Final Essay

[Anonymous]

The course began with an indepth discussion on the interconnectedness of East Asian societies and the United States of America. It was brilliant way to begin a course mostly rooted in the historical aspects of East Asian Cultural traditions/philosophy as it allowed us to see those connections bud and flower into our modernity. From the discussions on the various political philosophies such as Mohism, Legalism, Confucianism and the like to other disucssions on Japanese Poetry. The class demonstrated the humanity and social heirarchies present in Asian society can often directly parallel or uniquely oppose Western or American ideas. When one considers this it creates massive springboard for analysis and comparative study that will broaden, heighten and enlighten any classroom.

The most stand-out and defining moment of the class for me was the Rittenbergs account of the cultural revolution. It was at all times challenging, thought-provoking and heroic. Their shared experience of absolute freedom before absolute tyranny speaks volumes of the dangers of misguided or misdirected populism in China. It serves as a warning to all nations, especially the United States, about the dangers of mob rule. If I were to create a lesson highlighting the dangers of totalitarian regimes and asked students to draw modern parallels the results would be striking to say the least. With focus how dictators assume power, put forth their vile agendas and deify themselves within the minds of their supporters. The Rittenberg lecture at USC reminded me again about my role as a teacher to serve students deep, meaningful lessons designed to impact.

The course overall has renewed in me the spirit to go beyond my curriculum to craft challenging and thought provoking lessons that link our nation to East Asia. And though our nation has always been linked to East Asian, create lessons that embolden and highlight those relations.

[Anonymous]

Harpreet Sidhu
Clayton Dube
East Asia Seminar
23 June 2017
Final Essay
Since I teach English, I did not really know how learning about East Asian history was going help me build English curriculum. It was not until after I started learning about the connections to be made to all of the Asian literature that we were exposed to in this class did I start to see how to incorporate it into my English curriculum. Much of the classical Chinese poetry that has to do with nature can be used to make connections to poets such as Walt Whitman and Robert Frost. It gives my students another cultural perspective about how others view nature and how they convey it through their writing.
I also have always loved Japanese culture, especially the warrior traditions. I was most looking forward to this unit in the seminar. I teach my students about flawed heroes in the texts that we read and analyze. Learning about the samurai and their traditions influenced me to create my final project on comparing Shakespeare’s Macbeth to legendary filmmaker, Akira Kurosawa’s interpretation of Macbeth, “Throne of Blood.” I want to teach this unit to my AP English Literture class at some point to really analyze the warriors in both mediums and to truly see each character’s flaws.
Overall, I have really learned a lot about the East Asian culture, history, politics, and how each of these has had and continues to have lasting effects on the world. I will continue to look into other East Asian texts and bring them to my class for students to truly have a culturally rich and diverse learning experience.

[Anonymous]

Final Essay
I absolutely loved attending this seminar class. I learned so much about East Asia, and many ways to incorporate teaching about it in the classroom. I’m glad for this experience as it opened my eyes to many very important topics and issues and also gave me a better depth of knowledge of my own culture (I’m half Korean). The things that were of greatest relevance to me personally was learning about the Chinese Cultural Revolution and also learning about how important poetry, literature and the arts were- and how it was considered the most important accomplishment in personal and professional life.
I teach primary grades in elementary school (Kinder, 1st, 2nd) and the topics I can relate to our curriculum the most would be basic geography, poetry and literature, and I believe the students would especially enjoy topics covered in warrior Japan. Students can compare and contrast tomb sites, warriors, castles, and culture of ancient civilizations around the world. A fun literature unit would be to do a “Cinderella around the world”- comparing different versions of ‘Cinderella’ from different cultures, with an opinion on which is their favorite. Lastly, other languages fascinate young students, especially in primary grade levels. It would be fun for them to learn some of the characters and the different tones in the Chinese language.

