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9th Grade Advanced English Class Summer Work

General Instructions:All the work must be placed in an organized manner in a semi-transparent folder. There should be a title page with your name and class. All the pages must be numbered. Each unseen exercise must have the name of it on the top of the page. Each unseen exercise must be done on a different page. All the vocabulary must be done in a separate section. Organization of the summer work is worth 10 points.Unseens:Read the texts and answer all the questions on separate pages. Put the pages in a folder. Write headings on every page. Write the numbers of the questions. Write FULL sentences.Vocabulary:Write all the vocabulary (English + definition in Hebrew or English) on separate pages. Put the pages in the folder. Write the name of the unseen that the vocabulary belongs to.

Walking Tall

How did Ruby Bridges make history over 50 years ago?

“Don’t be afraid.” That’s what Ruby Bridges’s mother told her on Nov. 4, 1960. Little Ruby listened carefully to the advice. Soon, four United States federal court marshals, or officers, arrived at the Bridges family home in New Orleans, La., to drive the first grader to William Frantz Public School. A screaming mob was waiting. People stood near the building shouting.

Ruby held her head high. With the marshals surrounding her, the 6-year-old walked into the school and into history books. That morning, Ruby became one of the first African Americans to attend an all-white elementary school in the South. Dividing Lines For a long time, parts of the United States were segregated, or separated by race. Under law, black children could not attend the same public schools as white children. People of different races also had to use separate public restrooms and drinking fountains. U.S. leaders worked hard to end segregation. They wanted all Americans to have civil rights. Civil rights are the rights to be treated equally. In 1954, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that segregation in public schools was unconstitutional. The case was Brown v. Board of Education. By the year 1960, however, many Southern cities, including New Orleans, were still not following the court’s ruling. That prompted a federal court to take action in New Orleans. It ordered the city to desegregate its public schools. Ruby Bridges was one of the first students to lead the way. School Days Ruby made it inside William Frantz Public School that first day. However, there was so much uproar, she didn’t make it to class. From the principal’s office, Ruby watched as angry parents pulled their children out of school. On her second day, Ruby met her teacher, Barbara Henry. By then, so many kids had been removed from the school that Ruby was Henry’s only student. The pair worked one-on-one for the whole year. “Mrs. Henry was one of the nicest teachers I ever had,” Bridges told WR News. “She made school fun for me.”

Outside the building, people continued to protest. Others, though, believed everyone should have civil rights. By the end of the year, crowds began to dwindle,

or decrease. When Ruby returned to school for second grade, there were no more protesters. Many of the other students had returned.

Building Bridges

By the late 1960s, most schools in the United States were no longer segregated, thanks to the efforts of civil rights workers. Other laws were passed that improved life for African Americans. The Civil Rights Act of 1964, for example, helped protect African Americans’ rights to seek jobs. Bridges never had to attend a segregated school. She graduated from high school and continued her studies in business school. Today, Bridges speaks to kids about the importance of treating one another equally. She has never forgotten her experience at William Frantz Public School, and she shares details about her first day there in her speeches. “I wasn’t really afraid,” Bridges told WR News. “I didn’t really know what was going on at the time, and I loved school.”

The Little Rock Nine

Before Ruby Bridges, there was the Little Rock Nine. They were nine African American students in Little Rock, Ark. On Sept. 4, 1957, the students attempted to begin classes at the all-white Central High School. But the governor of Arkansas and the angry mobs surrounding the school prevented them from entering. Finally, President Dwight D. Eisenhower took action. He sent U.S. troops to protect the students, and they finally began classes. High school was far from easy for the group, but some of them went on to graduate. In 1999, Congress awarded the Little Rock Nine the Congressional Gold Medal for their bravery.

How Ruby Made History

How does it feel to make history? WR News student reporter Kaelin Ray asked Ruby Bridges. Kaelin Ray: How does it feel to know that you are a part of U.S. history?

Ruby Bridges: I’m very proud of that fact. My mother was really happy about my being able to attend that school. My father was more concerned about my safety.

KR: What was your first day at William Frantz Public School like?

RB: My first day I spent sitting in the principal’s office, so it was very confusing.

KR: What was it like to meet your teacher, Mrs. Henry, again many years later? RB: I was really, really excited about meeting her again because she [was] a very important part of my life that had been missing for a long time.

Answer the questions according to the instructions above.

1. Why did Ruby Bridges have a reason to be afraid? 2. What does the word “race” mean in this context? 3. How did segregation affect African Americans? 4. Complete the following sentence:

When civil rights are respected, everybody……………………………………. (p4)

5. What case did the U.S. Supreme Court hear? (p4)6. What did the court decide? (p4) 7. Why did a federal court take action in New Orleans? (p5)8. What was unusual about Mrs. Henry’s class that year? (p7)9. What did the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (p10) have in common with the 1954 U.S.

Supreme Court ruling (p4)? Complete the sentence: They both …..10. Why did President Dwight D. Eisenhower send U.S. troops to Little Rock, Arkansas?

(p.14/p.15)

Walking Tall – Vocabulary

Copy the words onto the answer pages. Write a definition according to the context of the text next to the word. Write the number of the word!

1. mob 2. unconstitutional

3. prompt(ed) 4. uproar 5. protest

6. decrease 7. improve(d) 8. seek 9. prevent(ed) 10. award(ed)

Practice: https://quizlet.com/_4z5lp0

Memories—Good and Bad

A person’s memory can be like a mansion with many, many rooms. Some of the rooms you visit frequently, while others you may not enter for many years. As you age, some of these rooms may change, and you may remember things slightly differently than how they actually happened. In other cases, the rooms may stay the same, but the doors may become locked. Sometimes these rooms can only be unlocked if you find a special key. Some of these rooms you may enjoy visiting; some of them, you may just wish the door stayed shut.

