LAFS.910.L.3.5Archived Standard

This lesson is the 2nd part in a 3-part series on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s speech "I've Been to the Mountaintop." This lesson focuses on some of the figures of speech and rhetorical devices used by Dr. King in his speech. The speech has been divided into eight sections. As students read through each section they will analyze some of the figures of speech and rhetorical devices King used, record their answers on a graphic organizer, and analyze how use of the figure of speech or rhetorical device impacted the meaning of that section of the speech. Students will write an extended paragraph using the quotation sandwich method as the summative assessment for the lesson.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson, students will read the poem "The War After the War" by Debora Greger and examine the three different speaker perspectives within the poem. This lesson provides an opportunity for students to examine and analyze figurative language and perspective, as well as craft their own poem using multiple perspectives and figurative language. Graphic organizers, answer keys, and a poem writing rubric have been included with the lesson. 

Type: Lesson Plan

This close reading lesson focuses on an excerpt from Markus Zusak's novel The Book Thief. Students will close read the text multiple times to discover Zusak's powerful writing style, as well as the power of words through the eyes of Liesel, the novel's protagonist. As students consider Zusak's style, they will build their comprehension of the text and write an analytical essay to demonstrate final interpretations and understandings.

Type: Lesson Plan

This lesson focuses on similes, metaphors, personification, irony, imagery and allusion in Richard Connell's short story, "The Most Dangerous Game." Students first create a "Silly Sheet" study aid for these literary devices, and then they engage in a "scavenger hunt" where they find examples of these devices in the story. Students then work in small groups to interpret the meanings of these devices within the context of the story. Finally, students will individually write an essay analyzing the effect that these devices have on the story as a whole. The "scavenger hunt" handout and answer key, two PowerPoints, and the directions for the essay with a planning sheet and rubric are included.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students often have difficulty envisioning and making sense of a story that is set in a markedly different time or circumstance than their own. This two-day activity introduces students to the dystopian society of 1984 by George Orwell. By analyzing Orwell's carefully chosen words, details, repetitions, and characterizations in these first few pages, students can construct a strong understanding of some of the key features of this society that will give them a solid framework for comprehending the rest of the novel. Doing this kind of close reading work also reinforces to students that authors do not randomly select the details they include in a text; they choose words carefully to create a mood or construct a particular image of a character or place in a reader's mind. The overriding question that students should be able to answer at the end of this exercise is: What can we understand about Winston Smith and the society he lives in based on the descriptive details George Orwell includes in the first few pages of 1984?

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will explore poetic expression, both written and spoken, and evaluate its significance as a medium for social commentary. Students will also examine literary devices including metaphor, simile, symbolism, and point of view.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson, students will conduct a close reading of a short story, "My Watch: An Instructive Little Tale," by Mark Twain. For the first reading, students will focus on story elements and selected academic vocabulary. In the second reading, students will analyze the structure of the text and the effects that are created by that structure. In the final reading, students will analyze figurative language used in the story and how it impacts meaning and tone. Graphic organizers to help students for the second and third reading are provided, along with completed organizers for teachers to use as possible answer keys. The summative assessment, in the form of an extended response paragraph, will require students to determine the central idea of the text and how it is shaped throughout the story. 

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson, the second in a three-lesson unit, students will explore Emily Dickinson's style by reading and analyzing a variety of her letters based on the historical context and audience of each. Students will use the letters, along with an Atlantic Monthly article, as sources for the summative assessment, a letter to the editor written in response to one or several of Dickinson's letters or topics.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson (the third in a three-lesson unit), students will analyze an excerpt from Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried. Working collaboratively and independently, students will explore the diction, images, details, language and syntax of the text. The summative assessment requires students to write an essay analyzing how the author uses language and literary techniques to convey the experience of the soldiers in the Vietnam War. Supporting handouts and materials are provided.

Type: Lesson Plan

This is lesson two of a three-part unit. This lesson should take approximately 2-3 class periods. In this lesson, students analyze poems from the Brave New Voices series. They will identify literary devices such as symbolism, imagery, and figurative language and find textual evidence to support analysis of these devices as well as each poem's title, theme and tone. To accomplish this, students will complete a close reading of three poems using the T-SIFTT (Title, Symbols, Imagery, Tone, Theme) pre-Advanced Placement strategy from College Board.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson (part one of three in a unit), students will work in small groups to analyze the language of Emily Dickinson's poem, "Tell all the truth but tell it slant". Student interests will generate research on Emily Dickinson's poetry, her time, and audiences to better understand the recursive nature of writing that authors practice. While individually developing language skills, students will practice a close reading of the poem "The Soul Selects her own Society" and create a re-envisioned poem using language resources and vocabulary development exercises. Class discussions will center on evaluating the effectiveness of the Dickinson poems studied. The culminating activity will include a response paper that examines the recursive nature of writing as experienced through the small group, research, individual exercises, and class discussion.

