Jason Guerrero Guerrero 1

Eng 112 B

Dr. Warner

Building Through Sports Literature

It’s hard to imagine a world where we cannot escape the harsh realities of life. There are times when we need an outlet that allows us to dream, challenge ourselves, and forget about our hang-ups. Drugs, violence, and broken homes seem to be the status quo these days, and reality is something has become a concept that seems to carry a shadow of negativity with it. The pitfalls of reality strike at the hearts of our youth and plague their character, and ultimately, their outlook on life. Teens often turn to sports to better themselves physically and mentally. Unfortunately, even sports gets bad press these days. Steroids, million-dollar salaries, and free agent happy athletes have altered the perception towards sports. Teachers find themselves not only struggling against their own duties, but the added weight of society’s downfalls and in this case sports, adds to the weight teachers must carry. However, teachers can turn a negative into a positive, and it does not mean only a math teacher is capable of this. With a literary approach, what sounds like a math concept can become an English teachers strategy to give young adults a look at something that has warmed our spirits and given us an opportunity to dream: sports in young adult literature. In particular, Robert Lipsyte’s The Contender provides teachers with a tool to re-kindle the innocence of sports and in turn, innocence within the potentially troubled youth.

The goal of this unit is to let young adults know that there are outlets in life that provide for an escape through troubled times, or challenging circumstances. From this unit, young adults are exposed to the spirit that refuses to be pushed down, and from that

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they can gain a sense of goal fulfillment no matter what obstacles you may face. Teaching this unit is suitable for most young adults in general. Young adults between the

ages of 13-19 can benefit from learning the unit’s aims. In further, the basis for this unit ties into a universal trend that seems to strike at the hearts of all those who it comes into contact with: fighting through life as the underdog.

Launching The Unit

I think of this in a light-hearted sense. Michael Buffer’s (famous boxing announcer) “Let’s get ready to rumble!” quote comes to mind as a fun way to start this unit and to look at things as a challenge and not so much an obstacle. In this sense, we move forward by considering all or some of the following for launching this unit:

*Play the film Rocky and observe the students as they watch the film. Following the film, have a discussion about what they found to be most interesting about the film.

A. Bridge some discussion questions and journal entries to tie in:

1. Does it matter that you need to be rich and famous in your life, or

that you do something that makes you feel good about yourself? Explain why or why not.

*Write about a time when you felt that you had to do everything in your power to seize an opportunity and did it matter whether you won or lost?

*Do you know someone like Rocky? If so, talk about what makes this person someone that you respect. If not, do you think you could respect someone like Rocky, why or why not?

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In addition to the film, spend a class going over some inspirational quotes by famous athletes and entertainers that relate to life and sports. The students should then choose two quotes that they found to be the most useful or intriguing. The goal of this exercise is to get the students to think with not only their minds, but through their character make-up as well. These quotes have been identified as the following:

Sports do not build character. They reveal it.

Heywood Broun

Sports serve society by providing vivid examples of excellence.

George F. Will

If all the year were playing holidays; To sport would be as tedious as to work.

William Shakespeare

We didn't lose the game; we just ran out of time.

Vince Lombardi

It is almost impossible to remember how tragic a place the world is when one is playing golf.

Robert Lynd

The Text

In detail, The Contender provides the reader with an insight to how sports can carry the spirit beyond the streets and even beyond inner turmoil. There’s the presence of a role model that extends beyond family: Alfred’s boxing coach. The story places the protagonist in an environment filled with instability, uncertainty, and danger. Alfred is able to overcome such odds through his persistent approach that he practices in boxing: never giving up. Alfred learns from his coach that the journey and how you go about the journey is the way to success, not just success itself as a means to an end.

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Extending the Unit

For this portion of the unit, it is necessary to draw from the students what they have truly learned from the unit. Part of the unit will also include a list of young adult books that are very similar to the contender. The novels share a common ground in that they are tied into sports, and that there is a journey that the protagonist must go through. Students will be introduced to these novels through a handout that includes brief summaries, so that they may choose what novel suits them best. Of course, students may opt out for another novel as long as the novel meets commonalities with the ideas tied into the unit, and this will be met by a written proposal of the work they have opted out for (justification is essential when opting out of assigned work). Presentations or a report will go along with the individually assigned reading. For the presentations, students must work alone and are free to choose from the following:

1. Presenting real life athletes or entertainers who overcame great adversity to be where they are.

a. Presentation must include a short biographical description of the person they choose and how that person is related to the book they choose.

b. A handout for the rest of the class depicting a compare and contrast to their protagonist and the real person they have chosen.

For written reports, students must put themselves in the position of their protagonist. Would they have made the same choices? Would they feel the same if they were in the protagonist’s situation? How would they take the journey vs. the reward notion?