One of the keys that can often unlock a person’s memory is a specific sensory input—something you can see, smell, touch, taste, or hear. There is the famous case of the novelist Marcel Proust, who tasted a madeleine—a kind of cookie—and it caused him to suddenly remember an enormous amount of his childhood, memories that had previously been locked away. He went on to write a seven volume novel called ‐In Search of Lost Time, in which he explored these memories and what they meant to him. Proust might not have written these volumes exactly as they are had he not eaten that fateful madeleine.

As Proust demonstrates, while we can consciously summon certain memories—for example, if you try to think of your mother’s face, you can almost certainly do it—there are others that visit us involuntarily. This has to do with how the human brain is wired. While much of the brain is still mysterious to scientists, it has been determined that the memory center of the brain, where memories are made and stored, is closely linked to the sensory center, where the brain controls and processes the body’s senses. A certain sensory input, such as Proust’s cookie, may fire up not just the sensory center, but the memory center, too.

The senses you possess are a way for your brain to monitor what’s going on outside. When you receive a particular sensory input, meaning one of your senses is stimulated, that sense will send a signal to your brain telling the information it just received. For example, when Proust tasted his cookie, the sense receptors on his tongue sent a message to his brain telling it how the madeleine tasted. The messages are signals transmitted along nerve cells until they reach the brain. When the brain receives these signals, it processes them and controls the body’s reaction to them.

Sense receptors react to many different types of inputs, including electromagnetic, mechanical, and chemical. In Proust’s case, his tongue was sensing the chemical makeup of the cookie and its mechanical properties, such as the cookie’s hardness and brittleness.

When a nerve signal reaches the brain, the brain can react in a multitude of ways. Often the signal will trigger immediate behaviors or memories that happen automatically, without conscious decisions on your part. For example, let’s say you’re barefoot, and you step on something sharp. You probably wouldn’t have time to think, “Gosh, that really hurts. Should I lift up my foot? Yes, I think I’ll do that.” Your brain, having registered the pain, reacts by lifting up your foot without you thinking about it. Just as your brain receives signals from its sense receptors through nerve cells, it can send out a command through nerve cells. In this case, your brain sent a signal to your foot telling it to move away from the sharp object.

Not all behaviors your brain tells you to do are the best choices. If you’re walking in the woods and you see a bear, your brain, having received the image of the bear through the eye’s optic nerve, may start producing chemical compounds called hormones. Amongst other things, hormones affect moods and many behaviors. In this case, the brain will likely produce a hormone called adrenaline, which causes your body to gain energy and alertness. It may also send a signal to your legs that says, “Run!” This is because your brain might have learned from experience that it is a good idea to run from danger. However, in this case, running from a bear is a bad idea. Instead, experts say people should back away from the bear at a relatively slow pace. If you run, the bear is more likely to chase. Hopefully, you will remember this fact, and the next time you see a bear in the woods, your brain will access the memory of what to do.

The way the brain reacts to what it senses often has a lot to do with how it has learned to react in the past. Consider the case of a soldier who goes to war. When a soldier is on a battlefield, he or she very frequently feels unsafe. The soldier may believe that the enemy could strike at any time. As part of his or her training, the soldier has learned to stay alert for any signs of danger and, if one is detected, to react immediately. This is often very important, as any hesitation could result in harm to the soldier or his or her fellow soldiers. Good soldiers often learn to react automatically to certain kinds of danger, much like how people would react automatically when they step on something sharp. For example, if soldiers hear a

gunshot, they may react immediately by dropping to the ground to avoid getting hit.

The longer a soldier stays at war, the more his or her brain can become used to reacting in this way. The soldier’s senses may become attuned to certain inputs they were never attuned to before the war. For example, his or her nose may begin to be alert for odors that signal danger, and the soldier’s ears may become alert to certain sounds. If he or she successfully avoids danger using his or her senses in this way, then the soldier’s brain would tell him or her to continue doing this. The brain may also become quicker at releasing hormones, such as adrenaline, if it has been trained to defend the body in this way.

While these reactions may serve the soldier extremely well in a combat zone, they may not be as useful when he or she is at home. In fact, the soldier may have to spend some time readjusting to being in a place where the potential of danger is low. This is because the brain has become used to reacting to certain inputs in a particular way and may need some time to be trained to react in a different way. For example, on the battlefield, the brain might have learned to react to the sound of an airplane by producing adrenaline to prepare the soldier for action. However, if the soldier is away from the battlefield and hears a plane, this injection of adrenaline probably wouldn’t help much. In fact, it may just make him nervous. The same is true when a soldier feels threatened. While it may serve him well to react instantly in combat, in civilian life, it may be better for him to think for a moment before reacting.

Soldiers, particularly soldiers who have been deeply affected by their time in combat, may, like Proust, be overwhelmed by a flood of memories when they receive certain sensory inputs. While some of these memories may be positive, others may be distressing. The 1998 film Saving Private Ryan featured scenes of the historic D Day ‐landing at Normandy Beach that were recreated in incredible detail. In the battle, many soldiers were killed. When the film was released, there were reports of veterans, particularly World War II veterans, who grew deeply disturbed at seeing the battle scenes. In part, this was because, by recreating the sights and sounds of battle, the film had unlocked many memories the veterans had of the war, some of which were very painful.

