Pock Face & Theobold? How do the women react to his answer?

31.  What happens with the whiskey? Why do you think this section is included in the book?

32.  What did Bull do to fool Antoine as Antoine was trying to find him? According to Veronica, why does he do this?

33.  How does Bull react when Pock Face tells him what he has done? How does this compare with what you would expect?

Chapter 9

34.  After they find the body, what is the tension between Rafferty and Grant? How are they approaching the crime differently?

35.  What do we learn about the man who was killed?

36.  What seems to be Sid Grant’s opinion of the Indian community? Find specific examples to back up your ideas.

37.  What does Antoine do as he translates?

Chapter 10

38.  Who is the Boy? What do you think are the most important pieces information we get about him in this chapter?

39.  What is confusing to Rafferty about the situation with the murder and how Bull and his people are involved?

40.  Who is singing in this chapter and what is the significance?

Chapter 11

41.  Where are Bull and his men kept and why is this location chosen instead of the jail?

42.  What does The Boy think working for the government does to an Indian mans relationship with his own people? Why do you think he continues his job if he believes this?

43.  What problem does Bull have with the white man’s law that is keeping him at the agency?

44.  What does Pock Face tell his people when he decides to speak?

How does Pock Face’s dad, Louis, react to his son’s announcement?

How does Bull react?

45. What has the Boy come to talk to Bull’s people about?

46. What is Bull’s impression of the “government man” (Rafferty)?

47. How does Bull want to handle the situation he and his people are in?

48. Why does Bull grieve for his brother Henry Jim when he isnt even dead?

Chapter 12

49. What do Catherine and Lucille have in common?

50. What are all the women in camp doing or getting ready for?

51. What is Marie Louise’s predicament and how does it turn out?

52. If you were a woman in camp, whose actions would probably most closely resemble your own? Why?

Chapter 13

53. Who arrives on the train?

54. Who is Adam Pell?

Chapter 14

55. Where does Antoine plan to go after leaving the women at his Uncle Jeromes camp?

56. What plan for the Indians does the Long Armed man explain to Antoine at the boarding school?

57. Describe Antoine’s experience at boarding school.

58.  What brings Antoine back to the Little Elk Reservation?

Chapter 15

59.  What disturbs Antoine about Henry Jim’s place, and what does he see once he gets there that makes him feel better?

60.  What is strange about Henry Jim lying on the ground? Why has Henry Jim moved out of his house? Does this make sense to you? Why or why not?

61.  What did the government man tell Henry Jim that turned out not to be true?

62. How does Henry Jim seem to feel now about the decisions he’s made in his life?

Chapter 16

63. What is Edwards evaluation of Henry Jim’s health?

64. What is Rafferty concerned about? What is The Boys advice to Rafferty when he questions him about how to proceed with the murder investigation?

65. What conclusion has Henry Jim come to about why his tribe just left him behind? Assuming his conclusion is correct, do you think they did the right thing?

66. How does Rafferty decide to handle the situation with Bull and the murder accusations & Henry Jim needing his family near him as he is growing weaker?

Chapter 17

67. What happened many years ago that first caused Bull to become angry? What changed? How?

68. What types of things were the white people doing at first that just made the Indians laugh?

69. Initially, what did Indians think would eventually happen to the white men? How did things actually progress? What does Bull think his people’s mistake was in dealing with the white people?

70. Explain Bull’s experience with the white school.

Chapter 18

71. What is the relationship between Adam Pell and Gen (or Ms. Thomas Hendricks Cook) and how is the boy that was murdered related to them?

72. What did Adam’s friend Carlos do with his family’s land and how did people react?

73. What was Adam Pell’s promise to Carlos that caused him to miss his sisters Christmas gathering to go to Cuno, Peru?  What did living in Cuno make Adam begin to think about?

74. What decision does Thomas Cooke make after listening to Adam and how does Gen react?

Chapter 19

75. Why is the design of the dam impressive to the engineer? He uses the word “beautiful” in his description. What adjective would you use?