Type: Lesson Plan

This is the first lesson in a unit of three lessons focusing on spoken word poetry, as presented on the Brave New Voices Web site. In this lesson, students will read, view, and analyze several poems in print and on video; use poetic devices identified in the read and viewed texts; write original poems based on their own lives; and present their original poems to the class using appropriate intonation, inflection, and fluency. At the end of the unit of study, students will write an analytical paragraph evaluating Brave New Voices poems.

Type: Lesson Plan

The lesson introduces students to irony and how instances of irony in a piece of literature, "A Sound of Thunder" (1070L) by Ray Bradbury, advances the plot. Students are exposed to examples of irony from other works of literature to assist them with this particular form of figurative language. The summative assessment entails a written analysis of how the author incorporates instances of irony to further develop the plot.

Type: Lesson Plan

This lesson introduces four simple, easy-to-identify context clues intended to teach students to use them as they read challenging texts independently. Denotative and connotative meanings are explained and illustrated in the context of the story. Students apply their learning from the beginning of this lesson to a first reading of the beloved story "The Gift of the Magi" by O. Henry. This short context-clues lesson and the accompanying quiz, activity, and chart are easily adaptable to use as a segue to the first reading of any challenging novel, short story, or play where vocabulary may be especially difficult and a need to teach and/or review context clues is essential.

Type: Lesson Plan

This lesson is part one of a 3-part unit. The goal of Lesson 1 is that students will be able to identify and explain the effect of literary devices and what they reveal about the author's purpose, tone, and theme found within a specific passage. In Lesson 2, students will write paragraphs based on the devices found in the passage and their meaning. In Lesson 3, students will write an essay based on the prompt in Lesson 1 and using the activities of both Lessons 1 and 2.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson, students will conduct several close readings of an excerpt from the prologue of The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. For the first close reading, students will focus on identifying the narrator and select academic vocabulary. In the second reading, students will analyze different examples of figurative language within the prologue. They will focus on how the word choices impact the tone of the novel and what effect it has on the reader. During the final close reading, students will explore the persona of the narrator. The summative assessment is a two-paragraph writing assignment which will require students to discuss how Zusak's use of figurative language enhances the story. Students will also examine how the structure of the text sets the tone for the rest of the novel.

Type: Lesson Plan

Practice analyzing word choices in "The Raven" by Edgar Allan Poe, including word meanings, subtle differences between words with similar meanings, and emotions connected to specific words. In this interactive tutorial, you will also analyze the impact of specific word choices on the meaning of the poem.

This is Part Two of a two-part series. Part One should be completed before beginning Part Two. Click HERE to open Part One.

Type: Original Student Tutorial

Practice analyzing word choices in "The Raven" by Edgar Allan Poe in this interactive tutorial. In this tutorial, you will examine word meanings, examine subtle differences between words with similar meanings, and think about emotions connected to specific words. You will also analyze the impact of specific word choices on the meaning of the poem.

This tutorial is Part One of a two-part series on Poe's "The Raven." Click HERE to open Part Two.

Type: Original Student Tutorial

Learn to identify figurative language within poetry, including the use of similes, metaphors, and personification. In this interactive tutorial, we'll analyze William Wordsworth’s “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud” and William Shakespeare’s “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” to discover how figurative language contributes to the meaning of each poem.

Type: Original Student Tutorial

Students read a high-interest short story. A PowerPoint mini-lesson explains the difference between freewriting and summary writing helping students distinguish between the two. An additional PowerPoint mini-lesson on writing thesis statements for literary analysis is provided. Students progress from freewriting to generating thesis statements to writing an outline for a literary analysis essay.

Type: Teaching Idea

Students will use teaching strategies as they read and discuss Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel's memoir Night. Everyone in the classroom takes a turn assuming the "teacher" role in a reciprocal teaching activity, as the class works with four comprehension strategies: predicting, question generating, summarizing, and clarifying.

Type: Teaching Idea

Type: Unit/Lesson Sequence

This unit exemplar from Student Achievement Partner web resources has been developed to guide students and instructors in a close reading of Lincoln's Gettysburg Address. The activities and actions follow a carefully developed set of steps that assist students in increasing their familiarity and understanding of Lincoln's speech through a series of text dependent tasks and questions that ultimately develop college and career ready skills identified in the Florida State Standards. This unit can be broken down into three sections of instruction and reflection on the part of students and their teachers, which is followed by additional activities, some designed for history/social studies and some for ELA classrooms.

Type: Unit/Lesson Sequence