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Young Adult Literature Selections

Deadline by Chirs Crutcher: Deadline is a story about a young man with big intentions for his senior year. However, in order to accomplish such goals he must take on some very challenging tasks. A couple of his goals: being the best football player his town has seen and also getting together with a girl who hardly knows he exists. The only problem: many secret discoveries lie ahead, and they may not be as welcoming as the protagonist Ben intends.

Dogsong by Gary Paulson: Not so much a sports story, the existence of this novel on the list has more to do with the theme tying into the intentions of the unit than just being about sports: the journey and learning from it. The setting is old fashioned in that the protagonist (Russel) is from a village. Having grown tired of his surroundings and wanting more from life, Russel seeks a different means of life. Russel’s wants are answered by the village shaman who in turn sends Russel on a journey of self -discovery.

Ultimate Sports by Donald R. Gallo: This is an anthology that features various themes and twists. Because it’s an anthology that associates sports with young adults, it seems fitting to add to this collection recommended for young adults.

The Perfect Distance by Kim Ablon Whitney: The one with all the twists. It is a story of young girl who must come to grips with reality at a very young age. Francie (the protagonist) has dreams of riding horses in competition, but the cards she has been dealt in life make the dream all the more distant. Racism, broken-homes, and alcohol provide for a drama filled cocktail that also provides some good lessons to learn from.

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Concluding the Unit

This is the part where the student takes what they have learned and apply to themselves. Journal entries come to mind, but that would seem redundant. At this point, students should have developed some images of inner strength; therefore, it would be of good feedback to see how the students were affected based on the their views of how inner strength can be symbolized. Making collages, making a single symbol, or using a specific piece of art students can display what they’ve learned and how they feel.

By this time, students should also have an idea of what makes a life-learning journey so important. In addition, students should see how sports help us to minimize the troubles in our everyday lives. To test this have students write a journal entry in which they feel that the works that were discussed or read justified this assumption.

The Unit is designed to play into the emotions of the students. It is a unit that focuses on reaching out to youth in contrast to just lecturing them. It is a unit that can get a little comical with regards to it’s opening (Rocky), but in the end the purpose gets across and that is what’s most important here.

Sport is imposing order on what was chaos.

Anthony Starr

What other people may find in poetry or art museums, I find in the flight of a good drive.

Arnold Palmer

Play is the only way the highest intelligence of humankind can unfold.

Joseph Chilton Pearce

Eighteen holes of match play will teach you more about your foe than 18 years of dealing with him across a desk.

Grantland Rice

Hunting is not a sport. In a sport, both sides should know they're in the game.

Paul Rodriguez

Some people think football is a matter of life and death. I don't like that attitude. I can assure them it is much more serious than that.

Bill Shankly

For when the One Great Scorer comes

To write against your name,

He marks-not that you won or lost-

But how you played the game.

Grantland Rice

Nobody in the game of football should be called a genius. A genius is somebody like Norman Einstein.

Joe Theismann

It's not so important who starts the game but who finishes it.

John Wooden

My life is like a zombie movie! I survive game after game after game, but the football just keeps coming! The only way to stop team sports is to aim for the head.

Matt Milby

If it weren't for baseball, many kids wouldn't know what a millionaire looked like.

Phyllis Diller

Not every age is fit for childish sports.

Titus Maccius Plautus

A good hockey player plays where the puck is. A great hockey player plays where the puck is going to be.

Wayne Gretzky

When you're in a slump, it's almost as if you look out at the field and it's one big glove.

Vance Law

I couldn't see the ball come off the club for the first 27 holes. It came off the club that fast.

Buddy Marucci

He's in the mold of a Tom Watson, in that he'll hit the ball in the trees and undaunted go it there, flail it out and make something out of it.

Gary Mccord

I'll let the racket do the talking.

John Mcenroe

Don't park in the spaces marked, "Reserved for Umpires.".

John Mcsherry

If everything seems under control, you're just not going fast enough.

Mario Andretti

If you think it's hard to meet new people, try picking up the wrong golf ball.

Jack Lemmon

Focus on competition has always been a formula for mediocrity.

Daniel Burrus

Baseball is a game where a curve is an optical illusion, a screwball can be a pitch or a person, stealing is legal and you can spit anywhere you like except in the umpire's eye or on the ball.

Jim Murray

There isn't a flaw in his golf or his makeup. He will win more majors than Arnold Palmer and me combined. Somebody is going to dust my records. It might as well be Tiger, because he's such a great kid.

Jack Nicklaus

If all the year were playing holidays; To sport would be as tedious as to work.

William Shakespeare

Anybody who watches three games of football in a row should be declared brain dead.

Erma Bombeck

We didn't lose the game; we just ran out of time.

