Unit Plan Overview

         Using all three texts, students are going to explore the idea of classism in American society, and how our views of the lower class are shaped by the stories about them. In different ways for each book, we will touch on point of view and how it shapes a story. Students will then be allowed to reflect on their own life and study how p.o.v. can impact their stories as well. We will trace the theme of classism through each book, pulling out details about the perceptions of the lower class, and the perceptions those in the lower class have.

Essential Questions:

• Are we stuck in the situation we’re born into?
• What is class mobility?
• What is the difference between middle and lower class?
• Is it possible? For Maggie? For Esperanza?

• Does our economic situation impact our fate?
• What is fate?
• Can we change it?
• How do our “protagonists” see fate?

• How does society feel about the lower class?
• What are the effects of oppressing an entire group of people?
• What is the glass ceiling? Does it exist?
• How do the jurors feel about the lower class?

• Do outside perspectives change the way we see ourselves?
• How do society and the media portray the different classes?
• How do different points of view change a story?
• How did it affect Esperanza’s? The accused kid? Maggie’s?

Objectives:

Students will be able to....

  - Apply different points of view to the same story

- Analyze the sources of information (how it's manipulated and why)

- Determine how a society/themselves perceive people in different classes

Yale Unit Plan

    Just from briefly skimming the unit plan, the elaborate interconnection of ideas and activities is clearly established. This is one of the most daunting things about becoming a teacher to me, because there literally has to be a point to everything that lends itself to an even bigger point. In my studies so far, my job has been  to layout single lessons at a time with only a bigger topic in mind. Now it's time to integrate like in this Yale example. I don't care much for how this unit plan is laid out. It is clear, don't get me wrong, but my thought process does not match up with how this is organized. My first thoughts when planning lessons in advance is to consider an idea, think about a rationale, but then go straight to objectives and how my ideas fit in with them. But after reading the whole plan through, I understand that I gathered that the difference between planning a lesson and planning a unit is the idea of a theme. We've studied essential questions all semester, but only in context of how to teach one specific book. So while considering my own unit plan, I decided to start with finding a theme that can be taught with a minimum of two of our syllabus, and reaching for that third book. I still have to consider how I am going to think of activities for these books that point towards the theme I've come up with: Predestination. Another thing I don't agree with about this unit layout is that the essential questions and the unit itself are sort of buried in the middle. Those seem to be the most important things in a classroom, yet they are barely touched upon here. I do like, however, how the scaffolding is very clear in this layout. It starts from the broadest of the elements and builds down to activities and Core Standards.
   

Hashtag #3

"The kids bend trees and bounce between cars and dangle upside down from knees and almost break like fancy museum vases you can't replace."

#irreplaceable    #delicate       #oneofakind


"and nobody looked up not once the day Angel Vargas learned to fly and dropped from the sky like a sugar donut, just like a falling star, and exploded down to earth without even an 'Oh.'"

#donutsdon'tfallfromthesky       #imagination        #sheactuallycouldn'tfly


"And what about the kind that looks like you combed its hair? Yes, those are clouds too."

#mymomusedtocombmyhair          #cloudsareunexplainable      #hairisnot


"My feet swell big and heavy like plungers, but I drag them across the linoleum floor straight center where Uncle wants to show off the new dance we learned."

#dancingorcleaningthetoilet     #nocorrelation


"Some are skinny like chicken lips. Some are baggy like soggy Band-Aids after you get out of the bathtub. I don't care what kind I get. Just as long as I get hips."