Sometimes, triggering memories can be valuable for healing. Every year, many veterans visit the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C. The memorial is a long wall into which the names of U.S. soldiers who died in the war are etched. Veterans visit the wall for many reasons, but it is nearly always an experience that draws up many emotional memories. Seeing the names and touching the wall can hurt, but it can also remind people of trusted friends whom they lost to the war. Without the wall, these memories might stay locked in a room to which no one has a key.

Answer the questions according to the instructions above.

1. What does the writer compare memory to? (p1)2. What is sensory input? (p.2)3. Why might we remember something that happened when we taste something? (p3)4. Which of the different kinds of inputs mentioned in paragraph 5 DIDN’T Proust

register?5. Does the brain always trigger an immediate reaction? Write YES or NO and then

justify your answer by writing ONE word. (p6)6. Why might you run from a bear? (p7)7. What two changes may occur when a soldier is at war for a long time? (p9)8. Why did many World War II American veterans (1941-1945) feel distressed when

they saw a film in 1998? (p.11)

Memories – Good and Bad - Vocabulary


1. sensory 2. input 3. demonstrates 4. conscious(ly) 5. summon6. determine(d) 7. monitor 8. signal 9. nerve 10. cells11. multitude 12. trigger 13. registered 14. producing 15. generates16. gain 17. aid(ed) 18. alert 19. detect 20. attune(d)21. readjusting 22. civilian 23. veteran(s) 24. healing 25. etch(ed)

You can practice the words using quizlet:

https://quizlet.com/_4z5m6t

Mix the Old with the New

Chefs in busy restaurants do a lot of different things. They check the inventory of ingredients used for each popular dish. They may supervise a kitchen staff, making sure their assistants are working well as a team. They may ensure that diners are not waiting too long for their food. They may taste the food before it leaves the kitchen. They do a lot and think about everything that goes into the food and experience their restaurant serves. But they may not think about how they and their staff change the properties, structure and state of matter of food...but they are doing that with many dishes they serve. Do you know how to change the properties, structure and state of matter of a substance? If you have made ice before, the answer is yes. When you put an ice tray filled with water in a freezer, the temperature of the water in that ice tray lowers. The freezer makes a physical change of state to the water by turning it from a liquid to a solid. When we cook, we change many things about the food we are preparing. These could be any number of properties: size, shape, mass, color or temperature. We can change the physical or chemical nature of the food. We can even change the state of matter the food is currently in to another state of matter.

STATES OF MATTER

There are four common states of matter we see almost every day: solid, liquid, gas and plasma. We can observe all four of them in a kitchen. A solid is as simple as an ice cube, or frozen water. Melt that ice cube, and you produce water, a liquid. Boil that water, and you produce steam, or water vapor. Believe it or not, plasma can be found in kitchens too. It’s found in fluorescent lights, neon signs and plasma televisions. Other examples of plasma include the sun and lightning.

CHEMICAL CHANGES

A chemical change produces something from other materials and occurs on the molecular level. Some examples of chemical changes that take place in a kitchen are frying an egg, grilling fish or burning that egg or fish. When you smell onions sautéing in a pan or catch a whiff of the chicken roasting in the oven, the scent coming from the food is also a chemical reaction. Hopefully the scents you smell are only appetizing ones. There are undesirable chemical changes that occur in the kitchen, too. If you smell the odor of rotting food, you’ve got a chemical change that needs some addressing! After you wash your metal pots and pans, make sure they dry properly. If they don’t dry, the metal could react to the oxygen in the air and rust. Rust is evidence of another chemical change you don’t want in your kitchen. PHYSICAL CHANGES

Physical changes in the kitchen do not produce a new substance. Changes in state or phase are physical changes. For example, cutting vegetables, or even dissolving salt in a hot soup are examples of physical changes. In general, physical changes can be reversed using physical means. In the example of dissolving salt in a hot soup, evaporating the water naturally or applying heat to boil off the water can return the salt to its original state of matter. When water is boiled, steam is created. That steam is water vapor, or the gas phase of water. That change from a liquid to a gas is an example of a physical change. Let’s say you’re making a smoothie with strawberries, bananas, kale and orange juice. When you’re cutting the fruits and vegetable into smaller pieces, it’s a simple physical change. When you add them to the blender with the orange juice, the physical change that takes place during blending is more complex, and you now have a liquid. You can even go full circle and turn your liquid ‐smoothie into a solid by turning it into popsicles in the freezer.

A DIFFERENT KIND OF COOKING

There are some chefs in this world who reject or reinterpret traditional cooking techniques and cuisines. They push the boundary of food with new techniques to create entirely new combinations of flavor and texture. They take states of matter, physical changes, and chemical changes of food to a whole different level.

MOLECULAR GASTRONOMY

While some chefs may not actively think about the science behind the food they serve, others are using a modern style and science of cooking called molecular gastronomy. Molecular gastronomy is a scientific discipline that studies the physical

and chemical processes that occur while cooking. Chefs who practice molecular gastronomy study and apply scientific principles when cooking and preparing their dishes. Their goal is to use their knowledge to make a tasty and unique dining experience. They are concerned about how to make food delicious as well as what makes food delicious. To understand this, they have to consider many factors. Some of these factors include how their ingredients are grown, processed and transported. Where did the seeds used to grow the fruit come from? What kind of dirt and how much water did this vegetable receive? After harvest, was it ever put in a plastic bag? Was it sent by air, truck, and/or boat? What negative effects did transportation have on the produce? Only after all that is determined do many molecular gastronomy chefs finally get to the cooking part of their craft. They want to understand how ingredients change with different cooking techniques. They want to know how all of a person’s senses, not just taste, play into the enjoyment or dislike of food. They go deeper and learn how the brain interprets the signals our senses send to ultimately determine the flavor tasted. They even experiment with how food is presented, who prepares it, and what mood the diner is in. Many of these factors are what most chefs consider anyway, but what really differentiates molecular gastronomy chefs is in the preparation and presentation steps. And when it comes down to it, a molecular gastronomy chef is many things at once: a little physicist, a sprinkle of chemist, a dash of agriculturist, a spoonful of biologist, and a heap of psychologist to top it off. That’s a solid list of ingredients that hopefully turns into fun and tasty food.

