Introduction

In The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams, Laura is a young woman who spends all of her time playing old phonograph records and playing with her glass menagerie. She tried to go to typing and shorthand school, but dropped out. Her mother Amanda wants Laura to find a husband, however Laura does not receive any gentleman callers because she is not outgoing and has never been popular.

The Quest

How can we help Laura develop into a more rounded person? What advice may be given to her if she were dealing with her personality issues in today's society?

We are going to design a self-help magazine for her. You will use the information you gather about the professionals that can help her and the conditions that seem to trouble her. Your job is to help her understand how to work around the issues she faces and lead a normal life. You will be writing these helpful articles as though you are the professionals.

The Process and Resources

Laura needs your expert advice!! As a team, you are going to divide up and try to help this girl out.

There will be members of your group who will research the different professions out there that could help her in today's 'personality disorder' savvy world. The professions that they will research are physical therapy, social work, and psychiatry/psychology. The members who are taking care of this portion of the project have a different set of instructions to follow.

Those of you who are going to help get the background information on the disorders Laura suffers from will divide yourselves among four tasks. Even a trained psychiatrist needs a diagnosis and some background information on the condition before he/she can help!

Phase 1 - Background: Something for Everyone

After you've all gathered your information, you'll come back together as a group to design the self-help magazine. The first step is information gathering.

Phase 2 - Looking Deeper from Different Perspectives

Instructions:

You will research three jobs in the caring profession and create a magazine that will help Laura understand herself. Your magazine will contain four articles - a minimum of one article written to her from each of the professionals is required.

1. Physical Therapists - This article will inform Laura about her disability. It can discuss treatments or ways to overcome her disability.

2. Social Worker - This article will help her grow mentally. It should have fun and creative ideas to help her 'break out of her shell.'

3. Psychologist - This article should help Laura improve her self-esteem and self-confidence by describing her condition and providing options to make it more bearable.

The four tasks below will give you information that each professional could use when writing to Laura. You will need to pair up with those people who researched each of the professionals so you can decide which professional would help her in dealing with each of the problems below.

Shyness

Laura is a very shy person. Write your first article using the information you will find on the sites below. REMEMBER: You must write your article from the perspective of the caring professional that would deal with this issue. Check with the group members who research the professions.

How can Laura overcome her shyness?

• www.mentalhealth.org
• www.ability.org.uk/shyness.html
• www.embarrassingproblems.com/pages2/shyness.htm
• shyness.com
• www.solosingles.com/talk.htm

The Introvert

Laura is introverted. Write this article using the information you will find on the sites below. REMEMBER: You must write your article from the perspective of the caring professional that would deal with this issue. Check with the group members who research the professions.

How can Laura work towards slowly becoming less of an introvert?

• www.bloomfield.edu/orr/int.html
• http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Lake/3262/Myers_Briggs/Myers_Briggs.htm
• http://keirsey.com/pumII.ei.html
• www.tnpc.com/parentalk/preteens/pretee54.html

Physical Disabilites

Your third article is about physical disabilities on how they affect people. REMEMBER: You must write your article from the perspective of the caring professional that would deal with this issue. Check with the group members who research the professions.

• www.csun.edu/~sp20558/dis/physical.html
• www.rit.edu/~nrcgsh/arts/open.html
• www.bcm.tmc.edu/crowd/national_study/national_study.html
• http://www.occ.cccd.edu/departments/studentsvcs/specialsvcs/menu.htm

Anxiety Disorders

Laura has an anxiety disorder. She has trouble functioning in the real world because of this problem. REMEMBER: You must write your article from the perspective of the caring professional that would deal with this issue. Check with the group members who research the professions.

• www.mentalhealth.org
• www.surgeongeneral.gov/library/mentalhealth/chapter4/sec2.html
• http://health.yahoo.com/health/centers/depression/index.html
• www.psych.org/public_info/anxiety.cfm
• http://www.nimh.nih.gov/anxiety/anxietymenu.cfm
• http://lexington-on-line.com/naf.rules.html
• http://www.couns.uiuc.edu/Brochures/testanx.htm

Phase 3 - Debating, Discussing, and Reaching Consensus

Print out all of the articles that you have read through and have decided look good. Get into your groups and decide what it is each of these professionals may want to 'say' to Laura.

When you've written up each of the pieces that are included in this project, peer-edit to make sure everyone has done them right. This is a group grade, so if someone is not on target - TELL THEM!!!

Look for:
1. Is the article written from the perspective of the caring professional?

2. Does the article address what it was supposed to address?

3. Is the article free of grammatical errors?

4. Is the article free of spelling errors?

5. Do the four articles cover all three of the caring professions?

Phase 4 - Real World Feedback

You will now design a self-help magazine specifically for Laura. Each magazine should have:

1. Creative title
2. Decorative cover
3. Table of contents
4. Each of your four articles
5. Advertisements/any creative sections you see in
magazines
6. Find a creative way to include the professional descriptions

This project is worth 2 test grades!!
The first test grade:
5 points for completion of each of the professional descriptions (social worker, physical therapist, and psychologist).

68 points for the completion of each article (17 points per article).

17 points for creativity and completion of all parts of the required magazine components.

The second test grade will be a grade given for overall presentation of your magazine.

Your Contact is: Ms. Leskie or Mr. Tirico

Conclusion

Would a person like Laura benefit from having those resources we all have today? Or is her situation one that nothing could really help?