#bodyimageissues          #hipsdon'tlie          #whyisthisanorm

Brainstorms on Twelve Angry Men

    For the project, I'm considering the part  A and the focus on character in Rose's novel. I think role playing is one of the easiest way for students to get practice with character roles, and really getting an in depth perspective on how it's built. I want the first part of my activities to focus on presumptions we make based on appearances. Part one of the first day of this mini-unit would be to present a series of faces to the class, and then to themselves they would brainstorm brief phrases and adjectives they would use to describe these people. Then we would go around the room and share anything we noticed or thought about these people to highlight the different perspectives we can have just in one picture. Part two of this class period would be focused more on character building. By first passing out little slips of paper, each class member would have to come up with a character and a trait that doesn't have to do with physical appearance (e.g. a middle aged recovering alcoholic). Then the slips would be redistributed, assigning a completely random character to each student. Then we would set up a sort of makeshift fish bowl activity where questions are presented to the characters about their personalities and past, and we start a discussion where they have to stay in character no matter what. To end the fishbowl (this part I haven't quite figured out) I would show them a picture, or give them a situation, and their homework would be to write creatively about what their character think happened in this photo/situation.
    For the second day of this mini unit, I would have them share their stories about what they thought happened and again point out the difference. But then I would tell them "the truth" and have them acknowledge the differences in their version and what is perceived to be the truth. For the rest of class, I would want them to do an independent journal about how their character's past shaped their version of the truth and be prompted by the question "why did I (the teacher) make you think of a past for your character and then introduce you to the situation?" I haven't figured out yet an example I would give at the end of the fishbowl that could be considered "the truth" (hence the quotes). I also don't like how completely wide open the create a random character part is. In a high school classroom, that kind of freedom can cause havoc in one of two ways: either students will get too inappropriate/outlandish with the roles, which could be interesting, or they could just stick to the generic and make it less fun for a big group discussion. The other thing I'm not too sure about are the prompts that would be in the fishbowl to keep the discussions flowing. I remember from my own high school experience that discussion is not easy to keep going with students.

Hattie Carroll vs. William Zan(t)zinger

       On the same day that Martin Luther King gave his famous "I Have a Dream" Speech, William Zantzinger (dubbed Zanzinger by Bob Dylan in "The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll") was convicted to a six month sentence in county jail on counts of manslaughter and assault. Hattie Carroll, the victim of said slaughter, was nothing more than an African American barmaid that happened to take too long to make his drink. Dylan just so happened to be one of the celebrities who was present for King's delivery of his iconic speech. Before King's address, Dylan performed one of his other songs from the same album (The Times They Are A-Changin') as "Hattie Carroll." In the early sixties, Dylan's music shaped the image surrounding racism among the white community, in a society that was still highly segregated.
       On a more singular level, "The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll" particularly criticized the legal system and how Lady Justice was not actually blind in this society. In Virginia today (where Carroll and Zintzinger lived) the sentence for manslaughter is "imprisonment of not less than one year nor more than 10 years or confinement in jail for not more than 12 months, and a possible fine of not more than $2,500" (statelaws.findlaw.com/virginia). But if the crime is found to be "wanton," the sentence can be raised to twenty years. If Zantzinger had been going around attacking people all night before getting to Carroll, his actions are the epitome of wanton - deliberate and unprovoked. But because he was a white socialite and plantation owner, and she was a black bartender, he was let off with six months in a county jail after beating her with a toy cane and causing her brain to bleed. He served a longer jail sentence (19 months) for tax fraud and deceptive practices. The song juxtaposes Zantzinger and Carroll, comparing their standings in society, while continuing to prompt us not to cry during the story of her death. Where he urges us to cry is in the last verse where he describes the fairness of the legal system, and irony that they just let this man go after he murdered an innocent woman.
       After doing this kind of background research, I would hope that students would have a better understanding of how appearances and race can effect an opinion or a decision. I would also like for them to know about what kind of world 12 Angry Men is taking place in. I would use this as a post-reading activity so the group can maybe bring different lenses to the events of the books, and maybe create a different interpretation. I think the song is a good way to incorporate different mediums into a lesson and change it up from the usual read and analyze. Researching topics like this allows students to make their own connections as they continue finding facts and different perspectives. The positive thing about using this song after the book is that while the book uses minimal appearances, the song is hinting that the justice system is controlled entirely by people who fit the "normal" profile. It helps students understand that this incident was not a one time thing, even though the book neer blatantly said the killer was black (although it was implied).

#hashtag2

"7TH Juror: You know what the soft sell is? You're pretty good at it. I'll tell ya. I got a different technique. Jokes. Drinks. Knock 'em on their asses."

#wineanddine #notbragging #lifeofasalesman

"12TH Juror: I have this habit of doodling. It keeps me thinking clearly."

#ad-libs #notreallypayingattention #breakfastwiththebuiltinbounce

"FOREMAN: Oh i probably forgot to tell you - I'm assistant head football coach at the Andrew J. McCorkle High School. That's in Queens."

#CorklePride #KinginQueens #manwitha(game)plan

"3RD Juror: I run messenger service. 'The Beck and Call Company.' The name's my wife's idea. I employ thirty-seven people . . . .Started with nothing."

#startedfromthebottom #nowwehere #fancynameforabusybody

"10TH Juror: I got three garages of mine going to pot while you're talking. Let's get done and get outa here."

#iamimportant #youarenot #iworkwithcars #thereforeiamright

Are All Twelve Men Really Angry?

