Message from rpastor

[Anonymous]

I sat through "Last Samurai" with thoughts of using portions dealing with the samurai culture (avoiding the battle scenes that give it the "R" rating that makes using the entire movie out of the question for my 7th grade classes), but found them to be too few and far between for my editing abilities and equipment.

For those who have classes that need a visual explanation of the samurai culture, I recommend a TLC video from the "Ancient Tribes" series "The Samurai" (Vol.15) released by Ambrose Video Productions. I found a copy in the LA County Library. My classes are Esl learners of varying abilities and this video is perfect for them. It's 26 minutes long with lots of visuals, no "talking heads" other than the narrator. It covers the Taira/Minamoto civil war and uses it as a vehicle to explain the samurai culture and beliefs. The vocabulary used by the narrator is appropriate for most of my students and the video moves at a pace that is slow enough to follow yet fast enough they won't become bored.