The story of A.P. Platonov's "The Sandy Teacher" was written in 1927, but in terms of its problems and the attitude of the author expressed towards it, this story is more similar to Platonov's works of the early 20s. Then the worldview of the novice writer allowed critics to call him a dreamer and "environmentalist of the entire planet." Speaking about human life on Earth, the young author sees how many places on the planet and, in particular, in Russia, are unsuitable for human life. Tundra, swampy areas, arid steppes, deserts - all this a person could transform by directing his energy in the right direction and using the latest achievements of science. Electrification, melioration of the whole country, hydraulic engineering - that's what excites the young dreamer, it seems to him necessary. But the main role in these transformations must be played by people. The “little man” must “wake up”, feel like a creator, a person for whom the revolution was made. Just such a person appears before the reader the heroine of the story "The Sandy Teacher". At the beginning of the story, twenty-year-old Maria Naryshkina graduated from pedagogical courses and received a job assignment, like many of her friends. The author emphasizes that outwardly the heroine is "a young healthy man, like a young man, with strong muscles and firm legs." Such a portrait is not accidental. The health and strength of youth is the ideal of the 20s, where there is no place for weak femininity and sensitivity. In the life of the heroine there were, of course, experiences, but they tempered her character, developed an “idea of ​​life”, gave her confidence and firmness in her decisions. And when she was sent to a distant village "on the border with the dead Central Asian desert", this did not break the will of the girl. Maria Nikiforovna sees extreme poverty, "heavy and almost unnecessary work" of the peasants, who daily clear away places filled with sand. She sees how the children in her lessons lose interest in fairy tales, how they lose weight before her eyes. She understands that in this village, "doomed to extinction", something needs to be done: "you cannot teach hungry and sick children." She does not give up, but calls on the peasants to be active - to fight the sands. And although the peasants did not believe her, they agreed with her.

Maria Nikiforovna is a person of active action. She turns to the authorities, to the district department of public education, and does not lose heart because she is given only formal advice. Together with the peasants, she plants bushes and arranges a pine nursery. She managed to change the whole life of the village: the peasants got the opportunity to earn extra money, "began to live more calmly and well." About her two closest friends, the author says that they are "real prophets of the new faith in the wilderness."

The arrival of the nomads inflicts the most terrible blow on Maria Nikiforovna: after three days there was nothing left of the plantations, the water in the wells disappeared. Tossing about “from this first, real sadness in her life”, the girl goes to the leader of the nomads - not to complain and cry, she goes “with young anger”. But, having heard the leader’s arguments: “He who is hungry and eats the grass of the motherland is not a criminal,” she secretly admits that he was right and still does not give up. She again goes to the head of the district and hears an unexpected proposal: to transfer to an even more distant village, where “nomads who are switching to settled life” live. If these places were transformed in the same way, then the rest of the nomads would settle on these lands. And of course, the girl cannot help but hesitate: is it really necessary to bury her youth in this wilderness? She would like personal happiness, a family, but, understanding "the whole hopeless fate of the two peoples, squeezed into the dunes of the sands," she agrees. She looks at things realistically and promises to come to the district in 50 years "not along the sand, but along the forest road", realizing how much time and work it will take. But this is the character of a fighter, a strong man who does not give up under any circumstances. She has a strong will and a sense of duty that prevails over personal weaknesses. Therefore, the manager is certainly right when she says that she would "manage the whole people, not the school." The "little man" who consciously preserves the achievements of the revolution will be able to transform the world for the sake of the happiness of his people. In the story “The Sandy Teacher”, a young woman becomes such a person, and the firmness and determination of her character are worthy of respect and admiration.