PREPARATION

Molecular gastronomy chefs look at how ingredients are changed by different cooking methods. These cooking methods affect the eventual flavor and texture of food ingredients. One method is called direct spherification. This is the process of turning a liquid into little caviar‐ like balls. Employing gelling solutions like sodium alginate, liquids like fruit and vegetable juices, and even milk, are dropped into calcium chloride and water to form a thin shell around the liquid. This jelly membrane creates the ball that pops with the liquid’s intense flavor when eaten. The spheres are fragile and are usually served immediately. Another method is a variation on the existing technique of using foams. Well known foams include ‐whipped cream and mousse, and also involve the use of air or another gas to create a lighter texture and feel when eaten. A variation on the foaming technique is to make foam that is made of mainly air. You can make foams out of almost anything. It can have so much air that it resembles big soap bubbles. This changes the texture into something lighter while allowing the flavor to remain. Steak bubbles, anyone? A recipe that combines the foam and spherification techniques is Apple Caviar with Banana Foam served on a spoon. Combining apple juice in the form of spheres and banana foam whisked with heavy cream, milk, sugar and gelatin, this spoonful is not your typical dessert! Some molecular gastronomy cooking methods involve temperature regulation. One method is called sous vide and entails cooking food, ‐like meats, in airtight plastic bags in a water bath. This ensures the entire piece of

meat is cooked evenly and also retains its juices. Cooking times when using the sous‐vide method don’t have to, but can increase dramatically. Some chefs choose to tenderize tough meats like beef brisket with a sous vide water bath that lasts for two‐ to three days. Although it may seem like weird science or just plain ridiculous, molecular gastronomy chefs want to explore new possibilities in the kitchen. Combining new and old cooking techniques, new equipment and technologies, and various sciences, these chefs may be inventing the food of the future. Whether they are successful or not, they are definitely making things fun.

GOOD FOOD IS GOOD FOOD

Whether a chef uses traditional or new cooking methods, the fundamentals of cooking are the same. Both traditional and molecular gastronomy chefs change the properties of the food they serve. They change the states of matter, properties and structure of food to, hopefully, serve a great meal.

Answer the following questions according to the instructions above.

Mix the Old with the New

1. What does the writer explain in paragraph 1?2. How do chefs who use molecular gastronomy in their cooking differ from chefs

who cook in the traditional way? (p. 6/7)3. Complete the sentences according to paragraph 8

Chefs who practice molecular gastronomy want to know what ________________________ to the ingredients before they buy it.

4. According to paragraph 10, what is the main difference between a traditional chef and a molecular gastronomy chef? Complete the sentence: The main difference is in the way he…………………………………………………………………………………………..

5. What is “Apple Caviar with Banana Foam served on a spoon” an example of? (p11/12/13/14)

6. How is food cooked using the “sous-vide” method? (p15)7. What do traditional and molecular gastronomy chefs have in common according

to paragraph 17?

Mix the Old with the New - Vocabulary


1. inventory 2. supervise 3. staff 4. properties 5. substance6. whiff 7. odor 8. rotting 9. addressing 10. dissolving11. reversed 12. evaporating 13. reject 14.

combinations15. discipline

16. apply 17. principles 18. factors 19. transported 20. craft21. differentiates

22. sprinkle 23. dash 24. employing 25. membrane

26. fragile 27. variation 28. foam 29. texture 30. entails

31. retains 32. tenderize 33. fundamentals

I suggest you prepare a quizlet for this set and practice it.

Researchers Beginning to Better Understand False Memory Formation

If you think planting false memories only happens in the movies, think again. False memories happen all the time in humans—we frequently misremember how, when, and why certain things happened. We misremember small details, but also major events. Often we misremember things that happened only recently. Now scientists are on the path to finding a better means of understanding why false memories happen to people, by learning how to plant them in the first place.

According to James Gorman in an article in the New York Times in 2013, researchers are already able in experiments to convince humans to remember certain words and images inaccurately. A recent study by scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) took this process a step further by planting entirely false memories in mice.

Though mice and humans are very different creatures, their memory formation processes are similar. Studying the memories of mice has helped researchers understand exactly what goes on in the brain during the formation of fake memories.

A team of scientists at MIT, who published their findings in the journal Science, found that mice could be convinced of having been shocked in a certain location when they had not in fact been shocked there.

The scientists first allowed a group of mice to become comfortable in a certain area without being shocked. They then introduced the mice to a second area where they received shocks, while stimulating the parts of their brains that had become activated while exploring the first area in peace. Next they put the mice back in the original area. The mice froze in fear of being shocked, though they had no actual memory of being shocked there. The activation of the brain cells while shocks were being delivered was enough to convince the mice that they had been shocked there before even though they had not.

According to Joel N. Shurkin with the news service “Inside Science,” these false memories are as powerful and seemingly real as actual memories. At the same time, it is worth considering whether a human, with greater awareness and context than a mouse, would somehow be less easily convinced by the implantation of false memories. Still, this process reveals how easy it is to toy with the idea of “reality.”

This experiment and its conclusions further the understanding of specifically how and where memory formation occurs in the brain. Norwegian scientist Dr. Edvard I. Moser, who was not involved in the experiment but commented on it later for the

Times, said this is the closest we have ever come to being able to point to a specific part of the brain and say it is responsible for memory.