76. How did the US Marshal and his men find the gun? What two questions are still left unanswered even after the gun is discovered?

Chapter 20

77. What is the first thing Bull says to the group when he arrives at the agency? How is this received?

78. How are the white laws and Indian ways of handling crimes different? What are the benefits and drawbacks of each system?

79. Why is Bull afraid of Sid Grant?

80. What are the contents of the two packages from Bull’s camp?

81. What are the two reasons the Marshall gives for his belief that Bull is not the murderer?

82. Who interrupts the meeting at the agency meeting and what is his message?

83. What stops Bull from rising to confront Adam Pell when he realizes he was the one responsible for the dam?

84. How does Thomas Cooke react to Pock Faces declaration and what does he recommend?

85. What realization has shocked Adam Pell? In what way, besides the trouble over the dam, is Adam Pell involved in the trouble on the Little Elk Reservation? After the discussion, what does he want to do and why?

Chapter 21

86. What did Rafferty and Doc Edwards make up to explain to some of the government men that came to Henry JimҒs funeral and asked why his body was taken from a teepee and not his “elegant house” and why they were taking his horse along to the burial?

87. What did Henry Jim’s burial service entail?

88. How long was Rafferty on the Little Elk Reservation before any of the Natives actually started taking to him? Does this seem a long or short amount of time? Explain.

89. What does Henry Two Bits come to ask Rafferty? What does he have that surprises Rafferty?

90. How have things changed between The Boy and the rest of the Little Elk people?

91. What does Bull ask The Boy to do for him?

Chapter 22

92.  How does it seem things are going to turn out for Pock Face? What leads you to this conclusion?

93.  What behavior of Bull’s, in his younger days when he was still drinking, sometimes scared others? What ended Bull’s drinking days?

Chapter 23

94.  What does Adam Pell realize American laws made legal that he feels is wrong (but none of his important friends seemed to agree). What did the law allow that Rafferty considered “thievery”? How does he think the white men who came to the reservation were also “exhorted”?

95.  What are the two things that resulted as the dam?

96.  How does Adam react to the judge’s claim that these exploits against the Indians were “hasty and not well considered”? 

Chapter 24

97.  What does Two Sleeps experience in this chapter?

Chapter 25

98.  The Little Elk people always get together for storytelling and remembering in the winter, but there are some things different than this winter than last. What are they?

99.  Describe the circumstances of how Antoine ended up at boarding school.

100. Describe how Celeste, Antoine, Veronica and Bull are related and how their relationships have changed over the years.

101. Why does Bull want to tell old stories—those his father knew—instead of telling stories from his own life? Do you think anything similar to this happens in society today?

102. Who is Featherboy really? What does he bring the Little Elk people and why is the bundle important or why do they people need to protect it?

Chapter 26

103. Why does Adam Pell want to bring the Little Elk people a gift?  What does he plan to give them? Where did this come from and why does he think it is a good gift? Do you think his gesture is appropriate or not? Explain.

Chapter 27

104. What messages does the Boy bring to Bull’s camp?

105. How does Louis feel about the current situation they are all in? What does he think they should do? What is Bull’s reply?

Chapter 28

106. How has the Little Elk Valley changed over the last few years? Which changes are positive? Negative?

107. What does Pock Face think they should do about the requests they receive? What does Louis think about it or want to do?

Chapter 29

108. What problem does Adam Rafferty think would arise if all 2,000 Indians actually decided they wanted to farm, as the government wants them to?

109. How does Adam Pell feel about the government’s Indian policy now he is aware of it?

110. What do Doc Edwards and Rafferty want Pell to do instead of telling Bull what actually happened to the bundle? Why? Do you think their plan is wise? Explain.