The story of A.P. Platonov's "The Sandy Teacher" was written in 1927, but in terms of its problems and the attitude of the author expressed towards it, this story is more similar to Platonov's works of the early 20s. Then the worldview of the novice writer allowed critics to call him a dreamer and "environmentalist of the entire planet." Speaking about human life on Earth, the young author sees how many places on the planet and, in particular, in Russia, are unsuitable for human life. Tundra, swampy areas, arid steppes, deserts - all this a person could transform by directing his energy in the right direction and using the latest achievements of science. Electrification, melioration of the whole country, hydraulic engineering - that's what excites the young dreamer, it seems to him necessary. But the main role in these transformations must be played by people. The “little man” must “wake up”, feel like a creator, a person for whom the revolution was made. Just such a Person appears before the reader the heroine of the story "The Sandy Teacher". At the beginning of the story, twenty-year-old Maria Naryshkina graduated from pedagogical courses and received a job assignment, like many of her friends. The author emphasizes that outwardly the heroine is "a young healthy man, like a young man, with strong muscles and firm legs." Such a portrait is not accidental. The health and strength of youth - this is the ideal of the 20s, where there is no place for weak femininity and sensitivity. In the life of the heroine there were, of course, experiences, but they tempered her character, developed an “idea of ​​life”, gave her confidence and firmness in her decisions. And when she was sent to a distant village "on the border with the dead Central Asian desert", this did not break the will of the girl. Maria Nikiforovna sees extreme poverty, "heavy and almost unnecessary work" of the peasants, who daily clear away places filled with sand. She sees how the children in her lessons lose interest in fairy tales, how they lose weight before her eyes. She understands that in this village, “doomed to extinction,” something must be done: “you can’t teach hungry and sick children.” She does not give up, but calls on the peasants to be active - to fight the sands. And although the peasants did not believe her, they agreed with her.

Maria Nikiforovna is a person of active action. She turns to the authorities, to the district department of public education, and does not lose heart because she is given only formal advice. Together with the peasants, she plants bushes and arranges a pine nursery. She managed to change the whole life of the village: the peasants got the opportunity to earn extra money, "began to live calmer and more satisfying"

The arrival of the nomads inflicts the most terrible blow on Maria Nikiforovna: after three days there was nothing left of the plantations, the water in the wells disappeared. Tossing about “from this first, real sadness in her life”, the girl goes to the leader of the nomads - not to complain and cry, she goes “with young malice”. But having heard the leader's arguments: "He who is hungry and eats the grass of the motherland is not a criminal," she secretly admits that he was right, but still does not give up. She again goes to the head of the district and hears an unexpected proposal: to transfer to an even more distant village, where “nomads who are switching to a settled way of life” live. If these places were transformed in the same way, then the rest of the nomads would settle on these lands. And of course, the girl cannot help but hesitate: is it really necessary to bury her youth in this wilderness? She would like personal happiness, a family, but, understanding "the whole hopeless fate of the two peoples, squeezed into the dunes of the sands," she agrees. She really looks at things and promises to come to the district in 50 years "not along the sand, but along the forest road", realizing how much time and work it will take. But this is the character of a fighter, a strong man who does not give up under any circumstances. She has a strong will and a sense of duty that prevails over personal weaknesses. Therefore, the manager is certainly right when she says that she would "manage the whole people, not the school." The "little man" who consciously preserves the achievements of the revolution will be able to transform the world for the sake of the happiness of his people. In the story “The Sandy Teacher”, a young woman becomes such a person, and the firmness and determination of her character are worthy of respect and admiration.

Ilya KOSTIN,
11th grade, school number 1,
Novomoskovsk,
Tula region
(teacher -
Vladislav Sergeevich Grishin)

About the story of A.P. Platonov "Sand teacher"

When you read Andrei Platonov's story "The Sandy Teacher", you involuntarily recall the frames of the Japanese film "Woman in the Sands" - an adaptation of the novel of the same name by Kobo Abe. In essence, the story is the same story about the struggle of a woman with a sandy desert. But unlike the Japanese woman, who adapts to life in the sands, the heroine of the story - twenty-year-old Maria Naryshkina - is trying with all her might to win over the desert. Man and the elements of nature - this is the theme of the "Sandy Teacher". A short story with a clear rhythm of syntactic constructions, with memorable word images, the author divides into five small chapters. This technique turns the story of Naryshkina, as it were, into a short story about three years of her life in the "sandy steppes of the Caspian region."

Besides, she, Maria Naryshkina? The teacher's daughter, who completed pedagogical courses in Astrakhan, and then was appointed as a teacher "in a distant region - the village of Khoshutovo, on the border with the dead Central Asian desert." Platonov writes that "the desert was her homeland." And yet the heroine was unpleasantly surprised by the landscape and the sudden “desert storm”. “The sun emanated heat from the height of a terrible sky, and the hot dunes from a distance seemed like flaming fires, among which the crust of salt licks was white as a shroud. And during a sudden desert storm, the sun was dimmed by thick yellowish loess dust, and the wind hissed streams of groaning sand. And then, seeing the miserable Khoshutovo, covered with snowdrifts of sand, knowing the “hard and almost unnecessary work” of the Khoshuty people who tried to clear the sandy blockages, Maria Naryshkina decides to start fighting the desert.