[Anonymous]

I visited China about two years ago. Even though I enjoyed the trip a lot and learned a lot about China. At the end of my I realized that I did not have a lot of knowledge about China or East Asia in general and felt like I missed something on this trip. This institute allowed me to understand the history and culture of China that I felt like I missed out on in this trip.
The institute provided valuable information, the lectures were engaging, and I appreciated the strategies presented. The institute offered so much information that I thought I could incorporate into my curriculum as a high school social studies teacher. However, a I move on to a new teaching assignment next year, as an 8th grade U.S History teacher I find that it will be a bit more challenging to incorporate the information that I learned. Nonetheless, I think I would like to incorporate some of the readings with my students when looking at some of our units next year. For example, when exploring Westward Expansion and the assimilation process of Indigenous youth through the Carlisle school I will bring in the piece about hair and the strategy of submission. Furthermore, I think that the strategies will be something that I will incorporate, specially the guiding questions. I will also try to bring in guest speakers to my class. The guest lecturers and speakers were so knowledgeable and engaging and I really appreciate the institute’s organizers effort to make sure we had so many experts to learn from. Guest speakers would add a lot of value to a unit of study and would like to incorporate into my 8th grade class for next year.
I enjoyed attending class and learning something new each session. I am looking forward to second part of this institute in the fall.

[Anonymous]

I remember my first class with the US-China Institute, and feeling like I had no idea what I was supposed to do. I felt so lost. I have now participated in three sessions, and one of the things I am repeatedly impressed by is how each speaker is such an expert in their field, that information just flows out of them effortlessly. I have been in awe and am even envious of people like Clay Dube, Samuel Yamashita, and Jennifer Jung Kim, whom I've heard a few times, because they are able to be experts in a field. I teach elementary school, and I feel like I am pulled in a thousand different directions, but I'm not particularly great at, or knowledgeable about anything; jack of all trades, master of none. So one day, a couple of months back, I was reading diary entries from "Diary of an Evacuated Schoolgirl" to my class. (I also put it under the document camera while I'm reading, so they can see it). We were talking about the diary entry and the girl, and my students were asking questions, and I was answering them. It became apparent to me that I was filled with enough knowledge of the subject matter, that I could give them sufficient answers from memory. I had become saturated enough with Chinese, Japanese, and Korean history, that I could answer questions without having to research. That was a very exciting moment for me. It was as notable as the moment when I became able to not only play the piano, but also sing while I was playing. It felt like I had finally put enough puzzle pieces together that I could tell what the picture was going to be. It was no longer a pile of unrecognizable things that I had to sift through. The information had finally become organized and orderly and, therefore, readily available - useful. So that is actually how I feel about myself and this class now. I feel useful. That is a good feeling, and I appreciate the US-China Institute for reaching out to teachers like me who have a wish to become useful experts.

[Anonymous]

Participating in the traditional East Asia Origins to 1800 Institute allowed me to grasp a deeper understanding of the cultures of China, Japan, and Korea. Although I currently teach my second graders about ancient China and Modern Japan, I feel it was on a very superficial level and just offered them limited information on such rich and vast cultures. Now that I understand them a lot more and have become more familiar with some of the practices, I can extend my lessons by exposing them to more literature, poetry, art, and music. As we delve more into the countries I can have them compare their own culture with that of Asian children. After completing the unit we can have a culmination where they can recite poems like Haikus and Sijos, dance to Chinese music, or even K-Pop. I can also encourage them to create their own performance and present to their parents. I would also go as far as to provide them with foods from each culture so they can try food different from their own culture. After this activity we can discuss differences and similarities. Guiding them to the understanding that these cultures are very interrelated.
Overall I enjoyed the topics offered and all the presenters. They were very passionate and well versed in their craft. Everything we learned was very valuable and sparked a greater interest to learn more about Asia. I look forward to participating in any activities provided. It was a pleasure to be in your class!
edited by jmartinez on 6/24/2017
edited by jmartinez on 6/24/2017

[Anonymous]

