$10 - $20 12th Grade English Language Arts Lesson

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Kindred UNIT PLAN | Discussion Questions, Vocab Lists, Writing Prompts, & More | Octavia E. Butler

By Rigorous Resources for High School English

This 60-page EDITABLE unit has everything you'll need for profoundly stimulating lessons on Octavia Butler's Kindred!! Invite your class to engage in student-driven discussions without compromising on intellectual rigor. The daily quizzes, discussion prompts, and writing assignment will challenge your students to dig beneath the surface of the text and unlock profound interpretive insights!

Hold your students accountable for completing the nightly homework by beginning every class with a quick vocabulary and reading quiz. Challenge students to explicate textual details using a wide range of interpretive lenses: formalist, historicist, feminist, psychoanalytic, etc. Facilitate dynamic discussions that inspire students to arrive at a whole new depth of insight!!

Everything you’ll need to teach the novel is included in this bundle:

Unit & Pacing Guide: Suggestions for how to pace the reading homework and organize the classwork for Octavia Butler's Kindred. (2 pages)

Author Introduction: A brief summary of the life of Octavia Butler and the research that she conducted before writing Kindred. (1 page)

Discussion Questions: Sixteen pages of higher-order discussion questions guaranteed to inspire profoundly thoughtful class discussions! This unit features double-sided handouts with 8-10 questions for each of the novel's 8 sections. The discussion questions are the beating heart of this curriculum. They challenge students to build interpretive arguments that require the support of carefully selected textual evidence — leading to keen interpretive insights! Guaranteed to build skills in close reading and critical reasoning! (16 pages)

Quick Writes: A "quick write" can be used at any time in a class to get students to pause and reflect on the text in writing. Introduce a quick write before you begin a discussion to allow your more reticent students to collect their thoughts. Or roll one out toward the end of a discussion to let students capture and refine their best ideas. (8 pages)

Vocabulary Lists: Lists of 10-12 vocabulary words to accompany every nightly reading assignment. Every vocabulary word comes with a definition and a sample sentence with the word as used in Kindred. A total of over 100 words. (8 pages)

Vocabulary & Reading Quizzes: Build students’ vocabularies while holding them accountable for the nightly reading homework. Each quiz contains 7 questions on vocabulary words plus another 3 questions on reading comprehension. Grading these quizzes is simple and quick. They’re an easy way to log up to 8 grades in your gradebook. Answer key provided. (16 pages)

Writing Assignment: Challenge students to take their interpretations one step further by writing an analytical paper on Butler’s wonderfully complex novel. Let students choose amongst 5 profoundly thought-provoking sample topics — or invite them to develop an original topic of their own. (2 pages)

Poetry Pairings: Seven thematically relevant poems by two exceptionally talented black women poets, Lucille Clifton and Natasha Trethewey. (7 pages)

This unit is filled with dozens of visual images that shed light on important scenes from Octavia Butler's novel: documentary photographs of antebellum plantations, excerpts from Butler's handwritten drafts and journals, paintings of biblical figures referenced in the novel, etc. But what really distinguishes this curriculum is how the discussion starters and writing prompts deepen students' thinking and help them arrive at profound interpretive insights!

This resource packet will come to you in two separate formats: Word docs *and* PDFs. Because the Word docs are fully editable, you'll be able to customize the materials to suit your teaching style and/or the skill levels of your students — year after year! If you don't have Microsoft Word, you'll still be able to access the entire unit as PDFs, which are easy to navigate and quick to print!

Because I believe that teachers should be able to see what they'd be getting before they purchase, the preview for this resource provides direct access to dozens of actual pages from the unit. Click on the green “preview” button to see exactly what you’ll get....

Thank you for choosing “Rigorous Resources”!!

Happy teaching!

Adam Jernigan, Ph.D.

adamjernigan@gmail.com

P.S. Don't forget to click “follow” for email updates on new products by Rigorous Resources. New products will be 50% OFF for the first 24 hours!