    The first major component to the characterization of the jury members is their lack of names. Having to constantly look back to see which juror said what to whom was initially an annoyance, but as I got farther into the first act, the namlessness started to make sense. By not naming the characters anything other than Jurors 1-12, and only giving minimal details about professions and interests, it is impossible for readers to judge based on appearance. It gives off a "the truth has no face" vibe that is further built upon by the author's ability to build character without giving any indications towards physical appear. In fact, as a direct contrast to Maggie, the idea of race is simply eliminated (save for one middle-European immigrant). It leaves the reader to develop a completely non-biased opinion of these jurors, and also of the accused and his victim.
   By only building characterization through dialogue, personalities shine through in words and actions. We get a few back stories thrown into the script, like the man "making a man" out of his son, which keeps building on this idea of facelessness. Because we never get a description, we can't consciously put a face to their problems, so as not to build on our own prejudices. This book generally reminds me of a music video I saw once for a song about abuse, where the abusers face was never shown. "Independence Day" by Martina McBride never puts a specific face on the abuser, so that we don't associate his look with an abuser. It helps to contribute to the story that any one can come from any background and experience anything, just like our jurors.
   What concrete facts we do get about our characters are professions and facts about a few of them. Juror 4 is a broker - very analytical and diligent.  Juror 3 is the owner of a messenger service, which tells me he likes to always be in the know (almost like a busybody). Juror number 7 is quite the die-hard baseball fan, which can symbolize the righteous true blooded all American (not necessarily a good thing). The eleventh juror is our German immigrant, which is Juror 7's foil (an outsider) and also a watchmaker.  Juror 8, the "hero" of the play, is an architect with a level, calculating mind. Juror 12 is an advertising agent, and the most fickle among our cast (he knows what the people want). Juror 5 is the man from the tough past, the one who is the "exception" to the awful people from the slums. Juror 10, is the outspoken garage owner that knows everything about everyone. To sum up the rest, there is a meticulous house painter, and a wise elderly man. Each profession says something about these men, because of the lives they chose to live. So without giving us very many details at all, Rose aids us in building a mental picture, without a picture at all.

Interview Questions

1)  If you were to teach this book using only one literary element, which one would it be and why? What made this element stand out about the rest?

If I was to teach this book using only one literary element I would use point of view because from the very beginning of the book Crane allows the reader to see different points of view from different people in the community. I believe the beginning and ends of books tells you everything you need to know to understand the book as a whole.

        

         

2)  At what point do you think Maggie lost her innocence, and how did that change her from beginning to end?

Maggie lost her innocence when she started prostituting. That changed her from beginning to end because in the beginning she was almost like the chosen one she was very different from her loud fighting brother she was more quit and laid back; however when she started prostituting her entire mind set changed.

3) If you had never read the book before, what mood would the first chapter give off? What about the last? How do you think Crane successfully gives off each of these moods (basically, what did he do differently from the first to the last chapter?)

The first chapter would give me a weird feel of the book, I wouldn’t be sure if I want to continue reading the book or not its gives me little rascals with a mixture of Oliver twist in sense where fighting is exciting but the way Crane describes the fighting isn’t intriguing enough. In the last chapter I felt the same way I feel like Crane doesn’t use enough descriptive words in order for me to truly engage with the text. 

If these questions did not produce the elaboration I was hoping for, or the support from the text, how do I incorporate them into my paper?

A Unit on Maggie

     When we first started reading this novel, I was fooled into thinking it was a story of hope and the magic of perseverance. It would be an understatement to say that I was completely wrong. Once I finished the book and realized that it wasn't a story of conquering a classist society, the entire book shifted from hopeful to forlorn. So instead of teaching Maggie in a unit focusing on poverty or global issues as the essential questions, it would do more for students to read the book thinking about smaller topics or tools that lend to the essential questions about survival of the fittest. Why wasn't Maggie one of the strong? What made her weak? Why was Maggie considered a "flower blooming in a puddle of mud?" Does morality make us weak?
      As we read Maggie for this class, I don't feel like we had any specific essential questions to keep in mind as we discussed, read, and lead activities. Conversely, I also feel that covered a broad range of them, because it was up to each of us to pick what we thought the text was applicable to. What we focused on, for the most part, was how we would build on this for our own classroom (which could be an essential question, but not in an ELA classroom). From this unit intro, I would define "essential question" as a frame work question(s) that is the main focus students should keep in mind and pull details the pertain to it. These questions should also inspire a certain degree of reflection, and encourage students to make as many self to text/world connections as possible.
       By using Darwinism as the main focus of the text, using subjects other than English becomes possible. Science and history can be used to relate different types of "artifacts" that are brought into lessons. Also, by asking what makes Maggie weak, we can explore issues like morality and hope. Since both of those issues are subjective and will illicit different definitions from each student, a great deal of reflection is required for students to fully fathom what they mean. Like in our discussions about nobodies and somebodies, there is no one true definition. By using the broad theme of survival of the fittest, a few different subcategories can be explored while still supplementing the former. Morality, by definition, is different for each person, so I hope that these essential questions would help students to critique their own morals. I would also like for them to think about how Maggie would have felt today, in a society that holds little value in morals, and survival of the fittest seems to be the motto of even the politicians.