111. Why does Adam think his object is a good substitute for the bundle?

Chapter 30

112. Where are Bull and his group going, and what makes Bull suspicious?

Chapter 31

113. Where is Veronica going?

114. What do Veronica and Two Sleeps end up doing?

115. What does Veronica see that Two Sleeps seems to miss?

116. What does Two Sleeps see/ understand?

Chapter 32

117.  What does Rafferty think of The Boy? Of Bull?

118. What does Rafferty confront Adam about? (then warn him about again a few pages later)

119. What chance does Rafferty think they’ve missed by telling the Little Elk people their sacred object is gone?

120. Why has Adam Pell brought Mr. Davis?

121. What does Adam Pell tell Bull and his men? How do BullҒs men react?

122. What does Louis that basically ends the meeting?

123. Whose acts would you say are noble in the end? How do you decide?

124.  What do you think of the ending of the book? Is it strong or weak? Interesting? Regardless of whether your like or dislike it, does it seem appropriate? Why or why not?

125. Go back to the first sentence of the book: “The Indian named Bull and his grandson took a walk into the mountains to look at a dam built in a cleft of rock, and what began as a walk became a journey into the world.” After finishing, what do you think this means?

126. What parts of the book seems to reflect historical events?

First, what is the meaning of human equality as articulated in the Declarations assertion that ғall men are created equal? Equal in what respects? What view of human nature does this presuppose? Does the Declaration mean to include African-Americans, as Abraham Lincoln, along with Frederick Douglass and the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., insisted?

Second, what does the Declaration mean by asserting that we possess rights that are not ԓalienable? Who or what, precisely, cannot alienate our rights? Are all rights deemed inalienable, or only some? And why?

Third, why does the Founding generation consider government just only when it is instituted by the consent of the governed? Is justice for the Founders merely consent-based? If not, what might trump consent?

Fourth, why did the Founders opt for representative democracy over the ԓpure version of democracy practiced in ancient Athens? What did The Federalist (penned by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay) assert was the inadequacy of ancient democracy?

Fifth, how does the Constitution seek to reconcile democracy, which means rule by the majority, with the rights of minorities? Stated differently, how do we do justice both to the equality of all and to the liberty of each?

Sixth, and finally, what economic conditions make American democracy possible? Why does the Constitution protect property rights? Why do its critics, such as Marx, believe private property to be the root of injustice? How would Madison and Hamilton have responded to MarxԒs and his followers critique?

Implicit in these questions are at least ten fundamental documents and major speeches that every American citizen should study. The questions regarding the meaning of human equality, inalienable rights, popular consent, and the right of revolution clearly require an examination of the Declaration, along with Frederick DouglassҒs The Meaning of the Fourth of July to the Negro,Ӕ and Chief Justice Taneys infamous opinion for the majority in the Dred Scott case (where Taney denies that African-Americans have any rights that whites are bound to respect). Against Taney, Frederick DouglassҒs and Lincolns scathing critiques of the Dred Scott opinion need to be taught.

The Declaration needs also to be scrutinized in its relation to the pro-womanҒs-suffrage, 1848 Seneca Falls Declaration of Sentiments and ResolutionsӔ and the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr.s ғI Have a Dream speech, delivered on the National Mall in 1963. Why did Elizabeth Cady Stanton look to the form and substance of the Declaration of Independence in crafting the Seneca Falls Declaration? What did the Reverend King mean by asserting that the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution constituted a ԓpromissory note to which every American was to fall heir?

The Constitution, of course, must be taught to our students. As both critics and admirers of the Constitution agree, there is no more authoritative commentary on that document than The Federalist, the series of 85 newspaper essays defending and explaining the Constitution, written during the period that the states were debating its ratification. Specifically, the questions regarding representation, minority rights, and the economics of democracy require examination of the Constitution and The Federalist, along with Theodore and Franklin RooseveltԒs writings and speeches on economic democracy.

Finally, for reasons already articulated, all students need to be introduced both to Tocquevilles defense of democratic equality and to his concerns over the intellectual conformism to which American democracy lies exposed.

I think of myself as a _______ (your temperament e.g. quiet, bubbly, shy, outgoing) person, although I’ve also been known to __________ when __________ . I asked my friends how they would describe me and they said ________, ________ and _________.

