On Seeing the 100% Perfect Girl

Learning Objective

• • To read and understand the main ideas and themes of the story To analyse the language used.

Love:

•

Discuss with your shoulder partner:

Can you measure love?

Explain your answer.

• • • • • • • • •

What does

love

someone?

mean to

If ‘love’ were a colour, it would be red because it’s hot and passionate.

If ‘love’ were a song, it would be…because… If ‘love’ were an animal, it would be a…because… If ‘love’ were a model of mp3 player, it would be a…because… If ‘love’ were a day of the week, it would be…because… If ‘love’ were a website, it would be…because… If ‘love’ were a celebrity, it would be…because… If ‘love’ were a high street shop, it would be…because… If ‘love’ were…

Write your own Love Poem

• Use the pattern “If love were…” and write a 6 line love poem to explain what love means. • • •

Success Criteria

Start each line “If love were…” Write 6 lines You can use rhyme if you want

Listen Write:

• Listen to the information about Haruki Murakami.

• Write down anything you can remember.

• Compare with your shoulder partner.

• Answer the questions.

Haruki Murakami:

• • • • • • • • Born in Kyoto, Japan but grew up in Kobe.

He won a literary prize for his first novel, Hear the wind sing, this encouraged him to keep writing.

He has also translated the works of several American authors into Japanese.

He spent four years in America teaching at the University of Princeton.

As he grew up, he spent a lot of time listening to rock and Jazz music and reading American authors.

He identifies more with western culture rather than the traditional culture of Japan.

Many of his stories combine normality and surrealism and focus on loss, destruction and loneliness. Other themes are: old and young, past and present, the unlikely crossings in life and the connections between people.

Questions:

Think, pair, share: Write in full sentences 1. What has influenced Murakami’s writing?

2. What are the main themes of his writing?

3. How do you think this

links

Beautiful April Morning?

to the story ‘On Seeing the 100% Perfect Girl One

The 100% Perfect Par tner

• • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IgkR sis3yGY (Watch to 1.39)

What would be your ideal partner?

PREDICTIONS

• Write a paragraph explaining what you think happens next – we are only half way through the story.

The Fairytale Ending?

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=flub8vnfFi I&feature=fvst

Which statement is most accurate?

1. The reader is left confused at the end of the short story.

2. The reader has to read the story more than once to see the message the author is trying to get across by including the fairy story.

3. The reader is left feeling sorry for the narrator because he can only imagine his 100% perfect relationship as he missed his chance

Which statement is most accurate?

1. Murakami is just trying to show off by putting a fairy story within his short story 2. Murakami is using the fairy story to make a point about how people should not waste opportunities in life 3. Murakami believes that a 100% perfect relationship can only exist in a fairy story

Write a paragraph in response…

•

Why does Murakami include a fairytale in his writing?

Read the Story

• •

Success Criteria

Read the story by yourself Make annotations as you read

What do we learn about the narrator?

Quote from the Story What this shows about the narrator

…on a narrow side street in Tokyo’s fashionable Harajuku neighbourhood..

- what I’d really like to do – explain to her the complexities of fate that had led to our passing This shows he’s a bit of a dreamer and doesn’t think about the sensible things in life. This shows us that he’s intelligent and well read and wants us to know it.

TASK

• Read each statement.

• Choose a colour for each statement.

• Colour the parts of the fairytale that match the techniques.

Colour Comments Typical opening of a fairy story makes the story sound magical and childlike.

Repetition of particular words and phrases to describe the boy and girl shows how perfectly matched they are.

Repetition of a word which suggests that the meeting between the boy and girl is something so amazing it is beyond nature and is something orchestrated by fate, or possibly by God.

A word suggesting that the relationship between the boy and girl is out of this world. Also a ‘modern’ word indicating the age of the couple.

The turning point in the story when a hesitation means the boy and the girl doubt their perfect relationship which leads to the heartbreak at the end of the story. Repetition of ‘tiny’ may indicate the pointlessness of their concern.

Links the fairy story to the rest of the story as the girl is walking from the east at the start of the story and the boy from the west.