Three years later, Khoshutovo was unrecognizable. Plantings turned green, the desert became friendlier, the school "was full not only of children, but also of adults who listened to the teacher's reading about the wisdom of living in the sandy steppe."

And suddenly everything changed. The reason for these unpleasant changes was the nomads who every fifteen years visited Khoshutovo with their herds. “Kochui”, as the Khoshuty people called them, trampled down all the plantings, devastated the wells. In response to the threat of a young teacher to complain, the leader of the nomads says: “Our steppe, young lady. Why did the Russians come? He who is hungry and eats the grass of his homeland is not a criminal.”

“In the district where Maria Nikiforovna left with a “report”, they explain to her in an accessible way that Khoshutovo will now manage without her, because people here have learned to fight the sands, that another village is waiting for her - Safuta, where nomads live, moving to a settled way of life. It is they who need to be taught the culture of the sands, which will attract the rest of the nomads there, who will stop destroying the landings of Russian settlers. And although Naryshkina thought about the prospect of burying her youth “in the sandy desert among wild nomads and dying in the shelugovy bush”, but, remembering the “smart calm leader, the complex and deep life of the desert tribes, I understood the whole hopeless fate of the two peoples, squeezed into the sand dunes, and said with satisfaction:

OK. I agree..."

The story ends with significant words closed: “You, Maria Nikiforovna, could manage a whole people, not a school ... But the desert is the future world, you have nothing to fear, and people will be grateful when a tree grows in the desert ... I wish you every well-being".

But is it possible to expect prosperity in a world that is a desert? There can only be one answer to this question: no.

To readers of the 1920s and 1930s, Platonov told about the meeting of a person face to face with the elements of nature. People of that time probably understood the problem of storytelling in the following way: a person must fight for the humane in a person. This is the way to conquer nature. Nowadays, the story is perceived somewhat differently. The pathos of The Sandy Teacher, covered by the author's irony, is a tragic prediction that has come true.

“Why did the Russians come?” These words are spoken today in many parts of the former fatherland. Modern “nomads” are now a “titular” nation, which quickly forgot that the Russians came not only to teach how to plant trees in the desert (as the heroine of the story does), but also to build cities and build factories. Now people like the “sandy teacher” are no longer needed in the steppes, and the modern leaders of the “nomads” explain to us our uselessness in their countries in almost the same way: “We are not evil, and you are not evil, but there is not enough grass. Someone dies and swears.”

Our stupid Russian idealism, boundless internationalism, for which we are ready to sacrifice our own well-being and even our lives, is also present in the main character of Plato’s story, who promised her boss: “I’ll try to come to you in fifty years as an old woman ... along the forest road. Be healthy - wait!” Thousands of Russians return to their historical homeland along the “forest roads” not after fifty, but after seventy years. And after them words fly by no means of gratitude ...

In vain they say: "There are no prophets in their own country." They are. Among the Russian prophets of the XX century - a wonderful writer, thinker A. Platonov.

Sections: Literature

The purpose of the lesson: to create conditions for the formation of a holistic vision of the problems of the story “The Sandy Teacher” among students.

educational: to acquaint students with the problems, compositional and plot features of the story;
developing: development of logical and figurative thinking; formation of dialogic skills;
educational: on the example of the image of the main character to form an active life position, civil courage.

Type of lesson: lesson of new knowledge.

Lesson form: dialogue lesson, one study hour using computer slides.

Interdisciplinary connections: history and literature, fine arts and literature.

Methods and techniques: partial search; visual, verbal, practical.

Equipment: handout: cards for individual tasks, information sheets.

Visual materials: portrait of A.P. Platonov, the text of the story “The Sandy Teacher”, a slide presentation, a reproduction of the painting “Christ in the Desert”.

1. The word of the teacher.

A.P. Platonov’s story “The Sandy Teacher” tells about the life of a young teacher who belongs to a generation of honest, purposeful people who believe in a bright future, real enthusiasts of their work, striving to transform the world and devote themselves to building a new life, new relationships between people, between peoples in the era of eradication of illiteracy.

1. How are the qualities of the heroine of the story manifested?

1) Why is the story called “The Sandy Teacher”?
2) What is the composition of the story?
3) What issues are raised in the work?

1. Based on this, how can you formulate the topic of the lesson? ( slide 1)
2. State your goals.
3. Working with an epigraph ( slide 2):

It will be difficult for you, but you have a heart, but your heart and mind will come, and from the mind even the difficult will become easy.