Additionally, the ability to plant and further understand memory formation and how easy it is to create false memories helps us understand that memory is actually a very unreliable tool. This is useful for humans to know as memory is used in many different ways, including witness testimony in court cases. In fact, witness testimony relies entirely on a person’s ability to remember events.

Shurkin quotes a statistic from an organization called the Innocence Project to highlight how serious this matter is when it comes to court testimony:

...eyewitness testimony played a role in 75 percent of guilty verdicts eventually overturned by DNA testing after people spent years in prison. Some prisoners may have even been executed due to false eyewitness testimony. It was not because the witnesses were lying."

In fact, the witnesses were just wrong without even realizing it. Someone who is convinced of a false memory believes it entirely to be true. This new information has the potential to forever change how we understand eyewitness testimony and general court proceedings.

While it may be scary to consider how unreliable our memories can be, researchers agree there is certainly a plus side to this new research. According to the authors of the study, “This type of research could one day help treat some emotional problems, such as post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), which involves the intrusion of ‐unwanted memories.” The ability to play with humans’ memories gives us much more power over the way we think and cope with painful memories, and could be key in helping people who suffer from a range of emotional problems.

Scientists have also long wondered why false memory creation is so easy in humans in the first place. Why are humans’ memories so prone to failure? Gorman noted in the Times the ability for the brain to be flexible and imagine different scenarios could be responsible for a great deal of human creativity.

However, this creativity—or the “imagination”—is unique to humans and is a big part of what makes us human. Unless animals are subjected to false memory experiments like the mice at MIT, they do not create false memories the way humans do.

Answer all the questions.

1. What does the writer explain in paragraph 1?2. Why have researchers been studying the memories of mice? (p2/3)3. Why were the mice afraid of being shocked in the place where they had not been

shocked? (p5)4. Thanks to the mice memory experiment, what do scientists know more about? (p 6/7) 5. Complete the following sentence: According to paragraphs 8-11, due to the fact that it is

easy to create false memories, we should not ………………………………………..

6. What is an advantage to planting false memories according t paragraph 12?7. What might be one of the reasons that humans misremember according to paragraphs

13/14?

Researchers Beginning to Better Understand False Memory Formation – Vocabulary Copy the words onto the answer pages. Write a definition according to the context of the text next to the word. Write the number of the word!

1. plant(ing) 2. means (noun)

3. inaccurately 4. process 5. unreliable

6. tool 7. testimony 8. entirely 9. verdict 10. overturn(ed)

11. executed 12. intrusion 13. cope 14. prone 15. scenarios16. subject(ed)


An Empire Built on Paper

Until the 8th century, paper was only produced in China and other parts of Eastern Asia. Scholars in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa had to make do with papyrus, a brittle material made only in Egypt, or parchment, a very fine sheet made from the skin of animals. Writing on papyrus and parchment was difficult. The pages were thick, fragile and expensive.

In China, however, scholars had long before discovered something far more useful: thin sheets prepared from compressed, dried out wood pulp—also known as paper. ‐In the 700s, during the period of Islamic dominance known as the "Islamic Golden Age," Muslim armies stormed east from Arabia and came into contact with the Chinese empire. In the Battle of Talas, in 751 A.D., armies of the Arab Abbasid Caliphate defeated the forces of the Chinese Tang Dynasty, bringing Islam to the edge of China itself.

Legend has it that two Chinese papermakers were captured during the battle and brought to Samarkand, where they were ordered to establish a paper manufacturing center in the heart of the Muslim empire. Whether or not this was wholly true, it is probable that Muslim warriors encountered papermaking during their battles with China. Seeing its usefulness immediately, they returned home with the technology to share with their scribes.

The Muslim empire was a "logocentric" culture, which means that they placed great importance on words. Their holy book, the Qur’an, was a great poetic work, and devout Muslims were expected to memorize parts of it, to be recited during religious ceremonies. One of their most famous art forms was calligraphy, a style of decorative writing, and their great mosques were decorated not with images of people, but the words of the Qur’an itself.

It is no surprise that a society which so valued words would fall in love with paper. Compared to parchment and papyrus, even rudimentary paper—much rougher and thicker than the pages of a book today—was a great improvement. Unlike parchment, which could only be made from the skins of animals, paper could be manufactured relatively cheaply and easily. Unlike papyrus, paper did not crack when it was bent. It was also thinner, which made the binding of books much simpler than it had been before.

Perhaps most importantly, paper absorbed ink, which meant that anything written on paper could not be erased. That's not very useful when you're trying to solve a math problem, but when writing official government documents, permanence is crucial.

Just as it had been in China, paper was originally used mainly by the Arab government. At a time when Europe was broken into a number of disorganized kingdoms, the Abbasid Caliphate, which stretched from Afghanistan to North Africa, might have been the greatest power on Earth. This sprawling empire contained dozens of great cities, millions of people, and several different, often conflicting, cultures. Although the empire's official language was Arabic, its people spoke many different languages—from Persian in the East to Berber in the West. Now those disparate regions could be united by the written word.

Paper's use spread quickly. By the end of the 8th century, a paper mill had been set up in Baghdad. Over the next 200 years, the technology spread to Syria, North Africa, and eve Spain—which was partially ruled by Muslims from 711 to 1492. Although the Abbasid Caliphate and other ruling houses of the Arab empire were skilled in war, they prized learning above all else. The Abbasids took inspiration from a well known ‐saying, "The ink of a scholar is holier than the blood of a martyr."

