Discussion 40 mins

Task: Answer these questions in your book first. Then, as a class, discuss the
responses using your discussion bingo card. You need to cross off at least four
new discussion statements as your exit card today. (You should nearly have a full
card).
1. It takes courage to stand up to societal or gender expectations, and Jack
failed at that. Do you agree or disagree with this statement? Use evidence to
support your response.
***
2. Jack’s story is not a tragedy. Do you agree or disagree with this statement.
Use evidence to support your response.
Personal Response Writing - 20 mins
1. Read through the sample paragraph, annotating the following:
❏ Topic sentence
❏ Explanation of topic sentence
❏ D: Textual evidence
❏ C+P: Analysis of textual evidence
❏ Comparative phrase (similarity)
❏ D: Personal evidence
❏ C+P: Analysis of personal evidence
❏ Comparative phrase (point of difference)
❏ Linking sentence
2. Make a list of comparative vocabulary you can use, organising the words into two
columns: To show similarity or to show difference. You will be able to use this as a
resource over the next few weeks in your writing.
Personal Response Writing Sample - Miss Griffin’s writing
Toni Jordan explores the impact of familial expectations on family members, through the characterisation of Jack Husting. Parents in
particular, have a strong effect on their children’s lives: through their expectations, and, how they perceive - or don’t perceive - their
children. Metaphorically describing Richmond through Jack’s eyes as a “poor man’s paddock” and an “endless field of patchwork”
(p73), Jordan creates a sense of bleak tedium in Jack and elicits sympathy for him from the reader. He is trapped in his boyhood room,
unable to escape from the “island” (p.73) where “it seems [he’s] the only who notices” that he’s grown up (p72). The imagery of the
desolate isolation works to illustrate Jack’s despair at returning home to his family. He wanted to stay out bush, however, his family
expected him to return to Richmond and work in a steady, city job. Jordan suggests that the expectations within family members can
conflict with each other, and even negatively impact a family member. Similarly, after I returned home from my gap year in 2009 - I’d
worked in Paris (France) and St.Ives (England) - my mother didn’t seem to realise that I had evolved past the high-school girl I had
been when I left Warrnambool. I was frustrated with my mother, annoyed that she couldn’t see me as the adult I clearly was. Even
though I didn’t roam at night as Jack did, I did draw farther away from my parents. My mother’s expectations that I was going to stay a
little girl of hers, infuriated me - I rallied against that expectation of me, turning instead into new jobs, new friends, and making some
questionable decisions along the way. Jack bemoaned the people who stayed in Richmond, with its “barrenness”, “ugliness” and the
“sad, crushed spaces” (p73), creating an image of a city that was suffocating him: even the city didn’t have space for Jack to grow. I
grew up in Warrnambool - a regional centre in Victoria, however to me, it seemed so provincial, backwards. Jack Husting’s
lamentations of Richmond mirrored my own, and we were probably around a similar age then. Nowadays, I look to my mother as a
source of pride and inspiration, wanting to be more like her, and wanting her advice on everything. Warrnambool, too, has changed in
my eyes as I have grown up - it is now a fond memory of home, of family and of love. Unlike me, Jack Husting will never have the
chance to reconnect with his family, to continue to grow up, and realise that even at 18 and 19 years old, he was still a child.
Personal Response Writing - 30 mins
Use these sentences as topic sentences for personal response paragraphs. You must select an appropriate jazzy
verb to put in the gaps, depending on the stance you are taking.

- Jordan ____ that gender expectations that were apparent in the 30s, are still relevant today.
- Jordan ____ the toxic masculinity values of the 30s.
- Jordan ____ the impact of familial expectations on family members.

Use the sample to guide you. Make sure you include:

❏ Topic sentence
❏ Explanation of topic sentence
❏ D: Textual evidence
❏ C+P: Analysis of textual evidence
❏ Comparative phrase (similarity)
❏ D: Personal evidence
❏ C+P: Analysis of personal evidence
❏ Comparative phrase (point of difference)
❏ Linking sentence