From the collection of fairy tales by A. Platonov

Reading, highlighting the main dialogic pair “heart-mind”

1. To what extent does the story reflect the features of the time?
2. Describe the historical period 1917-1927 ( information sheet 1)

Conclusion: Platonov solves universal human problems rather than specifically historical ones. But he does not abstract from his time, but tries to reveal his understanding of human life in the conditions of his contemporary historical situation.

Analysis of the main problems in the mode of dialogic pairs of A. Platonov's philosophy ( slide 3).

Familiarization of children with the main scheme ( Annex 1).

Make a diagram of dialogic pairs based on premises from the text . (Slide 4).

Text research work.

The events of the story “The Sandy Teacher” take place in the desert. According to a Western European scientist, an expert on Carol's symbols, a person manifests his strongest qualities in the desert. Jesus Christ, according to biblical tradition, went into the wilderness for forty days without food or drink to strengthen his spirit.

Work with the painting “Christ in the Desert” (information sheet 2)

The lyrical hero of A.S. Pushkin’s poem “The Prophet” is also inspired in the image of Seraphim in the desert:

Spiritual thirst tormented,
In the gloomy desert I dragged myself
And a six-winged seraph
He appeared to me at a crossroads.

Desert image.

1. Follow how the author describes the desert, and what does it look like at different times of the year?

• Astrakhan desert and Central Asian desert: what is their difference.
• Reasons for using the terms “landscape”, “salt licks”, “loess dust”, “dunes”
• The role of expressive means: comparisons (blazing bonfires shrouds - “fire that brings death”) epithets terrible sky, hissing wind, “groaning” sand, “smoking tops of dunes”, opaque air filled with sand, a storm in the desert, “when a bright day seems gloomy at night".

1. Why does the terrible picture of a devastating storm in the dead Central Asian desert end with a description of another land “filled with the ringing of life”, which seemed to the traveler beyond the sea of ​​dunes?
2. What was the desert for the villagers? Why, in the two descriptions of the desert, the first statement does not contain a negative assessment, which is in the second episode.
3. Match the description of the winter desert with the spiritual mood of the heroine.
4. Find and describe the desert, transformed by the efforts of the villagers and the young teacher.
5. Message: image of the state of mind of the heroine:

• at the beginning of the story - “landscape character of the description”
• the soul of the heroine, like a revived steppe, won this struggle.

Spend mini study on the suggested questions and propose the question to another group.

1. Listening to an individual task ( analysis of the image of the main character according to a given scheme) scheme ( slide 5)

At the beginning of the story, we see the heroine and her entourage as follows:

Then her first real sadness comes to her, connected with the collapse of her dream about the future. She comprehends the contradictions of life associated with the difficulties of life in the desert, meeting with the natives, comprehending their truth of life. The heroine changes, meets difficulties, achieves the restoration of the earth

Each student chooses a trajectory along which he builds his progress in the lesson

1. What is deed heroines?

To give your young years and your whole life to the service of people, voluntarily giving up personal happiness.

1. Highlighting “Values” – serving people.

Students highlight their (modern) understanding of this value, as well as that other understanding.

(Paphos and irony.)

1. The work of students in the dialog box “Dialogue with the Hero” ( application 2).

Question: What is the purpose of serving people?

Hypothesis: If a person gives himself entirely to serving people, his life has meaning.

1. Maria realized that it was necessary to help people in the fight against the desert
2. She did not lose all her strength, stamina, and yet she achieved her own goals.
3. She decided to sacrifice herself to save her village.

   11. Answer: The meaning of service to people is selfless performance of work that improves the lives of others.

People like Maria are needed. I recall the words of N.A. Nekrasov:

Mother nature! When would such people
You sometimes did not send to the world -
Life would have died out...

The heroine achieves results, but at what cost?

“I came back as a 70 year old woman, but…”

Suggest a different plot development, for example,

• The heroine does not agree to go on a new feat
• The development of action, the search for a different meaning of “service to humanity”
• Fill in the empty cells of the table.

1. Until the 1970s, visiting teachers worked in schools in our area. They, like the “sand teacher”, were sent to us. Their merit is the education and training of local personnel, familiarization with culture, etc.

Write a mini-essay on the topic “The role of a teacher in the countryside”.