Rigorous Resources is your one-stop shop for resources on American literature. Feel free to check out these complete units on canonical texts by diverse American authors:

Complete Unit on Tommy Orange's There There

Complete Unit on Arthur Miller's The Crucible

Complete Unit on Frederick Douglass's Narrative

Complete Unit on F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby

Complete Unit on Nella Larsen's Passing

Complete Unit on Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God

Complete Unit on Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun

Complete Unit on Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye

Complete Unit on Gene Luen Yang's American Born Chinese

English Language Arts
Close Reading
Literature
$24.99
$14.99
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The Vocab Bundle - Finding Meaning Of Unfamiliar Words Using Context Clues

By Blooming Through High School

Word Meaning with Nonsense Words

Why teach word meaning through nonsense words (context clues only)?

  • Students must use critical thinking to solve
  • Students must read the whole passage for context clues
  • Students must problem solve to find the best word that makes the most sense.
  • They can't find the answer except through problem solving.

All of these are things we want every student to do! This is something that is already adapted for high and low learners.

Starting with three nonsense words gets students going so they can work in groups or independently to decode the meaning of 7 REAL words (selected from the SAT vocabulary list).

This is a perfect activity for group problem solving and critical thinking!

Finding the meaning of words: in context, with a definition and from the Latin or Greek base. Four teaching pages are included for self-guided learning along with 7 student pages for practice with various shortened reading passages.

INCLUDED:

  • 3 Self-grading Google Forms
  • Editable Word Doc
  • PDF
  • Reading Passage
  • Teaching pages
  • Answer Key

BUNDLE & SAVE: ELA Test Prep, Study Guide & Activities Bundle

Word Meaning with Greek & Latin

✔️Need to teach Greek & Latin along with Context Clues?

✔️Looking for way to get your students thinking critically & making connections?

✔️Need to integrate vocabulary in a meaningful way?

This activity includes worksheets, task cards and Google Quizzes for vocab practice

Students will use key words from the definitions in the first activity to determine the meaning of the Greek or Latin prefix. By recognizing the prefixes in words they recognize (and some they won't) students will begin making connections to other words they hear and read. This is a natural way to build in vocabulary to daily instruction that includes context clues and the Greek and Latin.

Included:

  • Greek & Latin Roots Exploration: Dive into 45 carefully selected words, each featuring 9 impactful prefixes from the rich realms of Latin and Greek languages.
  • Word Definitions: Equip your students with a solid understanding of each word, laying the foundation for deeper language comprehension.
  • Fill in the Blank Sentences: Immerse your class in the learning process with cloze sentences that challenge them to apply their newfound knowledge in context.
  • Task Cards: Make learning interactive and enjoyable with task cards that encourage independent exploration and reinforce language skills.
  • Google Quizzes: Easily accessible quizzes that provide instant feedback, saving you valuable time and promoting a tech-savvy learning environment.

Vocabulary Starter

NEED TO TEACH VOCABULARY IN YOUR MIDDLE OR HIGH SCHOOL CLASSROOM AND YOU'RE NOT SURE WHERE TO START?

You came to the right place! I have been teaching for 5+ years, I have my Master's in Education with a focus on Literacy and I didn't know where to start.

So, I went back to everything I learned in my graduate program and re-read everything I could find.

I wrote & designed a student-engaging template to help students in my classroom to deeply internalize a word. I gathered key word lists when I didn't have a word from our daily reading, and thought about how to teach vocabulary so my love of etymology and words could be shared with my 10th graders. I've included all that and a guide to help other teachers get started with implementing and teaching vocabulary in THEIR classrooms.

Is this book for me?

  • You want to teach vocabulary explicitly
  • You want flexibility to choose your words daily based on what you’re reading
  • You need versatility to choose your own words from a given list
  • You want your students to deeply internalize the vocabulary they learn
  • You’re not sure where to start

Then this book is for you!