Vince Lombardi

It is almost impossible to remember how tragic a place the world is when one is playing golf.

Robert Lynd

It's amazing how much of this is mental. Everybody's in good shape. Everybody knows how to ski. Everybody has good equipment. When it really boils down to it, it's who wants it the most, and who's the most confident on his skis.

Reggie Crist

I play in the low 80s. If it's any hotter than that, I won't play.

Joe E. Lewis

If you can react the same way to winning and losing, that's a big accomplishment... quality is important because it stays with you the rest of your life, and there's going to be a life after tennis that's a lot longer than your tennis life.

Chris Evert Lloyd

I was showing early symptoms of becoming a professional baseball man. I was lying to the press.

Roger Kahn

We're going to turn this team around 360 degrees.

Jason Kidd

Desire is the most important factor in the success of any athlete.

Willie Shoemaker

Baseball is 90% mental, the other half is physical.

Yogi Berra

If you aren't playing well, the game isn't as much fun. When that happens I tell myself just to go out and play as I did when I was a kid.

Thomas J. Watson

Don't forget to swing hard, in case you hit the ball.

Woodie Held

Football is violence and cold weather and sex and college rye.

Roger Kahn

Football is a mistake. It combines the two worst elements of American life. Violence and committee meetings.

George F. Will

A good hitter has timing. A good pitcher upsets timing.

Warren Spahn

Every time you go out on the ice, there are slight flaws. You can always think of something you should have done better. These are the things you must work on.

Dorothy Hamill

Whenever I feel like exercise I lie down until the feeling passes.

Robert M. Hutchins

He's as good at his age as Jack (Nicklaus) was, and look at what Jack has done in the gime of golf. That's the highest praise I can give anyone, to compare him to Jack Nicklaus.

Michael Bonallack

Nobody's a natural. You work hard to get good and then work to get better. It's hard to stay on top.

Paul Coffey

He's tough [Tiger Woods]. I wish I was that tough when I was his age.

John Daly

Golf and sex are the only things you can enjoy without being good at them.

Jimmy Demaret

They say golf is like life, but don't believe them. Golf is more complicated than that.

Gardner Dickinson

The ardent golfer would play Mount Everest if somebody would put a flagstick on top.

Pete Dye

Back then, my idol was Bugs Bunny, because I saw a cartoon of him playing ball - you know, the one where he plays every position himself with nobody else on the field but him? Now that I think of it, Bugs is still my idol. You have to love a ballplayer like that.

Nomar Garciaparra

It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone.

A. Bartlett Giamatti

In my many years of coaching, he is the most focused in terms of the important aspects of his life and his goals. He is a giver, not a getter, and a product of two amazing parents.

Wally Goodwin

I know I am getting better at golf because I am hitting fewer spectators.

Gerald R. Ford

I went through baseball as "a player to be named later.".

Joe Garagiola

Quick guys get tired; big guys don't shrink.

Marv Harshman

Have you ever noticed? Anybody going slower than you is an idiot, and anyone going faster than you is a maniac.

Ronnie Corbett

When I was 40, my doctor advised me that a man in his 40s shouldn't play tennis. I heeded his advice carefully and could hardly wait until I reached 50 to start again.

Hugo L. Black

If you are going to throw a club, it is important to throw it ahead of you, down the fairway, so you don't have to waste energy going back to pick it up.

Tommy Bolt

The will to win is worthless if you don't get paid for it.

Reggie Jackson

If you watch a game, it's fun. If you play it, it's recreation. If you work at it, it's golf.

Bob Hope

I don't want to play golf. When I hit a ball, I want someone else to go chase it.

Rogers Hornsby

If profanity had an influence on the flight of the ball, the game of golf would be played far better than it is.

Horace G. Hutchinson

With those who don't give a damn about baseball, I can only sympathize. I do not resent them. I am even willing to concede that many of them are physically clean, good to their mothers and in favor of world peace. But while the game is on, I can't think of anything to say to them.

Art Hill

If you're not just a little bit nervous before a match, you probably don't have the expectations of yourself that you should have.

Hale Irwin

World records are only borrowed.

Sebastian Coe

Fans don't boo nobodies.

Reggie Jackson

http://www.best-quotes-poems.com/sports-quoteshttp://www.best-quotes-poems.com/sports-quotes

Works Cited

 Paulsen, Gary. Dogsong. New York: Antheneum Books for Young Readers,

l985.

 Crutcher, Chris. Deadline. New York: Harper Collins, 2007.

 Gallo, Daniel R. Ultimate Sports. New York: Delacorte Press, l995.

 Whitney, Kim Ablon. The Perfect Distance. New York: Knopf Books for

Young Readers, 2005.

 best-quotes-poems.com “ Sports Quotes” 2007 <http://www.best-quotes-poems.com/sports>