Sensory Details in Maggie

           "In a hilarious hall there were twenty-eight tables and twenty-eight women and a crowd of smoking men. Valiant noise was made on a stage at the end of the hall by an orchestra composed of men who looked as if they had just happened in. Soiled waiters ran to and fro, swooping down like hawks on the unwary in the throng; clattering along the aisles with trays covered with glasses; stumbling over women's skirts and charging two prices for everything but beer, all with a swiftness that blurred the view of the cocoanut palms and dusty monstrosities painted upon the walls of the room. A bouncer, with an immense load of business upon his hands, plunged about in the crowd, dragging bashful strangers to prominent chairs, ordering waiters here and there and quarreling furiously with men who wanted to sing with the orchestra.
           The usual smoke cloud was present, but so dense that heads and arms seemed entangled in it. The rumble of conversation was replaced by a roar. Plenteous oaths heaved through the air. The room rang with the shrill voices of women bubbling o'er with drink-laughter. The chief element in the music of the orchestra was speed. The musicians played in intent fury. A woman was singing and smiling upon the stage, but no one took notice of her. The rate at which the piano, cornet and violins were going, seemed to impart wildness to the half-drunken crowd. Beer glasses were emptied at a gulp and conversation became a rapid chatter. The smoke eddied and swirled like a shadowy river hurrying toward some unseen falls. Pete and Maggie entered the hall and took chairs at a table near the door. The woman who was seated there made an attempt to occupy Pete's attention and, failing, went away."

          Sensory details fall under the literary element of "imagery," and authors must appeal to all five senses if they wish to produce a vivid image in readers' minds. In the first part of chapter fourteen of Maggie: Girl of the Streets, Stephen Crane uses two condensed paragraphs (that don't quite fit in with the choppy and curt nature of the rest of the novel) to get readers believing that they are at this orchestra performance. By overloading this passage, Crane assails each of our senses - sight, sound, touch, taste, and smell - with tiny, yet significant details that convey the discourse that Maggie is feeling in this scene. As we read the long, windy sentences that fill this passage, our head starts to spin with all the details we are getting. We begin to smell the smoke cloud, and taste its density on our tongues as Crane goes into more details about it. The waiters dashing around the seas of flailing limbs make it so our minds' eyes can't fathom what they are seeing through this cloud, and we hear the wailing woman singing along with the music that's increase in pace increases the heartbeat.
       From this passage, we understand that Maggie is feeling a little frazzled at her boisterous and overbearing surroundings. By using our own senses to his advantage, Crane was able convey a sense of wariness by giving us solid, corporeal details to experience with Maggie. It is my opinion that this passage was meant to also give us a sense that Maggie does not feel safe in this setting. Crane uses words like "swooping down like hawks," "monstrosites," and "impart wildness" to issue a sense of danger, like she is surrounded by vicious creatures ready to attack. This ties into the theme of the book about survival of the fittest. In my interpretation of this passage, I would assume that Maggie no longer feels like she is one of the "fittest" in this social circle. If city living in the 1890's was like living in a jungle, then this was the watering hole where everyone strutted their stuff for power and prominence. I think that this is where Maggie starts to realize that there is no beauty in trying for the life she wants to live, and the remainder of the book has a more feral, animalistic feel than the hopeful beginning we read.

#hashtag

 Point of View
"She vaguely tried to calculate the altitude of the pinnacle from which he must have looked down upon her."
 
#whatevenisfeminism #mancrushmonday

Foreshadow

"Say, Mag," said Pete, "give us a kiss for takin' yeh teh deh show, will yer?"

Maggie laughed, as if startled, and drew away from him.

"Naw, Pete," she said, "dat wasn't in it."

