Day 8 : Revised Edition

Faculty's comments regarding the previous blog

Your life Daniel San. Not life. Note the tone of the analysis.

Daniel San Miyagi tired. Miyagi pruning bonsai. Daniel San you in what little you say. It is all outside. Good teacher third person. Bad teacher third person. Few people third person, My friends third person, Others third person, bullies third person, Today's generation third person.
Where is you?
The question is very simple.
What is the basic qualification for being a student?
Do you have it Daniel San?

Rethink climax, falling action resolution

Graph

We?

You?

Sermons?

Where u?

Illustrate each point you make with eg from recent life.

Then what's b r of student?

Do you have it?

Polish San

__________X__________

Friday
25/01/19

In the 8th session, we were seated in the auditorium. The faculty wasn't there. 'The Karate Kid', the movie was on pause on the screen. Some staff members were fiddling with the laptop kept on the podium. After a while, the faculty walked into the auditorium.  The faculty asked whether he was late, to which someone replied, no, the boss is never late. The faculty asked us why can't we hear even when there's a lot of noise around us. Students answered. Someone said because of the commotion. Some else replied because of the noises in our head. The faculty asked the same question from the students who left the class early the previous day. The faculty also asked one of them about what did the other student answer. The student who left early the previous day said she didn't hear the previous answer. The faculty asked another question which was why can't we see even when there's a lot of light around. Some students answered. A discussion followed about what should the students who left the class early in the previous session do. The faculty asked whether they should apologize to the class. The class didn't reply. Those students said they shouldn't have to apologize to the class. Some students said no apology is required and we should move on from this and continue with the class. A discussion followed there after. After the discussion the faculty took our attendance. He called iut a few names aloud the the faculty started whispering names. After that the faculty asked us to complete watching the movie. He asked us to relate it to the class learnings as well as to our lives and do a scene by scene analysis of it. The faculty then left the class. The class continued with the movie. The movie got over in about an hour. The faculty didn't come back. The students left the auditorium.

Movie analysis :-

Movie Name : The Karate Kid (1984)

Genre : Drama, Action

Real time : 2 hrs 13 min

Film time : A couple weeks or months at least

Scenes and Acts :-

ACT I : Exposition

1. Daniel moves with his mother from New Jersey to California not much to his liking. 

The faucet of their new apartment is broken. Daniel goes to find someone to fix it and finds Mr. Miyagi.

2. At the beach party, Daniel gets acquainted with a beautiful girl named Ali, but gets into a fight with her jealous ex-boyfriend, Johnny and gets hurt.

3. Daniel lies to his mother about his black eye. At school, he’s bullied by Johnny and his friends, but befriends Ali.

4. Daniel desires to learn karate, he visits a karate school and finds Johnny and his friends there. On his way home , Daniel is chased by Johnny and his friends. He tumbles down a hill on his bike. When his mother finds him, he tells her he must learn karate to defend himself.

ACT II : Rising Action

5. Daniel finds his bike has been fixed by the apartment maintenance man, Mr. Miyagi. He thanks him and they share time trimming bonsai trees.

6. After a Halloween dance at school, Daniel is beaten by Johnny and his friends, but is saved by Mr. Miyagi who takes all five of them out by himself.

7. Daniel discovers that Miyagi saved him from Johnny and his friends. He asks Miyagi to teach him karate, but instead, Miyagi takes Daniel to Johnny's karate teacher to call a truce. There, Kreese, the sensei, dismisses it. Miyagi then proposes that Daniel enter an upcoming tournament where he can compete on equal terms. He makes the sensei agree to end the bullying while Daniel is under training.

8. Miyagi takes Daniel to his home to begin training, but he makes Daniel wash and wax all of his cars instead. He makes Daniel paint his fences and house too. Daniel goes on a date with Ali, but the date ends on a sour note when Johnny and his friends show up.

9.While training at the beach, Daniel watches Miyagi perform crane kicks on a wooden piling. Daniel wishes to learn it but is told by Miyagi that one needs to learn to walk before one can learn to fly.

10. Daniel is heartbroken when he sees Johnny kiss Ali at an event. From there, he goes to Miyagi’s home and finds him drunk. He learns it's Miyagi's anniversary. He finds out that Miyagi fought in the Army. An old telegram revealed that his wife and child died in childbirth while he was at war.

11. Daniel and Miyagi finish training. For Daniel’s birthday, Miyagi gives him a car. Daniel then finds Ali, learns that Johnny forced himself on her and it was not consensual. She offers to cheer him at the tournament.

12. Daniel fights his way through the initial rounds of the tournament and makes the semi-finals.

ACT III : Climax

13. Kreese has one of his students perform an illegal kick to Daniel’s knee to secure Johnny’s victory. 

ACT IV : Falling Action

14.Miy fixes Daniel’s leg and the two face off for first prize. After Johnny takes advantage of Daniel’s bad knee and ties up the score, Daniel performs Miyagi’s crane kick and wins the tournament.

ACT V : Denouement

15. Ali, Daniel's mom, Mr. Miyagi and some others from the crowd come to Daniel after his victory to show their excitement and happiness for him. Ali hugs Daniel.

16. Johnny himself hands the trophy to Daniel.

Things I learnt from the film that can be related to my life are :

- Change is inevitable whether one likes it or not. 

For e.g. : Our college mare some changes in the curriculum this semester and instead of having the general electives and IDMs on a weekly basis like the last semester, they made it into modules. And though I liked the previous system better but the change has been brought and I had to accept it.

- There are obstacles in the way to learning that can demotivate. Realisation of what's important can help overcome the obstacles.

For e.g. : I chose the film appreciation general elective as I wanted to learn it because it was something new for me as I had no prior idea about what it would be like. After the first few classes I really wasn't sure about why certain things that were happening in class were happening and why we really need to write blogs. I had lost my enthusiasm for the subject to some extent. These were the obstacles to learning that I myself had created in my mind, however, a few more classes later, after certain discussions I did realise that whatever was happening in the class had important lessons for me to learn and that realisation helped me look at these classes in different light.

- Some people help you out of the goodness of their hearts and without hoping for anything in return.

For e.g. : The film appreciation faculty reads through the blogs of each and every student on a daily basis. He always sends me suggestions for improvements after reading my blogs and he's willing to read the improved blogs too. He's giving in so much of his time in helping me when he doesn't even need to and when he's not even getting anything out of it .

- Things are not always as they seem. Even the little things from daily life could have important lessons in store . What might often be thought of as a useless activity might indeed be of great value. A little patience and good observation is required to see things through.

For e.g. : The time spent on addressing all the other issues instead of learning about films seemed like a waste of time in the beginning. It felt like I was coming to class but nothing important was happening. But later on , through the discussions itself that happened in class, I realized that I could learn about film through books or even online, a teacher might not even be required after all but what I'm learning about life from the class discussions is what is really going to be of importance when I step out into the real world.

__________X__________

After I completed watching the movie 'The Karate Kid', I did see how the movie was trying to show that karate isn't just about the moves, but about using karate as a means to learn more important things. Some of the best education experiences are not about what they’re supposed to teach but about preparing students to learn other, often more important, things. And that's what our faculty has been trying to communicate to us since the very beginning. 

Also, at one point in the movie Miyagi stresses over quality rather than quantity. That's the other point that our faculty has tried explaining to us. However much he teaches from the specified syllabus, if we lack the basic skills like discipline, focus, balance, team spirit, then no amount of bookish knowledge can do us any good.

The qualities that are required to be a good student in my understanding are discipline, concentration, balance between the fun part and the learning part, patience, and a willingness to understand and grab in whatever the person standing in front has to offer. I know I don't have all of these and even the ones I do aren't there in me to the required degree. I will work on myself and thought it would take time, maybe lots of it but I can keep trying and maybe o e day I could become a good student.

This session was different from the others as I was instructed in advance about the task that was to be done after completing the movie and, hence, it was the first time I watched a movie and tried relating it to my own life.