Adaptable to every classroom in every situation, this is more than a fill-in-the-blank activity. Your students will have a guide to build a vocabulary for a lifetime of learning.

WHY TEACH VOCABULARY EXPLICITLY?

Generating curiosity and delight in playing with words supports long-term memory, enhances the connection between orthography and meaning, and develops a disposition which stimulates word consciousness. It also builds vocabulary! All of these are a part of a vocabulary rich classroom environment.

$21.25
$17.00
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Guided Reading Lesson Plan & Activities Grades KG-12 (13-Book Bundle)

By Bright Classroom Ideas Marketplace

Guided Reading is a research-based instruction process whereby the teacher works with small grouping of students being equal in a particular reading achievement level. The teacher provides for each reader's development of effective reading competencies. However different than in the earlier days of reading groups, small and temporary groups are flexible and dynamic. The observance and evaluation of the progress of readers are done by teachers on a systematic basis. Thus, grouping and regrouping students is based on the strengths of students and the intense changing needs throughout their reading development.

In the 1960s in New Zealand, Guided Reading was developed. It was enhanced over the years after it arrived in the United States thanks to educators like Gay Su Pinnell and Lesley Fountas. In 1996, Fountas & Pinnell published their enormously influential book, Guided Reading: Good First Teaching for All Children (Heinemann). This book changed how reading was taught, and it is still taught today to over a million teachers worldwide. The aim of Guided Reading lessons is to develop effective readers.

A set of 13 books is bundled together with all 13 worksheets of the Guided Reading series for grades KG-12. There are lesson plans and different activities for every grade, with the answers in the end section of the worksheet.

English Language Arts
Balanced Literacy
Reading
$11.38
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Flying Lessons and Other Stories BUNDLE OF LESSONS FOR ALL STORIES + BONUS

By Ms. J's ELA

This bundle includes lessons for all stories in the book Flying Lessons and Other Stories edited by Ellen Oh. The stories are not included in this resource. Lessons are focused on the following stories:

- How to Transform an Everyday, Ordinary Hoop Court into a Place of Higher Learning and You at the Podium by Matt De La Peña

- The Difficult Path by Grace Lin

- Sol Painting, Inc. by Meg Medina

- Secret Samantha by Tim Federle

- The Beans and Rice Chronicles of Isaiah Dunn by Kelly J. Baptist

- Choctaw Bigfoot, Midnight in the Mountains by Tim Tingle

- Main Street by Jacqueline Woodson

- Flying Lessons by Soman Chainani

- Seventy-Six Dollars and Forty-Nine Cents by Kwame Alexander

- Sometimes a Dream Needs a Push by Walter Dean Myers

Each lesson includes WORKSHEETS and a PRESENTATION. Worksheets come in color and b/w. Presentations include answer keys.

Each lesson contains:

- Pre-reading journal prompt

- Story vocabulary (except Main Street)

- Tiered reading questions

- Questions focused on one particular ELA standard

- Answer keys

BONUS ESSAY WRITING PROMPTS ARE INCLUDED!

If you teach 90 minute block classes, you would likely get through one lesson per day. If you teach 50 minute classes like I do, each lesson could take two days. This bundle could last from 2 weeks to 4 weeks depending on your schedule.

$20.00
$17.50
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Cask of Amontillado Activity Bundle

By Language Arts Excellence

This resource features a bundle of all of our lesson plans, materials, and activities for Edgar Allan Poe's chilling tale of revenge, The Cask of Amontillado. Each product is thoughtfully crafted and allows students to think outside the box by delving deeply into the story's themes, characters, vocabulary, and plot development. Lessons have all been classroom-tested and allow for differentiation while encouraging optimal student engagement. This activity bundle provides a week's worth of material to bring the story to life!

