Concept Unit

Lesson Plan Template

Unit Working Title: How I Can Use Literature to Approach Problems in My Life

Unit Big Idea (Concept/Theme): Approaching Adversity

Unit Primary Skill focus: Making an Argument

Week __3__ of 3; Plan #___9__ of 9; [90 mins.]

Plan type: ____Full-Detail _X_Summary

Content Requirement Satisfied: N/A

(Note: Refer to the list in the document called Concept Unit Lesson Plans)

Unit Learning Objectives (numbered) [from my Backwards Design Unit Document],

followed by Specific lesson objectives (lettered) being taught in this lesson:

SWBAT:
Cognitive (know/understand):
N/A

Affective (feel/value) and/or Non-Cognitive:

5. Students will value the importance of self-reflection and learning from ones mistakes when
looking back on how they approached certain problems
a. students will be able to analyze their own choices through self-reflection

Performance (do):
7. Students will be able to critically examine how characters in literature approach different
problems
b. students will be able to reflect on how they have approached obstacles in their own life
g. students will be able to translate their written record into a podcast

SOLs: [List with numbers portrayed in the SOL document]

7.7 The students will write in a variety of forms with an emphasis on exposition, narration, and
persuasion
d. establish a central idea and organization
f. write multi-paragraph compositions with unity elaborating on the central idea

CCSs: [List with numbers portrayed in the CCS document]

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.7.3
Write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique,
relevant descriptive details, and well-structured event sequences.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.7.4
Produce clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization, and style are
appropriate to task, purpose, and audience

Methods of Assessment:
[How will you know if the intended learning occurred?] List all methods of assessment used in
this lesson or which are related to this lesson and come in a future lesson. After each assessment,
indicate in brackets the number(s) and letter(s) of the unit objective and the related lesson
objectives that the assessment is evaluating.

Diagnostic Formative Summative

Since this is the last lesson in
this unit, we will revisit
many of the concepts from
the first day (e.g. why does
adversity matter? Why
should we care? Whats the
point of reading books at
all?) in small group
discussions. As these are
taking place, I will circulate
around the room and take
note of whether students
answers seem to have
changed since the beginning
of the unit and/or reflect
growth.
Standards: 5a
Objectives: N/A
Before this lesson, students The podcast creation of the
will have finished their self- Character Talk (along with
reflective writing assignments writing a script) and the self-
as part of their summative reflective writing assignment
assessment. Students will be are both summative
allowed to create their own assessments for this unit.
small groups and share these
pieces of reflective writing Standards: CCSS.ELA-
with each other. As students LITERACY.W.7.3
are reading their pieces to CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.7.4
each other, students will score SOL 7.7 d, f
their peers with a rubric. Objectives: 7g
These scores will not be the
only things going into that
students final grade for the
assignment, but I will take
them into consideration when
looking over the assignments
myself.

Standards: CCSS.ELA-
LITERACY.W.7.3
Objectives: 5a, 7b

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

Beginning Room Arrangement:

[Changes in this arrangement that become necessary later will be noted in the plan]

1. [5 mins.] Bridge/Hook/Opening to lesson:

Welcome students into the classroom. Explain that today is a day for showing off all your
hard work in this unit. Explain the structure of class today: first half is revisiting the essential
questions from the beginning of the unit in discussion groups and sharing your reflective writing
assignments with peers and having peers score them. Second half of the day is listening to
individual students podcasts and peer scoring them. Ask if anyone has questions.

2. [10 mins.] Small Group Discussions about Essential Questions/Affective Skills

Intro into small group discussions: give students a list of the essential questions and prompting
questions we talked about at the beginning of the unit. Assign them into groups of 4 and have
them discuss their progress towards having answers for these questions. Before breaking into
groups, pass out list of essential questions meant to spur discussion.

Remind students of established discussion norms and encourage them to ground their answers in
the text. I anticipate that many of them will say things like dealing with adversity is good
because it teaches you character or general statements like that. Encourage them to find specific
examples of their statements in the texts that we have read or their lives. Emphasize that all four
participants need to be speaking an equal amount, share the discussion floor and make a space
that allows everyone into the conversation.

Explain that I will be walking around and circulating, but that Im just trying to listen in on your
thoughts! Dont be intimidated!