"Ah, what deh hell?" urged Pete.

The girl retreated nervously.

"Ah, what deh hell?" repeated he.

Maggie darted into the hall, and up the stairs. She turned and smiled at him, then disappeared."

#allnetflix #nochill #ourfirstdate

"As she passed them the girl, with a shrinking movement, drew back her skirts."

#dirty #lowestofthelow

Symbolism
"She envied elegance and soft palms. She craved those adornments of person which she saw every day on the street, conceiving them to be allies of vast importance to women."

#goals #startedfromthebottom


Irony of Situation
"Shady persons in the audience revolted from the pictured villainy of the drama. With untiring zeal they hissed vice and applauded virtue. Unmistakably bad men evinced an apparently sincere admiration for virtue.
The loud gallery was overwhelmingly with the unfortunate and the oppressed. They encouraged the struggling hero with cries, and jeered the villain, hooting and calling attention to his whiskers. When anybody died in the pale-green snow storms, the gallery mourned. They sought out the painted misery and hugged it as akin."

#lookinthemirror #hypocrites

Motif

"The mother and the son began to sway and struggle like gladiators.

"Whoop!" said the Rum Alley tenement house. The hall filled with interested spectators."

#likemotherlikeson #Spartacus

Oxymoron

"The rage of fear shone in all their eyes and their blood-colored fists swirled."

#youmadbro?

Ekphrasis

"A ballad singer, in a dress of flaming scarlet, sang in the inevitable voice of brass. When she vanished, men seated at the tables near the front applauded loudly, pounding the polished wood with their beer glasses. She returned attired in less gown, and sang again. She received another enthusiastic encore. She reappeared in still less gown and danced. The deafening rumble of glasses and clapping of hands that followed her exit indicated an overwhelming desire to have her come on for the fourth time"

#storyofmylife

The Streets of the late 19th Century

       19th century culture is something we can only gain insight to through art. Since the oldest living person on the planet was born in 1900, we are officially out of people that were able to experience any part of that century. However, because George Bellows was born in 1882 and painted Both Members of This Club in 1909, we can count this piece as a primary source of the time period. Maggie, Girl of the Streets can also be grouped in this category because it was published in 1892. Unlike Bellows, Stephen Crane did not live a tough life in the harsh streets of NYC, and could only

Both Members of This Club - George Bellows (1909)

 pretend to know the inner struggle of city life.   So one obvious connection that students will be able to draw is that both of these works can be considered primary sources, and come from the same time period. They would have to dig a little deeper than surface value, however, to find more than just time period in common.
      After doing a little bit of research on Bellows, and the painting itself, I found that this painting was inspired by the time in New York when a corrupt power had made public boxing illegal, closing it to any fighter that couldn't gain access. Over 15 years before this was painted, the very opening scene of Maggie is a fight between children in an alley. I would like for my students   to be able to draw the connections between what class these boxers probably come out of, and the class of the "urchins" we see brawling in the book. The violent tendencies portrayed by the lower class in the novel, and how far they escalated, were probably what caused boxing to be banned in the first place. So unless fighters were sanctioned by the same, or two different, athletic facilities they would not be allowed to fight. This is where the phrase "both members of this club" comes from. When two fighters from the same athletic facility participated in a bout, the announcer would say this phrase to indicate the sanction of the fight. I would also like for my students to draw this similarity from the context research. Children would fight in the streets of New York, but it was mostly overlooked by the public because they appeared to be "members of the same club." But only the parents would know the difference between the urchins (the orphans) and their own children, thus breaking up the fight. It is also important to realize that the parental fighting was viewed as sanctioned because they were also members of the same team.
          I think it would also be important for students to think about whats going on with the crowd around the boxers in the painting. The expressions on the faces of the fight watchers are almost sadistic in their enjoyment. Aside from the fighters, what I notice most about the painting is the one cluster of bright fans beneath the black fighter. The faces, and the posture, of anticipation is reminiscent of the blood-lust experienced in the days of the gladiators. I would want my students to understand these fighting incidents as a way to claim territory and exercise dominance. But as it was for the gladiators and the boxers, fights are only sanctioned for the benefits of others. When the children fight for themselves, it is broken up, but the parents are allowed to keep going because they are "members of the same club."

