Learning Guide for Ground Hog Day

Subjects: U.S. Culture, Health;

Social-Emotional Learning: Humility, Redemption, Self-Esteem.

Moral/Ethical Emphasis: Caring, Respect.

Ages: 10+; MPAA Rating, PG; 1993; 101 Minutes; Color; Available from Amazon.com.

Description: An arrogant, self-important television weatherman is assigned his fourth year of covering the Ground Hog Day festivities in a Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, where he is trapped in a time loop in which he must re-live February 2 day after day after day. He repeatedly resists the opportunity to become a better person, even attempting suicide, until he finally relents and lives out the day as a compassionate and authentic individual.

Rationale for Using This Movie: The comic situation in which the main character must learn important life lessons encourages students to evaluate their ownroutines and to find ways to avoid patterns of self-defeating behavior.

Objectives/Outcomes for Students Using this Guide: Through assignments requiring writing in narrative, expository and analytical domains, students will exercise their ability to determine meaning from content and to apply themes to their own lives.

Possible Problems: None.

Parenting Points: Parents may ask their children to note the changes in the main character as he repeats one day’s experiences and to think about routines in their own lives that they may want to change.

Discussion Questions:

1. Phil meets the same people day after day until he finally learns how to treat them with compassion. Which interaction best exemplifies his insight into his dismissive behavior? Suggested Response: Answers will vary. Students may note Phil’s treatment of the homeless old man: At first the old man is ignored, then he is given money. The day in which the old man is hospitalized and dies, Phil demands to see the chart and refuses to accept the nurse’s evaluation of the situation. In the final interaction, Phil strugglesto revive the old man but accepts his death with sorrow.

2. When Phil seems to use his repeated days to his advantage, what changes does he make in himself? Suggested Response: Answers will vary: Phil learns to play the piano, speak Italian and French and finds numerous ways to help the local townspeople.

3. What may be the reasons that Ground Hog Day, as opposed to any of a number of minor cultural events, is used for the time loop in this film? Suggested Response: Any well reasoned answer is acceptable. Some students may note that there is a bit of intellectual snobbery in distaining a mid-western tradition. Others may feel the day itself has something to do with the hope of change that comes with spring.

Assignments and Assessments:

1. Write a narrative about a student in your school setting that finds him or herself in a time loop as experienced by Phil in the movie. Show the student go through resistance, acceptance and change over a period of days. Note the improvements that are made in the final day of the time loop that will serve to free the student from the repetition and to move forward. Use description, action and dialogue to reveal character and to show theme.

2. Research “Ground Hog Day” and write an expository essay in which you explain the origins of the holiday and the various events associated with it around the country. Seek to find any similar mid-winter activities in different cultures around the world. Conclude your essay with your opinion about the social or cultural value of Ground Hog Day.

3. Analyze the changes Phil experiences in the time loop. Focus on how Phil begins to notice his flawed behavior, how he shifts his responses to the situation and to the people he meets and finally how he becomes a more authenticated individual. Conclude your essay with a thematic statement about the process of personal growth as seen in the film.

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Bill Murray explains his feelings to two bleary-eyed, beer-drinking locals. "What would you do if you were stuck in one place and everything was exactly the same and nothing that you did mattered?" he asks despairingly. The two strangers listen very sympathetically. They didn't have to be trapped by a magic spell to know what he means.

But who in the audience hasn't ever wished time would stand still and offer a second, third or even a 20th chance?

"Well, what if there is no tomorrow?" he anxiously asks someone. "There wasn't one today!"

Directed by Harold Ramis; PG

a href=” Murray Battles Pittsburgh Time Warp</a>by Janet Maslin, New York Times, February 12, 1993

ahref=” of Groundhog Day in Philosophical Films</a>

ahref=” of Groundhog Day in "PhilosophyNow"</a> by Mike Faust

a href= Day: the perfect comedy, for ever</a> byRyanGilbey, The Guardian, Thursday 7 February 2013

Déjà vu gone mad.

Escapes  enlightenment

Groundhog Day also brings to mind the ancient Greek myth of Sisyphus, in which the eponymous anti-hero defies the gods and is punished by being sentenced to push a huge rock up a steep hill in the certain knowledge that as soon as he has succeeded, the rock will roll back down and he must start the process again. Like Murray’s character, Sisyphus cannot die, even though he might long for death as the only means to escape his personal Hell.

We don’t have forever, isn’t that the lesson of ground hog day.