Dottie Akers-Pecht

Lesson Plan Template

EDIS 5882: English Education
Context:
Date and time for which lesson will be taught: Friday, September 4th from 3:00 to 3:50
Course name: Honors English 11 American Literature
Grade level: 11th
Length of lesson: 50 minutes
Description of setting, students, and curriculum and any other important contextual
characteristics:
The students will have read Nathaniel Hawthornes introduction to The Scarlet Letter
entitled The Custom House for homework for today. This lesson will serve as a further
introduction to Hawthorne himself and the novel, as we will have already provided a brief
background during the last class period. Today we will provide opportunities for students to ask
their own questions about The Custom House in addition to exploring major passages and
themes via the discussion of guiding questions that I will provide them with.
Our 8th block students are particularly animated and eager to share during discussion.
Although this is an honors class, students of all levels typically have a difficult time
understanding The Custom House and Hawthornes purposes for including it in his novel.
Providing the students with guiding questions may help to hone their ideas so that our whole
class discussion is much more substantial and focused. Additionally, these guiding questions will
contain quotations and page numbers from the work and will encourage students to use these
pages in the text to find evidence for their ideas.

Objectives (number each objective to reference in the Assessment section):

SWBAT:
Cognitive (know/understand):
a. The students will understand that literary works often have autobiographical influences.
Affective (feel/value) and/or Non-Cognitive:
b. The students will value one anothers contributions to class discussion.
Performance (do):
c. The students will be able to analyze overarching themes and authors purpose within a
literary text.
SOLs:
Reading 11.4 h) Explain how an authors specific word choices, syntax, tone, and voice support
the authors purpose.

CCSs:
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.11-12.1
Cite strong and thorough textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly as
well as inferences drawn from the text, including determining where the text leaves matters
uncertain.
Assessments: Methods for evaluating each of the specific objectives listed above.
Diagnostic: Students will demonstrate what they already know about themes and authors
purpose in The Custom House by:
Identifying points of confusion/clarifications to address in discussion today (CCSS.ELALiteracy.RI.11-12.1)
Formative: Students will show their progress towards todays objectives by
Participating in a discussion considering authors purpose in The Custom House
(objectives a, b, and c, and SOL Reading 11.4h)
Summative: Students will ultimately be assessed in a future lesson on their understanding of the
objectives by:
Completing a multiple choice and essay assessment on The Scarlet Letter in which they
will need to draw on specific evidence from the text (objective c, SOL Reading 11.4h,
and CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.11-12.1)

Materials Needed:
Overhead projector
PowerPoint presentation on The Custom House
This PowerPoint will include guiding questions for the students to discuss that I will have
previously compiled
My own notes on important themes and points to discuss during this PowerPoint
presentation

Additionally, the students will need paper/a notebook and pencil/pen to record their initial
question about The Custom House

Instructional Steps (Procedures): Detail student and teacher behavior.

[Note: Any words that represent what I would say directly to students appear in italics.]

Beginning Room Arrangement:

The students desks are arranged in five groups of four, and one group of six. Students will
remain in this seating arrangement throughout the lesson.

1.

[5 mins.] Bridge/Hook/Opening to lesson:

Upon entering the classroom, students will see a do now activity on the dry erase board. This
activity will ask them to try to write down one point of confusion / question they have about
The Custom House. I will reassure them that they likely have many and that thats all right.
However, the point of this activity will be to narrow down their questions to concrete ones that
could be answered during the course of this lesson. Rather than sharing next, I will tell students
that we will have time to address any unanswered questions at the end of the class period. (Many
of their questions may be confronted within the topics of this lesson already.)

2.

[10 mins.] Step 1: Background on The Custom House

At this time, we will begin a brief PowerPoint presentation on the historical background of The
Custom House as well as biographical aspects of Hawthornes life that are relevant to the
literary work. I will incorporate questions to ask of the students as I review this background
information with them, such as asking them what a custom house even is and how much they
know about Hawthornes Puritan ancestral past already. I will provide the students with feedback
loops to guide them to conclusions about why Hawthorne may have wished to include this
introduction in the first place that contains many autobiographical details of his experiences in
Salem.

3. [5 mins.] Step 2: Viewing of the short film version of The Custom House
Students will now view a short film version of The Custom House. This film will help them to
visualize the events in the work, particularly the moment when Hawthorne comes across the
scarlet letter in the Custom House that would become the inspiration for his novel. I will mention
this fact to the students following the film.