The things I love most in life are ______, _________ and ________ (list your favorite things, e.g. hanging with friends, my relationship with God, photography, cycling, family, my kids). I’ve been ___________ (one of your hobbies) for ____ years, and I really love it.

My idea of the perfect day would start with _________. And then I’d _______ and finish off by ________.

The kinds of people I’d like to spend time with are ones who are ________ and ________. That’s important to me because __________.

Use specifics. Be sincere and honest. Write like you talk. Show your personality. If you make jokes, make them tasteful, self-deprecating or sarcastic, and do so with caution. Figure out what makes you different from everyone else, and use it to your advantage. Again, stay away from generic adjectives and focus more on proper nouns and stories. Stay consistently positive and confident without seeming annoying and arrogant. Be proud of who you are and wear it confidently in your language and tone. No red flags, no obvious baggage, no glaring insecurities, no spelling mistakes, no superficial wish list about money or looks.

You should have fun writing your profile. If you have fun writing it, the reader will likely have fun reading it.

Montana is fortunate to have a rich literary tradition. Many Montana writers have earned national reputations by telling stories about what life has been like at various times in “the last best place.” This course will explore some of the best-loved works of Montana literature, including fiction, memoirs and poetry.

Students in this course will not only read Montana literature, they will create some. Using the readings to form important questions, they will gather stories from their own family or community, researching in family photo albums, old newspapers, and other documents, and conducting oral history interviews. Each student will be expected to finish one previously unpublished story based on this research.

The reading will pay special attention to several important themes that occur over and over in Montana’s literature:

Men and Women and Families in Literature: Many Montana writers have written about the joys and challenges of living in families, including differences and similarities in male and female nature and character; possibilities of conflict between men and women; equality, subordination, oppression, rebellion, manipulation, conflict, harmony, and happiness in the relations between the sexes; love, courtship, marriage, maternity and paternity; ideals of masculinity and femininity.

Nature in Literature: We will pay attention to the role of nature and the landscape in literary works; relations between human beings and the natural world; obligations of human beings toward nature; conflicts between ecological and human interests; proper and improper uses of nature; meaning and role of natural forces and phenomena in literature; natural objects as symbols.

American Indians in Literature: We will explore how American Indians are represented in literature, discussing the relationship between culture and place; stories and storytellers in community; struggle and conflict with living between diverse worlds; traditional roles, stereotypes, and ideals of American Indians; cultural and personal loss and survival; concepts of power, success, relatedness, dreams, humor, and the sacred; the representation of heroes.

The Big Sky by A.B. Guthrie
The Big Sky is the first of Pulitzer Prize winning author A. B. Guthrie, Jr.’s, epic adventure novels of Montana’s vast frontier. In The Big Sky we will explore Montana during the fur trade era, traveling with Boone Caudill, Jim Deakins, and Dick Summers, three of the most memorable characters in Western American literature. Traveling the Missouri River from St. Louis to the Rockies, these frontiersmen live as trappers, traders, guides, and explorers. The story centers on Caudill, a young Kentuckian driven by a raging hunger for life and a longing for the blue sky and brown earth of big, wild places. Caught up in the freedom and savagery of the wilderness, Caudill becomes an untamed mountain man, married to the beautiful daughter of a Blackfoot chief. In The Big Sky, Guthrie gives us an unforgettable portrait of a spacious land and a unique way of life.

We Pointed Them North by E. C. ("Teddy Blue") Abbott $13.57
Blue’s recollections present a delightful view of cowboy life, drama, and humor during the great cattle drive and cattle ranching era. This fast-paced and irreverent memoir presents a vivid view of the real cowboy and the code that drove their action. Teddy Blue took part in the original cattle drives from the South to the Montana prairies and he tells the unforgettable stories of what young men in wild country did and thought.