Have groups pre-planned and assign them into their groups, they have small discussion and then
whole class share-out.. Explain that a random student from each group will be the one to share
what your group talked about, so everyone needs to be fully engaged in the conversation. End
whole class discussion time with the question about Why read? in the hopes that students will
discuss the importance of being a lifelong reader and using characters from literature to learn
more about their own lives.

3. [ 15 mins.] Peer grading groups: self-reflective writing assignments

Preface this activity with the following: explain that we are not grading the experience itself, just
how they presented it. So if someone grades my reflective writing assignment that happens to
be about something really personal like a family member dying, I need to remember that they
arent judging the family experience, but the effectiveness of how I told the story. Remind
students to be respectful when listening to their peers experiences because they may be personal
in nature and hard for some people to share. Remind students that these grades from their peers
wont be the only grades that determine their final grade for this project, but I will keep the peer
comments in mind.

Explain that students can choose their groups because of the nature of the subject matterI want
them to feel comfortable sharing these assignments because some of them may be really
personal. However, also stress that just because you are with your friends doesnt mean you
should grade everyone that waynot an excuse to check out and give everyone full scores on
everything. Reference the peer grading form (Appendix A) and show that the bottom sections ask
you to explain the rationale for your scores. Emphasis that students cannot skip over this
important step.

Let students know that once they fill out the feedback form for one of their peers assignments, I
will be the only person who sees that after that point. Ask if students have any questions and then
let them choose groups of four and get started.

**5 MIN BREAK**

4. [50 mins- end] Whole class Listening to Podcast: Final Products for Character Talk

Pass out peer grading sheets for podcasts. Briefly review the rubric we came up with as a class
with students and have it posted on the projector so students can reference it when writing down
their thoughts about their peers. Try to get through as many podcasts as possible; if each is a max
of 3 min should be able to do 15ishoverflow can go into next period. Have podcasts queued up
on computer so dont have to worry about technology stuff.

Make sure that students are paying attention to each podcast, may need to take a very quick
break if eyes start to glaze over. If needed, pause in between podcasts and remind students to
give the same attention to the ones they are listening to now as the ones they heard at the
beginning.
As students are peer grading, I will also have a sheet for each student and be writing down my
own thoughts to save me time later. At the end, thank students for all their hard work in this unit.
Do a preview of whatever is coming next and emphasize that students should be really proud of
their work so far.

Differentiated Instruction to accommodate one or more of my profiled students:

(This is where you identify specific aspects of this lesson which have been differentiated in order
to address the needs of one or more of your profiled studentsidentify them by name)

I anticipate that Stan (the ELL student) might have some anxiety about having the class listen to
his podcast (along with other students who might be nervous!) Before we start listening to each
podcast, students will have online access to the written transcripts for each in case they cant
understand something orally. These transcripts will be posted on the class website so all students
have easy access. Students will not be required to use these, but they will be there for students
who want them. Additionally, before we start listening to the podcasts, I will emphasize that
everyone put a lot of hard work into theirs and everyone should be proud of their final product.

Materials Needed (list):

Peer Grading Self Reflective Writing Rubric (Appendix A)
Peer Grading Podcast Rubric (Appendix B)
Discussion Sheet for Affective/Non-Cognitive Skills and Essential Questions (Appendix C)

Materials Appendix: (e.g., supplementary texts, Ppts, overheads, graphic organizers,

handouts, etc.)

Appendix A (already had this created):

Skills 9-10 7-8 5-6 3-4 1-2

Depth of Demonstrates Demonstrates Demonstrates Demonstrates Demonstrates
Reflection a conscious a thoughtful a basic a limited little or no
and thorough understanding understandin understandin understandin
understanding of the writing g of the g of the g of the
of the writing prompt and writing writing writing
prompt and subject prompt and prompt with a prompt. Is
subject matter. subject shallow either off-
matter. This matter, but reflection topic
reflection can leaves out (mainly
be used as an crucial summarizing
example for details. the event
other instead of
students. analyzing)
Use of Uses specific Uses relevant Uses Uses No examples
textual and examples examples incomplete or from the text
evidence convincing from the texts from the text vaguely are used and
examples studied to to support developed claims made
from texts support most claims examples to are
studied to claims in your in your only partially unsupported
support your own writing. writing. support and/or
claims. claims. irrelevant.

Who are you scoring? ________________________

What is your name? _________________________

Evidence of your score for depth of reflection

Evidence of your score for textual evidence

Notes: