Responding to Tragedy: Then and Now

Overview

Featured Resources

From Theory to Practice

 

OVERVIEW

Though this lesson focuses on the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, the activities can be used to help
students reflect on their responses to any tragedy from which they now have some distance. Students read and
discuss the personal responses of four different poets, focusing the relationships between language and
meaning. They then compose a poem of their own that includes a section addressing their initial responses to
the tragedy and their response to it in the present. Finally, they reflect on what they have learned by exposed to
the perspectives of their peers through reading their poems.

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FEATURED RESOURCES

• Reflecting on Tragedy
• Then and Now Poetry Reflection

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FROM THEORY TO PRACTICE

In classrooms in Manhattan’s Lower East Side at the time of the World Trade Center attacks, DelliCarpini and
Gulla found they were able to help students begin sorting through their complicated emotional and intellectual
responses to the tragedy by "engaging [them] in activities that [brought] their personal stories into the
classroom" (p. 48). "By encouraging students to use their experiences in making important connections to
events and material," they contend, "teachers and learners can develop classroom environments where a variety
of explanations, answers, and interpretations are developed, discussed, and integrated into the curriculum" (p.
48).

 

Further Reading

DelliCarpini, M., & Gulla, A. N. "Sharing Stories and Developing Multiple Perspectives in Post-9/11
Classrooms."  English Journal 96(2): 47 – 51.

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