The Undying West: A Chronicle of Montana’s Camas Prairie by Carlene Cross $9.66
In The Undying West, Carlene Cross creates a memorable blend of personal and Flathead Reservation history. It’s a wonderful model of writing based on family history research. She presents both homesteader and native views of the homestead era. The voices in her stories include those of her father and his “sod-busting” friends; the Salish, Kootenai, Nez Perce, and Iroquois Indians; the fossil remains of Montana’s prehistory; and even the wind, the soil, and the prairie grasses. She offers a personal testament to the enduring qualities of the West.

Winter Wheat by Mildred Walker $11.16
Montana’s literature is especially rich in its stories of what life was like for women here. With an arid “dry-land” wheat farm as both its geographic and metaphoric center, Winter Wheat--a One-Book Montana selection--is a love story in which eighteen-year-old Ellen Webb comes to understand herself better, but also comes to see her parents’ marriage in a new light. Her Vermont-born father and Russian-born mother, married during the first World War, have come as homesteaders to Barton, Montana - a grain-elevator and general store. It is 1940, the year Ellen will start college if the wheat harvest is good. The harvest pays and Ellen goes off to college, where she immediately falls in love: “I hadn’t meant to fall in love so soon, but there’s nothing you can do about it. It’s like planning to seed in April and then having it come off so warm in March that the earth is ready.” Ellen and Gil plan their marriage for after the summer harvest. But Gil arrives and doesn’t find Montana or the life of dry-land wheat farmers beautiful. Ellen begins to see everything, including her parents, with new eyes in this poignant examination of love and life.

Fools Crow (Contemporary American Fiction) by James Welch $10.20
Suspenseful and moving, written with an authenticity and integrity that give it sweeping power, Welch’s third novel is a masterful evocation of a Native American culture and its passing. >From their lodges on the endless Montana plains, the members of the Lone Eaters band of the Pikuni (Blackfeet) Indians live in harmony with nature, hunting the “blackhorns” (buffalo), observing a complex system of political administration based on mutual respect and handing down legends that explain the natural world and govern daily conduct. We watch the escalating tensions between the Pikunis and the white men ("the Napikwans"), who deliberately violate treaties and initiate hostilities with the hard-pressed red men, leading up to a searing experience based on the Marias River Massacre. There is much to savor in this remarkable book: the ease with which Fools Crow and his brethren converse with animals and spirits, the importance of dreams in their daily lives, the customs and ceremonies that measure the natural seasons and a person’s lifespan. Without violating the patterns of Native American speech, Welsh writes in prose that surges and sings. We follow Fools Crow’s growth from a boy in a traditional community to a man, responsible for keeping his family and tribe together through terrible challenges.

Red Rover by Deirdre McNamer $16.47
As boys, brothers Aidan and Neil Tierney ride the Montana prairie on horseback, yearning for adventure. As men, they find it: Neil pilots a B-29 over Japan, while Aidan hunts Nazis in Argentina for the FBI. But although they both return from the war, Aidan proves a casualty nonetheless. Sickened by a mysterious ailment, suffering almost more from disillusionment, he won’t survive 1946. Spanning the years 1927 through 2003 and employing richly layered, interlocking points of view, McNamer teases out the surprising truth behind Aidan’s death, portraying an era of idealism and of myopia and paranoia. If the high plains and deep valleys of Montana seem an unlikely place to play out the cynical spy hunting of the J. Edgar Hoover era, modern-day echoesallegations of profiteering in Iraqחremind us that no place on earth is too remote to be touched by the prevailing winds. The powerful ending rewards the time spent getting there. Elegant and assured, with a joy in language that shows on every page.

You save your files on a free internet site instead of on the hard drive of your computer, so you can get to the files and open them from any computer that is connected to the internet.

* Save 1000+ Microsoft Office documents in one place
* Access them from almost any computer with a Web browser
* No more flash drives or sending yourself documents via e-mail

This is a great way to get files from home to school, or vice versa. Also, you can “share” your files so that others can read and comment on them, so this is a great way to work together on group projects. No more getting hung up if someone in the group is absent but the files are in their folder on the school server.