To this end, the Abbasids did everything they could to encourage scientific achievement. As Europe languished in the Dark Ages, when even literacy was limited mainly to monks, the Muslim world entered a scientific golden age. Building on the knowledge of the ancient Greeks, Muslim scholars made great advances in geometry, astronomy, and mathematics.

As paper became more widespread, so did knowledge. The tedious process of writing books by hand was made easier by an adoption of assembly line style ‐ ‐techniques, which allowed a group of scribes to produce finished books faster than ever before. Great libraries were established across the Muslim world, and in capitals like Baghdad and Cairo, booksellers flourished. Scholars and poets were supported by the government, and for perhaps the first time in history, it became possible to make a living by reading and writing alone.

Even as paper became widespread, there was one place where its dominance was resisted: religion. Because paper was less expensive than parchment, it was initially considered unfit to bear the holy words of the Qur’an. However, the demand for copies of the Qur’an grew along with the population's literacy. Eventually, that

demand, along with the improved quality of the paper, made the new material considered suitable for religious use. The oldest known Qur’an written on paper dates from 971 972. ‐The western spread of paper didn’t end in the Arab empire. From there, the technology to manufacture paper made its way through Europe. It was not until the middle of the 15th century that a German blacksmith named Johannes Gutenberg invented a printing press that allowed for mass production of the Christian Bible. Most of Gutenberg's Bibles were printed on paper, becoming one of the most famous early works on paper in history. But it would not have been possible without the help of the Muslim empire.

An Empire Built On Paper

Answer all the questions.

1. What did people use parchment for? (p.1)2. Complete the sentence: In China, paper was made out of…… (p.2)3. How did Muslims learn about paper? (p.2/3)4. What does the writer present in paragraph 5? Fill in ONE word:

He presents the _______________________ of paper over parchment and papyrus.

5. What were TWO reasons for paper to be used in government documents? (p6/7)

6. What might have been the fundamental reason that the Muslim world was making great advances in geometry, astronomy and mathematics while Europe (non-Muslim) was not? (p. 9)

7. Why wasn’t the Qur’an written on paper at the same time as the Muslims used it for government documents? (p.11)

An Empire Built on Paper – Vocabulary


1. brittle 2. compressed 3. pulp 4. dominance 5. captured6.establish 7.

manufacturing8. wholly 9. encountered 10. scribes

11. devout 12. recited 13. rudimentary 14. binding 15. absorbed16. permanence

17. crucial 18. sprawling 19. disparate 20. martyr

21. languished 22. literacy 23. monks 24. tedious 25. adoption26. assembly line

27. flourished 28. make a living

29. initially 30. unfit

31. bear


Foot Binding

Throughout history, women have felt the pressure to conform to their society’s definition of beauty. Standards of beauty often reflect cultural values and beliefs, and women have gone to great lengths to meet these ideals. At times, women have had to take extreme measures to live up to these standards at the cost of their own well being. ‐One of the most striking examples is the Chinese practice of foot binding. For centuries, small feet were considered very attractive and ladylike, and the Chinese believed they made a woman’s movements more feminine and dainty. In order to attain such a coveted feature, it was common practice for young girls to break and bind their toes with the intention of shrinking their feet—a process that kept them in excruciating pain for months. Foot binding was practiced for over a millennium, until the Chinese government officially outlawed the practice in 1911.

According to the legend, foot binding began when an ancient Chinese emperor’s dancer bound her feet to suggest the shape of a new moon or a flower. The emperor was impressed with her "lotus dance," and other women emulated the practice until it spread across the country. (Bound feet were also known as lotus flowers.)

Yet the Chinese foot binding tradition officially dates back to the Tang Dynasty. It gained popularity with the rise of neo Confucianism and a hierarchical system of ‐subservience. Scholars who reinterpreted ancient Confucian thought believed they discovered a "lost" philosophy focusing on nature, training the mind, and cultivating discipline. In neo‐ Confucianism, the subjects of a kingdom were expected to serve their rulers (who were considered mothers and fathers of the country) and in turn, wives were expected to defer to their husbands, sons to fathers, and the weak to the powerful.

Zhu Xi, an influential scholar of neo Confucianism, contributed to the acceptance of ‐ ‐foot binding in China. According to Zhu Xi, the practice reflected purity and ‐discipline. He introduced it in Fujian as a way of spreading Chinese culture and teaching about the proper way for men and women to interact.

Another factor that led to the popularity of foot binding was women’s decreased involvement in civic life during the Song dynasty between 960 1279. During this ‐period, a woman’s most important task was considered giving birth to sons. Women didn’t participate in politics and were infrequently seen on the streets, in comparison with the previous Tang dynasty. Some historians suggest that the diminished status of women during the Song Dynasty made foot binding more socially acceptable.

Binding usually began when a girl was between the ages of four and seven. First the foot was soaked in hot water and the toenails clipped. Then came the painful part: the four small toes were broken, and the foot was bandaged tightly with the toes turned under toward the bottom of the foot. (It was believed that young bones were soft, which is why binding started early.) In order for the girl to maintain her balance, the big toe was left unturned. Every few days, the foot was unwrapped and then

wrapped again even tighter, until the foot shrunk to about four inches long. The arches were also broken, which caused the foot to contract even more. The entire process could take three years or longer, and it was so debilitating that young girls from wealthy families would often receive a servant to care for her personal needs, carry her when her feet hurt, and look after her on sleepless nights when the pain was unbearable.

Foot binding wasn’t just painful. It could also be dangerous. Complications included ulcerations and gangrene, and infections caused by ingrown toenails or lack of circulation from tight bindings. Sometimes toes even fell off—though this was considered a good thing because it meant the feet could be wrapped even tighter. Bound feet also had a foul odor and left many young women hardly able to walk. Sadly, it’s estimated that up to 10 percent of girls died in the process of foot binding.