4.

[20 mins.] Step 3: Discussion of guiding questions

One by one, I will display each guiding question on the PowerPoint presentation. Before
beginning to discuss them, I will mention that each has a direct quotation from the work that we
can find in the text before sharing our thoughts. I will urge students to use the book as they
answer these guiding questions. I will have arranged these questions chronologically as they

appear in the text so that we can move forward through Hawthornes narrative to discuss
important points of his introduction to The Scarlet Letter.
As we discuss these questions, I will provide feedback loops to the students to encourage them to
locate the answers to their own questions, either through providing them with higher level
questioning myself or directing them to the text to find more evidence. At times, I may request
for other students to contribute to the discussion if there are several people dominating the
conversation.

5. [10 mins.] Closure: Return to questions posed during do now activity

After discussing the guiding questions in detail, I will ask the students to return to their own
questions that they had about the work in the beginning of class. Many of these will likely have
been answered in the course of our discussion. I will request those students whose questions
havent been answered to share these so that we can think about possible answers as they apply
to Hawthornes purpose in writing the text, themes he brings forth, questions about terms, places,
or historical details, and any other points of confusion that arose.

Attention to Individual Student Needs: (Differentiation): Detail specific actions/materials

you will use to differentiate instruction in this lesson.
We have several students who have IEPs or 504 plans specifying that they need clarified
instructions. I will print out instructions alongside copies of the guiding questions for all students
so that everyone can refer back to the guidelines for this discussion as they wish. Students may
also wish to take notes on this sheet of paper if its easier for them to recall points that theyve
written down rather than having to remember them off the top of their heads in full class
discussion.
This lesson makes use of visual materials, such as the PowerPoint presentation, photos, and the
short film version of The Custom House, in order to appeal to students with different learning
preferences. Additionally, the text will often be referred to and portions of it will be read aloud
during discussion so that students who have trouble reading the text alone can hear it as they
follow along with those major passages we focus more deeply on.

Technology Use: Detail specific technology being used in the lesson with explanation for
why it is being used.

As mentioned above, the use of the short film The Custom House as well as the photos and
images featured in the PowerPoint presentation will allow students to visualize the events in the
novel, as well as appeal to students with different learning preferences. These devices will allow
the students to picture the major scenes that we discuss from the text and are especially important
considering the fact that this text is typically very difficult for most students to follow along with
as they read.

How this lesson incorporates specific insights from course readings and/or class discussion:
In class discussion, weve often encountered the issue of tying lessons together so that their
activities seem cohesive throughout. One area in particular that I would personally like to focus
on is showing students how the beginning activities of a lesson connect to their endings or the
overall themes that I wanted them to absorb by the end of class. Requiring students to first pose
their own questions in response to the text will require them to think about this work of literature
as soon as they step inside the classroom. As such, they will be more likely to be prepared to start
discussion as well. Then, a return to their questions at the end of class will show them how much
theyve already learned if their question is already answered, as well as give them the
opportunity to learn more by using the text to guide them toward the answers.

Materials Appendix:
The PowerPoint presentation is attached.

Instructions and Guiding Questions

When you first arrive in class, see the do now activity on the dry erase board. You are to write
one question that you have after having read The Custom House for homework. Its likely that
you have more than one question, but try to narrow your ideas down to one pressing point of
confusion that you had that we could potentially answer in class today.

Guiding Questions on The Custom House:

At all events, I, the present writer, as their representative, hereby take shame upon myself for
their sakes (9).
To whom does their refer here? What shame does Hawthorne carry and why?

Puritanic traits both good and evil (9).

How might the Puritans have had both good and evil traits? What are these traits according to
Hawthorne?

Human nature will not flourish, any more than a potato, if it be planted and replanted, for too
long a series of generations, in the same worn-out soil (11).
What is Hawthornes relationship with his hometown of Salem? Why is he fascinated with this
sense of locality?

What is the mystic symbol that Hawthorne encounters among the old records of the Custom
House (31)? What effects does it have on him, both physically and in terms of his literary
inspiration?

What I contend for is the authenticity of the outline (32).

What does Hawthorne tell us in The Custom House to help us believe in the authenticity of the
source of his inspiration for The Scarlet Letter? Consider all of his historical and
autobiographical details.