Included in this Bundle:

  • The Cask of Amontillado Literature Guide: This 25-page literature guide features a Common-Core aligned mini-unit for the story. It provides basis for comprehension, vocabulary acquisition, and reader response for The Cask of Amontillado and encourages students to think critically about Poe's use of irony, foreshadowing, literary elements, and symbolism. A full answer key is provided along with one bonus student-tested lesson plan. The wide range of activities in this guide will keep your students engaged and help them to gain a deep understanding of and appreciation for one of the most horrifying tales in American literature.

  • The Cask of Amontillado ESCAPE ROOM: This meticulously-crafted resource features all of the materials you need to conduct a full-length Escape Room for The Cask of Amontillado. Planning an escape room may seem like quite the daunting task (and it is!), but this product provides everything from the basics and set-up instructions to signs and answer keys so that yours runs smoothly from start to finish. The activity involves movement, energy, creative thinking and most of all, collaboration. Because this is a skills-based escape room, it is the perfect way to review the story for the final quiz or test. Your students will be having so much fun that they won’t even realize the higher order thinking skills they are applying in the playing of this game!

  • The Cask of Amontillado Socratic Seminar: This resource features lesson plans and materials to conduct a formal set of Socratic Seminars for Edgar Allan Poe's chilling tale of insult and revenge. Socratic Seminars (or "Fish Bowl" Conversations as referred to in this resource) are higher order ways of assessing whether your students are able to understand and react to your class texts. These seminars rely on the power of inquiry and allow students to take the lead in their learning and discussion. The only problem? They require a great deal of preparation. Fortunately, this student-tested resource includes everything you need to conduct a structured and formal set of Socratic Seminars in your classroom surrounding the short story, The Cask of Amontillado by Edgar Allan Poe... and no preparation is required by you at all.

  • The Cask of Amontillado Family Crest Activity (also included within Literature Guide): This product features a thoughtful and engaging supplemental activity for the story. In this mini-project that can be done in class or as homework, students will closely examine Montresor's family crest (or is it!?), then create their own symbolic family crest using meticulous instructions and the template provided. They will also need to thoroughly explain what they have included on their family crest. A detailed lesson plan is included for use on the following day that allows students to showcase and explain their family crests using an imaginative teaching method. This is a great activity to get your students to think symbolically and to reflect upon the ideals of their own families. Your students will thank you for offering such a thoughtful activity to go along with their reading of The Cask of Amontillado!

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Click to Follow Language Arts Excellence

$22.50
$17.50
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Passing UNIT PLAN | Discussion Questions, Reading Quizzes, Writing Prompts, Answer Keys, & More | Nella Larsen

By Rigorous Resources for High School English

This 150-page EDITABLE curriculum has everything you'll need to deliver profoundly stimulating lessons on Nella Larsen's Passing. Invite your class to engage in student-driven discussions without compromising on intellectual rigor. The discussion questions, daily quizzes, literary device exercises, and analytical writing assignment will challenge your students to dig beneath the surface of the text and generate profound interpretive insights!!

Hold your students accountable for completing the nightly homework by beginning every class with a quick vocabulary and reading quiz. Facilitate dynamic discussions that motivate students to become attached to the thrill generating shared knowledge. Challenge students to explicate textual details using a wide range of interpretive lenses: formalist, psychoanalytic, etc. Inspire students to arrive at a whole new depth of insight!!

Here are some highlights from the 150-page editable curriculum:

Discussion Question Handouts: Twenty pages of deeply thought-provoking discussion questions! One 2-page handout containing 8-10 questions for each of 6 sections of the novel. The discussion questions are the beating heart of these lesson plans. Every discussion question is grounded in concrete textual details and challenges students to arrive at lucid interpretive insights! The questions could be used to focus students’ thinking prior to beginning a discussion, to foster in-class writing such as stop-and-jots, or to assign written reflections for homework. Guaranteed to elicit student engagement and foster profound discussions! (18 pages)

Discussion Question Answer Keys: The answer keys to the discussion questions are informed by the best academic articles written by scholars who specialize in African-American women writers of the Harlem Renaissance: Deborah McDowell, Cheryl Wall, Bell Hooks, Judith Butler, and others. Of course, there is rarely a single "correct" answer for any question; rather, the discussions questions are made up of higher-order questions designed to foster lively exchanges and interpretive debates among students. They challenge students to build interpretive arguments that require the support of carefully selected textual evidence. (50 pages)

Quick Writes: A "quick write" can be used at any time in a class to get students to pause and reflect on the text in writing. Introduce a quick write before you begin a discussion to allow students to collect their thoughts. Or roll one out toward the end of a discussion to let students capture and refine their best ideas. (6 pages)

Vocabulary Lists: Lists of 10 vocabulary words for each of the novel's 6 sections , complete with definitions and sample sentences with the words as used in Passing. A total of 60 SAT-worthy words. (6 pages)

• Reading & Vocabulary Quizzes: Daily quizzes with 10 questions on the nightly reading homework plus another 10 questions on the vocabulary words. If you choose not to have your students study vocabulary, you can still use the portion of the quiz devoted to reading comprehension. Grading these quizzes is simple and quick. They’re an easy way to log 6 to 12 grades into your gradebook. Answer keys included. (24 pages)

Figurative Language Worksheets (x3): Three worksheets challenge students to identify the type of figurative used in fifty quotations from Passing. The types of figurative language include metaphor, simile, personification, hyperbole, paradox, and oxymoron. This bundle also features a glossary with definitions as well as examples of how each type of figurative language is used in Passing — so you can review them with students before they tackle the worksheets. Each worksheet can be used either as a quiz or as a fun refresher. Answer keys included. (12 pages)

Quotation Race: Students work in pairs to identify the speakers of 50 key quotations from Passing. Introduce this fun activity when you need to mix things up, or to refresh students' memories in preparation for the AP exam. Answer key included. (6 pages)

Q3 Practice Essay: Designed for teachers of AP Literature, this in-class practice essay will allow students to rehearse the "Q3" essay from the AP Literature and Composition Exam. The assignment asks students to write a 40-minute in-class essay in response to one amongst three recent Q3 prompts that featured Passing as one of the recommended works of literary merit. (5 pages)

Analytical Writing Assignment: Challenge students to take their interpretations one step further by writing an analytical paper on Larsen's Passing. Let students choose from one of 5 thought-provoking sample topics — or invite them to develop a similar topic of their own. Rubric included. (4 pages)

The entire resource packet will come to you in two separate formats: Word docs *and* PDFs. Because the Word docs are fully editable, you'll be able to customize the materials to suit your teaching style and/or your students' skill levels — year after year! If you don't have Microsoft Word, you'll still be able to access the entire unit in PDF format, which is easy to navigate and quick to print.

Finally, I believe that teachers should be able to see what they'll be getting before they purchase. So the preview for this resource provides direct access to over 25 pages from the bundle. Click on the green “preview” button to see exactly what you’ll get....

Thank you for choosing “Rigorous Resources”!!

Happy teaching!

Adam Jernigan, Ph.D.

adamjernigan@gmail.com

P.S. The current school year is an especially good time to teach this novel because a cinematic adaptation of Passing was just released on Netflix in 2022. The film is directed by Rebecca Hall and features talented actors like Tessa Thompson and Ruth Negga. If you're considering teaching this thematically powerful and aesthetically beautiful novel, my enthusiastic advice is to do it!

P.P.S. Don't forget to click “follow” for email updates on new products by Rigorous Resources. New products will be 50% OFF for the first 24 hours!

Rigorous Resources is your one-stop shop for resources on American literature. Every unit was designed by a Ph.D. with a research specialization in American literature. Feel free to check out these complete units on canonical texts by diverse American authors:

Complete Unit on Tommy Orange's There There

Complete Unit on Arthur Miller's The Crucible

Complete Unit on Frederick Douglass's Narrative

Complete Unit on F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby

Complete Unit on Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God

Complete Unit on Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun

Complete Unit on Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye

Complete Unit on Gene Luen Yang's American Born Chinese

English Language Arts
Close Reading
Literature
$29.99
$16.99
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The Alchemist Activity Bundle

By Language Arts Excellence

This resource features a bundle of all of our lesson plans, materials, and activities for Paolo Coelo's inspirational best-selling novel, The Alchemist. Each product is thoughtfully crafted and allows students to think outside the box by delving deeply into the novel's themes, characters, and plot development. Lessons have all been classroom-tested and allow for differentiation while encouraging optimal student engagement. You will not find tedious lists of comprehension questions and vocabulary words in this bundle; instead you will find materials that will bring the novel to life!

Included in this Bundle:

⭐ The Alchemist "Silent Conversation" Quote Pass Activity

This product features a thoughtful and engaging activity for use during the study of The Alchemist. Centering around 5 different provocative passages from the book, this lesson provides your students with a chance to think, reflect, and respond to their peers without ever saying a word. This creative approach is a great way to differentiate instruction among your students and allows even your most quiet students to shine. I am confident that this no-prep lesson will become a must-do activity within your unit on The Alchemist!

⭐ The Alchemist Anticipation Guide & Lesson Plan

This product features an anticipation guide for The Alchemist, and a meticulously-explained lesson plan that is in my opinion, the absolute best way to approach a new novel. Using a non-intimidating method called "Numbered Heads", this activity will get your students thinking, writing, conversing, and reporting about themes you will be encountering during your study of The Alchemist.

⭐ The Alchemist Bell Ringer Journal Prompts

This resource features a set of 25 reader response journal prompts for use during your unit on The Alchemist. Each bell ringer is comprised of a quote from the novel and a thoughtfully crafted question that encourages students to personally connect with his inspirational words. Prompts can be used as bell-ringers (most popular and mean the first 5 minutes of every class for a month are planned for you!), summarizers, stations, full class or small group discussion questions, for homework, task cards, sub plans, as a filler activity… the possibilities are endless!

⭐ The Alchemist ESCAPE ROOM

This meticulously-crafted resource features all of the materials you need to conduct a full-length Escape Room for The Alchemist. Planning an escape room may seem like quite the daunting task, but this product provides everything from the basics and set-up instructions to answer keys so that yours runs smoothly from start to finish. The activity involves movement, energy, creative thinking and most of all, collaboration. All tasks are skills-based so that with this fun lesson, learning is not sacrificed. Your students will be having so much fun that they won’t even realize the higher order thinking skills they are applying in the playing of this game!

⭐ The Alchemist Quote Posters

Make your classroom pop with this set of 20 gorgeous posters featuring quotes from The Alchemist. Each 7.5 x 7.5 (square) poster contains a provocative quote from the novel imposed over a stunning photograph meant to inspire your students and motivate them to follow their dreams. The square format is reminiscent of Instagram and makes for an eye-catching arrangement on your wall or bulletin board. I suggest laminating the posters and using them not just during your Alchemist unit, but all year long!

⭐ The Alchemist Socratic Seminar Materials

This resource features lesson plans and materials to conduct a formal set of Socratic Seminars for The Alchemist. Socratic Seminars (or "Fish Bowl" Conversations as referred to in this resource) are higher order ways of assessing whether your students are able to understand and react to your class texts. These seminars rely on the power of inquiry and allow students to take the lead in their learning and discussion. The only problem? They require a great deal of preparation. Fortunately, this student-tested resource includes everything you need to conduct a structured and formal set of Socratic Seminars in your classroom surrounding The Alchemist... and no preparation is required by you at all.