I had jet-lag when I was writing the other night, so I forgot something! This summer, while I have some time off, I am going to scout around my town (Riverside), and try to get a complete picture of how Asian immigration affected my city. I teach third grade, so Riverside history is a major theme for us. Our Riverside history book is seriously old and incomplete, so I'm going to help update it with what I find in Riverside and pair it up with anything I can that I have learned thus far in this class. There is a lot of good information at the California Citrus State Historic Park. It is off of the 91 freeway at the Van Buren exit. Just follow the signs. I will email you when I'm done, to share. If you know of anything that pertains specifically to Riverside, I'd love to hear it. [email protected]

[Anonymous]

I learned a lot this semester. Below are some things that stood out and how I’m thinking of applying them:

First, I developed a much better knowledge of Japanese origins. That who we call the Japanese emerged as hunter-gatherer peoples with shamanistic religious practices and share a linguistic heritage with Turkic, Mongolian, and other Central Asian people. Moreover, that the earliest records about Japan come from Korean and Chinese sources and archaeological evidence. Over time Japan's relationships with Korean and Chinese thought, writing, and technology, shaped Japanese cultural development. Like all civilizations, Japan had a golden Age, the Heian Period, had a Middle Period, ages of disunity, reform, and unification, and eventually went through Modernization. Ultimately, I learned a lot about Japanese culture and history, both Ancient and Modern. Some of the ideas for school have been to develop a Heian Literary Unit. To compare and contrast Shintoism with Greco-Roman Mythology, and Hinduism. I also think Venn Diagrams comparing China and Japan is a simple task that I really never thought about, but you’d be an idiot not to do.

Second, I learned a lot about the Cultural Revolution. Despite having learned about the Cultural Revolution last semester, I felt I really got a grasp on the Cultural Revolution through the lecture by Mr. Rittenberg, by re-reading my notes from last semester, the readings for our classes, and watching the movie on the development of the Communist party (in which I had to google people and events every 5 minutes). Most certainly this will come in handy for re-working lectures, but I also want to develop some sort of essay about the Cultural Revolution and address the human impact of the Cultural Revolution.

Third, I learned a lot about Chinese Movie Industry and K-Pop. I think what I might do is try to find ways to take segments of Chinese films and work them into lectures and assignments. I’m a little less sure about K-Pop, but it might be something on its own to just get students interested in materials outside their world.

Fourth, gained a lot of varied pedagogical methods and lessons. From comparing and combining Japanese Poems and Art to Dr. Yamashita’s puzzle lecture method I plan to slowly weave in various pedagogical methods, ideas, and lesson plans in my future teaching. For example, I'd really like to develop an East Asia Literary unit for my English class next year. I have already read four lesson plans that with modification could help form the basis of a strong unit.

As a final note, I just wanted to say thank you to all the teachers who shared their lessons and ideas on the forum, to all the professors and individuals who shared their erudite learning, and to Catherine Gao and Prof. Clay Dube who made it all possible. Thanks!

[Anonymous]

My seminar experience was very insightful. Prior to participating in this seminar, I had almost no knowledge about East Asian History; let alone on how to incorporate it into my curriculum. As a sixth-grade teacher, my students are able to recognize when I am passionate about a subject and when I am not. In class, when it was time to study any Asian cultures, my lessons would be brief and the information would be very general. Now I feel more confident bringing up East Asian history and topics in my class.

In almost each session of the seminar, the speakers brought up either art, literature, or belief systems. I knew that this would be the key to getting my students’ attention! At my school, we tend to focus more on facts and events in history so incorporating other media would really be a game changer during my lessons.

There were many topics that really caught my attention during the seminar. Some of them were the signing and chanting, how people’s lives were sacrificed when a king died, the K-Pop industry and the effects on the people, listening to and creating Sijo Korean Poetry, the joyful and painful experiences of the people during the cultural revolution, and Japanese Feudalism including architecture. These topics are some that I believe my students would really enjoy learning more about.

Since I teach sixth-grade ELA and social Studies, I there is a huge push for having my students participate in a lot of individual and group research activities. These topics would lend themselves to my students researching these topics and discovering the information on their own. I look forward to seeing my students next fall learn more about East Asian topics.
edited by cgao on 7/14/2017

[Anonymous]

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[cgao]

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