Writing

Andrei Platonov became known to the reader in 1927, when his first collection of novels and short stories, Epifan Gateways, was published. Previously, Platonov tried his hand at poetry, appeared on the pages of newspapers and magazines with essays and articles. But the first book of his artistic prose showed that a creative individuality appeared in literature, bright and unusual. The very style of the writer, his world and, of course, the hero were unusual.
Platonov was very fond of all his characters: the driver, the worker, the soldier or the old man. Each one is beautiful in its own way. No wonder one of Plato's heroes said: "It only seems from above, only from above you can see that from below there is a mass, but in fact, individual people live below, have their own inclinations, and one is smarter than the other."
And from all this mass, I would like to single out not even a hero, but one heroine of the story “The Sandy Teacher”.
This story was written in 1927, at a time not yet so far from the hot revolutionary period. Memories of this time are still alive, its echoes are still alive in The Sandy Teacher.
But these changes of the era did not touch Maria Nikiforovna Naryshkina herself. Her father saved her from this injury, and her native city, "deaf, strewn with the sands of the Astrakhan province," standing "away from the marching roads of the red and white armies." Since childhood, Maria has been very fond of geography. This love determined her future profession.
Her dreams, ideas, her growing up during her studies are devoted to the entire first chapter of the story. But at this time, Mary was not protected from life's anxieties in the same way as in childhood. We read the author's digression on this matter: “It is strange that no one ever helps a young man at this age to overcome his anxieties that torment him; no one will support the thin trunk that shakes the wind of doubt and shakes the earthquake of growth. In a figurative, metaphorical form, the writer reflects on youth and its defenselessness. There is no doubt a connection with the historical, contemporary period, which is not able to help a person entering into life. Plato's hopes for a change in the situation are connected with thoughts about the future: "Someday youth will not be defenseless."
And the love and suffering of youth were not alien to Mary. But we feel that everything in the life of this girl will be completely different from what she saw in her youth.
In a word, Maria Naryshkina could not even guess about her fate. Yes, everything was not easy for her: the arrangement of the school, the very work with the kids, who in the end completely abandoned the school, since it was no longer up to her in the hungry winter. "The strong, cheerful, courageous nature of Naryshkina began to get lost and go out." Cold, hunger and grief could not bring other results. But the mind brought Maria Naryshkina out of her stupor. She realized that it was necessary to help people in the fight against the desert. And this woman, an ordinary rural teacher, goes to the district department of public education to be taught to teach "sand science". But she was given only books, treated sympathetically and advised to seek help from the district agronomist, who "lived a hundred and fifty miles away and had never been to Khoshutov." With this they carried out.
Here we see that even in a real difficulty, the government of the twenties did nothing to help people, even such initiators and activists as Maria Nikiforovna.
But this woman did not lose all her strength, stamina, and nevertheless achieved her own goals. True, she also had friends in the village - these are Nikita Gavkin, Yermolai Kobzev and many others. However, the restoration of life in Khoshutov is entirely the merit of the "sandy" teacher. She was born in the desert, but she had to make war with her. And everything worked out: "The settlers ... became calmer and more satisfying", "the school was always full of not only children, but also adults", even "the desert gradually turned green and became more welcoming."
But the main test was ahead of Maria Nikiforovna. It was sad and painful for her to realize that the nomads were about to come, although she did not yet know what to expect from them. The old people said: "There will be trouble." And so it happened. Hordes of nomads came on August 25 and drank all the water in the wells, trampled all the greenery, and gnawed everything. It was "the first, real sadness in the life of Maria Nikiforovna." And again she tries to fix the situation. This time she goes to the leader of the nomads. With "young malice" in her soul, she accuses the leader of inhumanity and evil. But he is wise and smart, which Maria notices for herself. And she has a completely different opinion about Zavukrono, who offered to leave Khoshutovo and go to another place, Safuta.
This smart woman decided to sacrifice herself, her life for the sake of saving her village. Isn't it a strength of character to give not just your young years, but your whole life to the service of people, voluntarily giving up excellent happiness? Isn't it strength of character to help those who destroyed your achievements and victories?
Even this short-sighted boss recognized her amazing courage: “You, Maria Nikiforovna, could manage a whole people, not a school.” Is it a woman's job to "manage the people"? But it turned out to be within her power, a simple teacher, and most importantly, a strong woman.
How much has she already achieved? But how many victories she still has to win ... I think a lot. Unwittingly believe in such a person. They can only be proud of.
Yes, and Maria Nikiforovna Naryshkina herself, I think, will never have to say about herself the way Zavokrono said: “For some reason I am ashamed.” He, a man, in his life did not accomplish such a feat, which he did and which the simple “sandy teacher” continues to perform.