Even if mothers could have objected to putting their daughters through such a tremendously painful process, social pressure likely made them willing practitioners of foot binding. Virtuous women were prized according to the tenets of Neo‐Confucianism, and foot binding was the ultimate symbol of a woman’s purity and discipline. The ability to withstand foot binding reflected a woman’s character, and her attractiveness was revealed not in her face or body, but in her feet. A girl learned that her family’s reputation was linked to the binding of her feet early in life. In fact, the process was so crucial to a woman’s status in China that a girl with natural, unbound feet had limited marriage prospects, while girls with tiny, well bound feet ‐increased their chances of marrying into a good family and moving up in society.

Although the practice was promoted as a way to increase health and fertility, foot binding was clearly detrimental to a woman’s well being. It greatly limited a ‐woman’s ability to walk, and some women became practically crippled. Bound feet forced women to hobble around and take extremely small steps. Many men found this shuffling sort of walk very attractive. Yet as a result of their compromised feet, women rarely participated in social or political life, often becoming very dependent on their husbands and families. Even this was seen as a virtue, for a woman who stayed at home was considered chaste and faithful to her husband.

At first glance, foot binding might seem to contradict Confucian thought, which forbids body mutilation. However, since the feet were considered a sort of accessory, foot binding fell into a different category altogether. Ironically, a practice promoted to achieve the ultimate symbol of beauty grossly disfigured women’s feet. The toes often became gnarled or fused together. Many men were unaware of the disfigurement caused by foot binding because women’s feet were always carefully concealed. During the day, feet were covered in a binder, socks and shoes, sprayed with perfume and scented powder, and then hidden beneath leggings and skirts. At night women wore special slippers, even while sleeping. Women were expected to wash their feet in private and separately from the rest of their bodies.

Not all Chinese practiced foot binding. It was less common among peasants and in poor communities because women were needed to work in the fields. Mongols, Hakka and Tibetans living in Chinese territory didn’t bind their feet at all. In Manchu province, foot binding was outlawed. Yet because the “hobble” associated with bound feet was considered attractive, a special type of "flower bowl" shoe was invented in Manchu to give women the same swaying small steps. The shoe sat on a high platform made of wood or had a small central pedestal.

By the 20th century, both native Chinese and Christian missionaries were calling the practice of foot binding into question. Anti foot binding reformers created natural‐ ‐foot societies for members who promised not to bind their daughter’s feet, or not let their sons marry women with bound feet. Many women’s rights groups attacked the practice because of the suffering it caused women. Educated Chinese felt that the practice made them seem uncivilized to the rest of the world. Yet even after the government banned the practice in the early 20th century, some girls continued to bind their feet because it was such a long held status symbol and a way for a woman‐ to marry into money.

Today, few women with bound feet are still alive. The tiny, intricately decorated special shoes made for bound feet will be all that remains of the painful practice.

Answer all the questions according to the instructions.

1. Paragraph 2 begins: “One of the most striking examples is…..” What is it an example of? (Look in the previous paragraph for the answer!)

2. What was the main reason that the Chinese broke and bound young girls’ toes? (p.2)3. Refer to paragraphs 4 to 6 in order to complete the following sentence:

One factor that led to the popularity of foot binding was parents wanted to teach their daughters ________________________. Another factor was that women were less involved____________________________.

4. What does the writer describe in paragraph 7?5. What proof is there in paragraph 8 that foot binding was life-threatening?6. What were the consequences for a girl who didn’t have bound feet? (p.9)7. Refer to paragraph 10 in order to complete the following sentence:

Although women could not ______________________________, men thought that ______________________________ . Moreover, men liked the idea that women stayed home because that meant that their wives _______________________________________

8. Why didn’t men feel disgusted when they saw the terrible disfigurement? (p11)9. Why was a “flower bowl” shoe invented? (p.12)10. What does the writer explain in paragraph 13?

Foot Binding - Vocabulary


1. conform 2. go(ne) to 3. striking 4. dainty 5. attain

great lengths6. coveted 7. emulated 8. subservience 9. defer 10. influential11. diminished 12. debilitating 13. ulcerations 14. gangrene 15. foul16. practitioners

17. virtuous 18. tenets 19. detrimental 20. hobble

21. chaste 22. mutilation 23. disfigured 24. pedestal 25. ban(ned)26. intricately


Summer Unseen Comprehension Work

Who's That Boy – Boy Actors and Other Strange Things on the Shakespearean Stage

William Shakespeare gave theatre some of its most famous heroines: Cleopatra, Juliet, Rosalind, Desdemona. But who was playing them on stage in his lifetime? Not female actors, but young boys! Yes, imagine Lady Macbeth with a hint of a moustache or Desdemona with a lower voice, and male actors both playing Romeo and Juliet! But theatre regulations of the time prevented women from acting, writing, producing, or being associated with theatre work in any other way. In fact, if some people in Shakespeare's time had their way, there would be no theatre at all!

Knowing Will Shakespeare

First off, we all know Shakespeare has long been dead. But what do we know about his life? We know, for example, that the man we consider to be Shakespeare might not be the writer of the plays and sonnets we attribute to him. We also know that this man came to London (many people believe) not to become an actor or a playwright, but because even before he was 21 years old, he was the father of three children, and couldn't afford to look after them anymore! He is one of the very few famous people who is believed to have died on his birthday April 23 at the age of ‐‐ ‐‐52. And if you went to the Library of Congress in Washington, and could read at a miraculous speed of one work about Shakespeare every day, you wouldn't be able to leave Washington for twenty years!