Every one has heard people quarreling. Sometimes it sounds funny and sometimes it sounds merely unpleasant; but however it sounds, I believe we can learn something very important from listening to the kinds of things they say. They say things like this: “How’d you like it if anyone did the same to you?"—"That’s my seat, I was there first"—"Leave him alone, he isn’t doing you any harm"—"Why should you shove in first?"—"Give me a bit of your orange, I gave you a bit of mine"—"Come on, you promised.” People say things like that every day, educated people, as well as uneducated, and children as well as grown-ups.

Now what interests me about all these remarks is that the man who makes them is not merely saying that the other man’s behavior does not happen to please him. He is appealing to some kind of standard of behavior which he expects the other man to know about. And the other man very seldom replies: “To hell with your standard.”

Nearly always he tries to make out that what he has been doing does not really go against the standard, or that if it does there is some special excuse. He pretends there is some special reason in this particular case why the person who took the seat first should not keep it, or that things were quite different when he was given the bit of orange, or that something has turned up which lets him off keeping his promise. It looks, in fact, very much as if both parties had in mind some kind of Law or Rule of fair play or decent behavior or morality or whatever you like to call it, about which they really agreed.

And they have. If they had not, they might, of course, fight like animals, but it they could not quarrel in the human sense of the word. Quarreling means trying to show that the other man is in the wrong. And there would be no sense in trying to do that unless you and he had some sort of agreement as to what Right and Wrong are; just as there would be no sense in saying that a footballer had committed a foul unless there was some agreement about the rules of football.

Now this Law or Rule about Right and Wrong used to be called the Law of Nature. Nowadays, when we talk of the “laws of nature” we usually mean things like gravitation, or heredity, or the laws of chemistry. But when the older thinkers called the Law of Right and Wrong “the Law of Nature,” they really meant the Law of Human Nature. The idea was that, just as all bodies are governed by the law of gravitation and organisms by biological laws, so the creature called man also had his law—with this great difference, that a body could not choose whether it obeyed the law of gravitation or not, but a man could choose either or obey the Law of Human Nature or to disobey it.

We may put this in another way. Each man is at every moment subjected to several sets of law but there is only one of these which he is free to disobey. As a body, he is subjected to gravitation and cannot disobey it; if you leave him unsupported in mid-air, he has no more choice about falling than a stone has. As an organism, he is subjected to various biological laws which he cannot disobey anymore than an animal can. That is, he cannot disobey those laws which he shares with other things; but the law which is peculiar to his human nature, the law he does not share with animals or vegetables or inorganic things, is the one he can disobey if he chooses.

This law was called the Law of Nature because people thought that every one knew it by nature and did not need to be taught it. They did not mean, of course, that you might not find an odd individual here and there who did not know it, just as you find a few people who are colour-blind or have no ear for a tune. But taking the race as a whole, they thought that the human idea of decent behavior was obvious to everyone. And I believe they were right. If they were not, then all the things we said about the war were nonsense. What was the sense in saying the enemy were in the wrong unless Right is a real thing which the Nazis at bottom knew as well as we did and ought to have practiced? If they had no notion of what we mean by right, then, though we might still have had to fight them, we could no more have blamed them for that then for the colour of their hair.

I know that some people say the idea of a Law of Nature or decent behavior known to all men is unsound, because different civilizations and different ages have had quite different moralities.

But this is not true. There have been differences between their moralities, but these have never amounted to anything like a total difference. If anyone will take the trouble to compare the moral teaching of, say, the ancient Egyptians, Babylonians, Hindus, Chinese, Greeks and Romans, what will really strike him will be how very like they are to each other and to our own. Some of the evidence for this I have put together in the appendix of another book called The Abolition of Man; but for our present purpose I need only to ask the reader to think what a totally different morality would mean. Think of a country where people were admired for running away in battle, or where a man felt proud of double-crossing all the people who had been kindest to him. You might just as well try to imagine a country where two and two make five. Men have differed as regards what people you ought to be unselfish to—whether it was only your own family, or your fellow countrymen, or everyone. But they have always agreed that you ought not to put yourself first. Selfishness has never been admired. Men have differed as to whether you should have one wife or four. But they have always agreed that you must not simply have any woman you liked.