Classic vs. Contemporary Literature

      To say that my tastes have changed would be an understatement. In high school, I refused to even open Great Expectations because I was so opposed to being forced to read classic literature. I was the just like every other teen girl at the time, caught up in the craze of the Twilight saga, searching hungrily for the next addition to my collection of supernatural romance books. Prior to my senior year and my introduction to John Steinbeck, I couldn't be bothered to open a classic. As I reflect on it now, I think that maybe it was because the language was so intimidating and the metaphorical weight was so formidable that I couldn't comprehend them. On top of that, teachers before senior year made it so tedious for us to make it through a novel that they ruined to impact a great novel can have. When it took is three months to make it through Romeo and Juliet in ninth grade, none of us ever wanted to pick up another Shakespeare play (which I actually love now, thanks to Levitan). I believe taking too much time to focus on the insignificant details, or trying to interpret themes before we know the whole book, takes away from the overall power and point a novel can have.
     Since coming to college, however, I feel that I have grown into a more mature reader. Not that I have as much time to read for leisure, but I find that I enjoy assigned books more because I can better understand them. As I began to read Maggie: Girl of the Streets, I found it was a little difficult to understand the dialect in which the characters speak. Having only read the first three chapters, I could see this posing a problem in the classroom because it is far different from how we speak today and students might interpret this to mean that the problems in the novel aren't still relevant today. As a teacher, it would be my job to break the wall that this dialogue creates and bring the students into Maggie's world. Just because I don't find it a particularly hard read doesn't mean that others won't, and just because I cannot relate to Maggie's situation personally, doesn't mean that there won't be students who can. To address these challenges in a modern day classroom, I would think it would be beneficial to approach the novel by discussing current poverty and child abuse rates, and helping them to understand that a lot of these problems still exist today. I also think it could be a good idea to talk about how the laws have changed from Maggie's time to our time, and how these laws are enforced and rights are protected.
    By approaching the novel in those ways provides a great opportunity for the students to find interesting ways to connect to classic literature. Instead of them just finding superficial connections with a character, this approach enables them to make connections between their world and the world portrayed in the book. These approaches provide the chance for students to start researching the time period in which a novel takes place, helping them enhance their connection building skills. Maggie itself provides the unique opportunity for students to begin exploring their own class consciousness and their awareness to the world around them. When thought about in the context of the modern world, there is a place for some classic literature in a classroom. It depends on the teachers ability to get students interested and how well they can bring it back to the students' lives. But there is also a place for good contemporary novels, too. Like we discussed, I also hope to one day include YA literature in my classroom, but I feel that Jago treated the subject as if there were no novels published more recently that are worth replacing the classics. Even some post-modern classics can have their time to shine. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Next by Ken Keasy found its way into my senior English class and evoked such a strong reaction in my class that no one failed a single assignment. Like I said before, it just depends on the teachers ability to get the students excited about reading.

Cookie Monster: Glutton for Punishment?

       In this title-less Cookie Monster adventure, we follow the fuzzy monster as he bakes cookies and attempts to bring them to cookie contest at the fair. He makes cookies of all different shapes and sizes, saving the best batch for the contest. Along the way, we see him pass by a fix-it shop for broken appliances. The square TV reminds him of the square cookie, so eats the the square cookie. Usually, when things are broken, it's best to stop using it and get it fixed. In the next frame, we see a police officer wearing a star badge. The star-shaped badge reminds Cookie Monster of the cookie shaped like a star, which he then proceeds to eat. To me, a police officer connotes an enforcer of rules, or someone that will ask us to stop any destructive behavior. In the second to last frame, Cookie Monster is once again reminded of a cookie by the octagon shape of a stop sign. He is reminded of the cookie, and once again eats it. Stop signs are a pretty self-explanatory symbol, meant for us to stop when we see it. Finally, when Cookie Monster reaches the fair, his basket is empty and all of his cookies have been eaten on the walk.
      Another interesting symbol, besides the shapes, in this story is the dog that frequently shows up in the background of most of the frames. In each frame he appears, we see him looking at Cookie Monster and the cookies he is eating. But in all those frames, excluding the last, the dog never has a cookie. Until we see him at the fair, where he is looking (victoriously) at Cookie Monster while he eats a cookie, while Cookie Monster has none. Interesting to think that this character, who is known for his lack of self control, ran into three different scenarios that should have made him stop. When he gets to the fair, he doesn't have a chance to win because he ate all of his cookies for the fair. If he had practiced self control, he may have won the contest and received a taste of more cookies at the fair. His gluttony proved too strong, and limited Cookie Monster from winning something he baked all day for. The real winner here is the dog, who practiced a little bit of control and was rewarded at the end.