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Suggested Procedure:
- Review some of the issues
and questions that were raised by students in the discussion of the
women that each of them portrayed and met in the first activity.
- Early in Regret to
Inform, filmmaker Barbara Sonneborn, says that, "For me,
Vietnam is the land of my imagination." Ask students what they
know about Vietnam. What does the word "Vietnam" conjure up
for them? Is it a place, a culture, a people—or is it merely a
war? How do they imagine the land of Vietnam?
- Tell students that they
will be writing poems and interior monologues from Regret to Inform,
so as they watch they should take notes on:
- images that have an
impact on them,
- choices that individuals
in the film confronted, and
- things people say that
strike them.
["Interior monologues"
are simply what we imagine a particular individual may have been thinking
at a particular moment. The best of these will be provoked by students
reflecting on vexing choices that individuals faced or on possible reactions
to incidents that had a powerful emotional impact on someone.]
- Distribute the map
of Vietnam and indicate that in the film Sonneborn travels from
Ho Chi Minh City (formerly Saigon) to Que Son, where her husband was
killed.
- If possible, have students
watch the video in one sitting. Regret to Inform does
not bombard viewers with facts. Its power as a teaching tool derives
from its images and stories, and is cumulative as these are revealed.
- The film will affect students
differently. It's a good idea to pause before launching a discussion
or beginning the writing assignments suggested here. You might simply
ask students to turn to someone else and talk about how the film made
them feel. Or they might list words that come into their heads to describe
the film or their reactions to it.
Ask students about
the individuals, images or situations that made an impression on them.
At this point the aim is simply to allow students to share their initial
reactions. You might list these on the board or overhead, as each student
comment may eventually trigger writing ideas.
Another possibility is to ask students about the questions that the
film leaves them with, as these will be of continuing importance as
students further explore the causes and effects of the U.S. war in Vietnam.
- My preference is to ask
students to write before launching a full discussion of Regret
to Inform, as the writing will almost always deepen their insights.
If you prefer to discuss the video first, see point
#2 in the Writing Follow-up for some ideas on discussion questions.
- Distribute the student handout,
Regret to Inform: Writing Choices.
Read over the interior monologue suggestions with students. Ask them
to look back over the list of images and situations that the class generated
immediately after watching the video. Ask the class if there are any
additional writing possibilities suggested by any of these.
- Distribute the dialogue
poem, "Two Women"
[reproduced here from Rethinking Our Classrooms: Teaching for
Equity and Justice, Rethinking Schools, 1994.] Ask for two female
students to volunteer as readers, and have them read the poem aloud
back and forth, dialogue style. Afterwards, ask what situations in the
video the poem reminds them of. On the Writing
Choices handout, indicate some of the dialogue poem suggestions,
and encourage students to think about writing from one of these, or
another that they might imagine.
- Finally, before they begin
writing—the Writing Choices
handout offers students three choices, interior monologue, dialogue
poem, or conversation—distribute Regret
to Inform: Film Quotes. These might suggest further
writing possibilities. Quotes like, "If you weren't dead, you weren't
safe," by Troung Thi Huoc, or Nguyen Ngoc Xuan's comment that after
the attack on her house, "nothing is black or white. It's all grey,
just like the smoke," might suggest poem possibilities to students.
The handout will be helpful as students think back over the film as
well as to refer to during their discussion.
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