But the most remarkable thing is this. Whenever you find a man who says he does not believe in a real Right and Wrong, you will find the same man going back on this in a moment later. He may break his promise to you, but if you try breaking on to him he will be complaining “It’s not fair” before you can say Jack Robinson. A nation may say treaties do not matter; but the next minute, they spoil their case by saying that the particular treaty they want to break was an unfair one. But if treaties do not matter, and if there is not such thing as Right and Wrong—in other words, if there is no Law of Nature—what is the difference between a fair treaty and an unfair one? Have they not let the cat out of the bag and shown that, whatever they say, they really know the Law of Nature just like anyone else?

It seems, then, we are forced to believe in a real Right and Wrong. People may be sometimes mistaken about them, just as people sometimes get their sums wrong; but they are not a matter of mere taste and opinion any more than the multiplication table. Now if we are agreed about that, I go on to my next point, which is this. None of us is really keeping the Law of Nature. If there are any exceptions among you, I apologize to them. They had much better read some other work, for nothing I am going to say concerns them. And now, turning to the ordinary human beings who are left:

I hope you will not misunderstand what I am going to say. I am not preaching, and Heaven knows I do not pretend to be better than anyone else. I am only trying to call attention to a fact; the fact that this year, or this month, or, more likely, this very day, we have failed to practice ourselves the kind of behavior we expect from other people. There may be all sorts of excuses for us. That time you were so unfair to the children was when you were very tired. That slightly shady business about the money--the one you have almost forgotten—came when you were very hard up. And what you promised to do for old So-and-so and have never done—well, you never would have promised if you had known how frightfully busy you were going to be. And as for your behavior to your wife (or husband) or sister (or brother) if I knew how irritating they could be, I would not wonder at it—and who the dickens am I, anyway?

I am just the same. That is to say, I do not succeed in keeping the Law of Nature very well, and the moment anyone tells me I am not keeping it, there starts up in my mind a string of excuses as long as your arm. The question at the moment is not whether they are good excuses. The point is that they are one more proof of how deeply, whether we like if or not, we believe in the Law of Nature. If we do not believe in decent behavior, why should we be so anxious to make excuses for not having behaved decently? The truth is, we believe in decency so much—we feel the Rule of Law pressing on us so—that we cannot bear to face the fact that we are breaking it, and consequently we try to shift the responsibility. For you notice that it is only for our bad behaviour that we find all these explanations. It is only our bad temper that we put down to being tired or worried or hungry; we put our good temper down to ourselves.

These, then, are the two points I wanted to make. First, that human beings, all over the earth, have this curious idea that they ought to behave in a certain way, and cannot really get rid of it. Secondly, that they do not in fact behave in that way. They know the Law of Nature; they break it. These two facts are the foundation of all clear thinking about ourselves and the universe we live in. 

Jim is “down on Solomon” for threatening to cut a child in two, and this is plainly preparation for our later discovery that Jim cares very much for his own children, and blames himself for having been unintentionally cruel to his daughter.

According to 2 Chronicles, two prostitutes ask Solomon to adjudicate their claim to the same baby. Lacking witnesses, the king resorts to the letter of the law, treats the baby as property, and orders it cut in half. Predictably, the sound heart of the real mother compels her to plead for the child’s life, Solomon finds his credible witness, and justice prevails. When the biblical account is viewed as an allegory about the relationship of justice (what is morally right) and the law (what is legally sanctioned), King Solomon becomes the wise intercessor; the child, a human being treated as property (the condition of the Israelites during much of Solomon’s reign); the fraudulent mother, a diseased conscience potentially abetted by civil law;