The Book-Of-The-Semester Project 2007 - 2008

1. Working with Quotations

The first category of the Hostos General Education Core Competencies/Learning Goals entails “Global Citizenship and Life Competencies in a Multicultural Planetary Civilization.” Explain what kinds of abilities students would need to have in order to satisfy the expectations of this category. Then discuss, after examining this quote, whether or not Sidney Poitier’s “Cat Island curriculum” gave him adequate preparation to meet the goals of this first category of Hostos’s “core competencies.”

“By the age of ten and a half, when I got to Nassau – which is the capital of the Bahamas and a real city – I had done much such flirting with risk, and much thinking for myself. Sometimes I was right; sometimes I was wrong – and every time I was right it strengthened something in me. By the time I reached Miami, Florida, at fifteen, entering the modern world as an immigrant teenager, I was still a kid, and I was still thinking like a kid, but I had something inside that was looking out for me. I had an inner eye that watched the terrain and watched (13) the circumstances, especially when I was in hostile territory. This was my education, my Cat Island curriculum. This watchful way extended to human nature – words, motivations, actions, and consequences. The quiet and simple atmosphere of my childhood enabled me to focus down to the level of the subtle body language that came at me from my parents and my siblings. On that tiny island I had gotten to know these signals really, really well. I had learned to read them just as I had learned to read the cliffs and the tides. I didn’t understand them all, but over time I could use them as a reference point in trying to understand what others were saying, what they were doing, why they were behaving toward me as they were. I think that this is the basis for what has come to be called ‘emotional intelligence.’ It’s a capacity that’s nurtured by silence and by intimacy, and by the freedom to roam” (12-13).

2. Working with Quotations

The author’s concluding thoughts in this chapter are as follows:

“As I entered this world, I would leave behind the nurturing of my family and my home, but in another sense I would take their protection with me.  The lessons I had learned, the feelings of groundedness and belonging that had been woven into my character there, would be my companions on the journey” (30).

Write an essay showing in what ways the childhood “nurturing of your family and home” has been a “protecti[ve]” force in your adult life.  If possible, compare your personal experience with Sidney Poitier’s.

3.  Writing a Letter

Write a letter to Sidney Poitier, telling him how your childhood was similar to and different from his on Cat Island.  Would you describe your childhood as an “idyll?”  Why or why not?

4.  Point-of-View Writing

You are Sidney Poitier’s parents.  Write  “A List of Rules for Bringing Up a Child.”