Cross Dressing in Theatre ‐Getting boys to play women's parts was certainly not Shakespeare's idea. The custom dates from Ancient Greece, and many societies up to Shakespeare’s time had similar restrictions on women in theatre, opera and other public performances. Men dressing up as women, or "cross dressing," as it is called, was therefore a rule in the ‐theatre, not an exception. According to Dr. Aoife Monks from Birkbeck College, University of London, "We do know that cross dressing is central to early ‐performance and it is one of the few universal theatrical forms. It was and always has been the norm, not abnormal to cross dress."‐

A Whole Lot of Angry People!

Frankly, no one knew for sure who all was angry about theatre, and for what reason. They kept changing all the time. We know that two authorities governed theatre: the City of London and the Crown (Queen Elizabeth I for much of Shakespeare's time). One Act of Common Council passed by the City of London in 1574 said that all plays should first be approved by the Mayor. It also said that plays should not be performed on Sundays (for people wouldn't go to church otherwise) or during Lent (when people should not be distracted with entertainment.)

Why were the city authorities so worried? They didn't want people going to the theatres in large numbers. We can imagine that people did go in large numbers, given the fact that this may have been the only form of entertainment open to them. The authorities feared thefts, quarrels, the spread of contagious diseases, young girls having affairs and even the building collapsing! But was anyone listening to them? Not really. It appears that the Queen herself and other members of the aristocracy were fans of theatre, and certainly of our dear Shakespeare. As long as they protected the acting companies, no one could touch them.

Another group that was very upset by theatre was made up of contemporary moralists. Sample this comment from one, John Stockwood: "Will not a filthy play, with the blast of a trumpet, sooner call thither a thousand, than an hour's tolling of a bell, bring to sermon a hundred?" In other words, Stockwood thought that people would rather see a play than go to church. Many agreed with him.

And just as some of our parents think there is a relation between television, video games, gambling, drugs and sleeping too much, John Northbrooke believed theatre was related to other "vices." He wrote in 1577 "A Treatise wherein Dicing, Dancing, Vain Plays or Enterludes with other Idle Pastimes etc. Commonly Used on Sabbath Day, are Reproved." And Philip Stubbes called playhouses "the chapel of Satan" in his "Anatomy of Abuses" and asked for an immediate and complete abolition of all theatre.

You Can't Wear That!

The most interesting complaint and the most relevant for our discussion on boy actors was about how the actors dressed. Did you know that the Old Testament forbids one sex to wear the clothes of the other? Also, remember that dress was highly codified during this time. "Sumptuary laws," used to control people's expenditure, also applied to clothing. For example, if you were a shopkeeper, you could not wear silver, purple or gold colors. You also couldn't wear fur, foreign wool or velvet. If you were a woman, depending on your rank, you could be forbidden from wearing anything from sleeves and buttons to petticoats! Now imagine what would happen to these laws on the stage. Actors, by no means a respectable class of people at this time, dressed as kings! Men dressed as women! People were so angry that they blamed plays for everything that went wrong at the time: "The cause of

plagues is sin: and the cause of sin is plays: therefore the causes of plagues are plays," declared one, Mr. T.W.

Women in the Audience

Was Shakespeare's audience more restricted or less diverse than theatre audiences today? From a butcher to a member of the aristocracy, a tailor to a foreign ambassador, students, lawyers, shopkeepers, everyone went to the theatre. Even those who could not afford to pay for a seat would stand crowded in the pit around the stage. They would whistle and hoot, and throw things at the actors if they were bored! This made the church authorities very angry. People were not going to church, they complained, because they found the plays more entertaining!

Were there any women sitting in the playhouse as these plays were put on? Some scholars believe that women came to watch the play— they could be ladies from the aristocracy, citizens' wives, prostitutes, or even young women masquerading as men. Others believe that they didn't, because the Tudors (the ruling family for much of Shakespeare's time) believed that theatre was a bad influence on women. They wanted women to sit at home, guard their modesty, and not be seen in public at all.

The Boy Actors of Our Times

Now Shakespeare may be long dead, but some of the conventions from his time are with us even to this day. Television has its roots in theatre, and so does film. Remember Robin Williams in Mrs. Doubtfire? Dustin Hoffman in Tootsie? The tradition of cross dressing is alive and kicking even today.‐Answer all the questions according to the instructions.

Who’s That Boy – Boy Actors and Other Strange Things on the Shakespearean Stage.

1. Why did male actors play female roles in Shakespeare’s time?2. How many facts about Shakespeare’s life are mentioned in paragraph 2?3. What did Shakespeare’s theatre have in common with theatres in Ancient

Greece? (p.3)4. What restrictions (הגבלות) were placed on theatres in Shakespeare’s time? (p.4)5. Why weren’t theatres closed down when they didn’t comply with the

restrictions? (p5)6. Name 6 arguments (טיעונים) that people used against theatres. (p.5-7)7. Why were people so angry about the costumes that the actors wore? Find TWO

reasons. (p8)8. Complete the following sentence according to paragraphs 9 and 10.

Some people believe that Shakespeare’s audience was probably more…………………………………………… However, others think that it couldn’t be because …………………………………………………………..

Who's That Boy – Boy Actors and Other Strange Things of the Shakespearean Stage - Vocabulary


1. regulations 2. attribute 3. restrictions 4. contagious 5. contemporary

6. sermon 7. vices 8. abolition 9 codified 10. expenditure11. plagues 12. diverse 13.

masqueradingI suggest you prepare a quizlet for this set and practice it.

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