5 Free Teacher Resources for Dava Shastri’s Last Day

[NHIE] Teachers Pt. 2: Mr. Shapiro & Mr. Kulkarni – Brown Teacher Reads

Time for some teacher-to-teacher talk on our two favorite Sherman Oaks teachers! This episode discusses and analyzes the pedagogical practices and personalities of Mr. Shapiro and Mr. Kulkarni. What do I agree and disagree with these teachers on as a high school English teacher myself? What are my predictions for Season 3? Catch them al in this episode.

1. [NHIE] Teachers Pt. 2: Mr. Shapiro & Mr. Kulkarni 48:28
2. [Never Have I Ever] Teachers in the Show, Part 1 18:57
3. 2 Causes to Support this Month 07:00
4. HS English Teacher’s Guide to Dava Shastri’s Last Day 32:40
5. BTR Origin Story 16:37

The podcast about the full set of free teacher resources that I’ve created for Dava Shastri’s Last Day by Kirthana Ramisetti is finally out!

I discuss 5 different resources I’ve created:

Go ahead and check out them out! It would be great to peruse the resources long with listening to the podcast. These assignments could easily be adapted to any novel. You can find all of them neatly tucked away and organized in this Google Drive folder.

“How to Date a Brown Girl (Black Girl, White Girl, or Halfie)” by Junot Diaz

Here’s the short story published in The New Yorker that I mentioned I taught during my student teaching experience. This was something my cooperating teacher chose for me to use. Apparently this level of sexual content was something appropriate or acceptable in that teaching placement, just so you know when taking a careful look at Chapters 11 & 12 in DSLD!

Also, this story is…pretty darn good.

BTR Podcast Music: The Dhol Snippet

Thank you to MashionPK for lending me an audio clip from this video for my podcast! I’ve borrowed a snippet of someone playing the dhol, a South Asian hand drum. You may have noticed this new addition to my podcast and I’m so excited about it. This was a perfect sound as I imagine BTR is an initiative that particularly brings together brown women celebrating their culture in imperfect ways. The amateur dhol-playing at a Desi wedding pre-game party by whichever person seems to be the ablest player is a sound that is so familiar and comforting to me.

When I was young, my mom had a VHS of the folk songs you’d sing at a mayoun or mehndi or dholki. We used to watch it sometimes together. I don’t know if I will continue this tradition of a dhol party when my child(ren) is old enough to get married because it sure is something I passed up when I was getting married myself. But this sound is precious and my understanding of these gatherings now is something beautiful. If I ever find myself buying a dhol and learning how to play it, I certainly will be exclusive about the songs I choose to learn because some of them are just so colorist–praising a “fair skinned bride” and all that nonsense.

I provide you with Exhibits A and B. Listening to these songs after understanding Junaid Jamshed’s spiritual awakening just makes me sad. What nonsensical songs these are, blegh. He passed away some time ago, may Allah accept his good deeds.I chose these songs because these are the two examples I can think of easily. Legend has it that the song “Sanwali Saloni” was demanded by fans with darker skin. Not sure if it’s true.