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Click to Follow Language Arts Excellence

$23.50
$18.05
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My Ántonia UNIT PLAN | Discussion Questions, Reading Quizzes, Writing Prompts, & More | Willa Cather

By Rigorous Resources for High School English

This 135-page EDITABLE unit has everything you'll need for profoundly stimulating lessons on Willa Cather's My Ántonia!! Invite your class to engage in student-driven discussions without compromising on intellectual rigor. The pre-reading handouts, discussion questions, daily quizzes, and analytical writing assignment will challenge your students to dig beneath the surface of the text and generate profound interpretive insights!!

Hold your students accountable for completing the nightly homework by beginning every class with a quick vocabulary and reading quiz. Facilitate dynamic discussions that motivate students to become attached to the thrill generating shared knowledge. Challenge students to explicate textual details using a wide range of interpretive lenses: historicist, psychoanalytic, feminist, etc. Inspire students to arrive at a whole new depth of insight!!

Here are some highlights from the 135-page editable curriculum:

Portrait of the Author: Willa Cather: This pre-reading handout will provoke students to make connections between Cather's life and central themes in My Ántonia — without spoiling any of the plot details. Includes a follow-up quiz with answer key. (4 pages)

Discussion Question Handouts: Thirty-five of higher-order discussion questions guaranteed to inspire profoundly thoughtful class discussions! This unit features double-sided handouts with with 8-10 discussion for each of the novel's 12 sections. The discussion questions are the beating heart of these lesson plans. They challenge students to build interpretive arguments that require the support of carefully selected textual evidence — leading to keen interpretive insights! (35 pages)

Vocabulary Lists: Lists of 10-12 vocabulary words for every section of the novel, complete with definitions and sample sentences with the words as used in My Ántonia. A total of over 120 SAT-worthy words. (12 pages)

Vocabulary & Reading Quizzes: Quizzes with 10 questions per reading assignment. Build students’ vocabularies while holding them accountable for the nightly reading homework. Each quiz contains 7 questions on vocabulary words plus another 3 questions on reading comprehension. Grading these quizzes is simple and quick. They’re an easy way to log 12 grades into your gradebook. Answer keys included. (24 pages)

Literary Devices Quiz: This quiz challenges students to identify the literary devices used in fifteen quotations from My Ántonia. The literary devices include metaphor, simile, personification, hyperbole, allusion, onomatopoeia, and more. This bundle also features a glossary with definitions of the literary devices as well as examples of how each device is used in Cather's novel — so you can review the devices with students before they tackle the worksheet. The worksheet can be used either as a quiz or as a fun refresher. Answer key included. (3 pages)

Quotation Race: Students work in pairs to identify the speakers of 50 key quotations from My Ántonia. Introduce this fun activity when you need to mix things up, or to refresh students' memories in preparation for the AP exam. Answer key included. (6 pages)

FRQ3 Practice Essay: Designed for AP Lit teachers, this in-class practice essay will allow students to rehearse the "FRQ3" essay from the AP Literature and Composition Exam. The assignment asks students to write a 40-minute in-class essay in response to one amongst three recent Q3 prompts that featured My Antonia as one of the recommended works of literary merit. (5 pages)

Analytical Writing Assignment: Challenge students to take their interpretations one step further by writing an analytical paper on Willa Cather's wonderfully complex novel. Let students choose from one of eight profoundly thought-provoking sample topics — or invite them to develop a similar topic of their own. Rubric included. (4 pages)

My store is called “Rigorous Resources” because the units feature content-rich lessons guaranteed to boost your students' close-reading and critical-thinking skills. This unit filled with dozens of historically relevant visual images: documentary photographs of dugouts and sod houses from the 1870s and 1880s, portraits of Red Cloud and other historical figures, paintings by the prairie-born painter Harvey Dunn, and much more. But what really distinguishes this unit is how the pre-reading handouts, discussion questions, exercises on literary devices, and writing assignment are all designed to help student arrive at an abundance of interpretive insights!

The entire 135-page unit will come to you in two separate formats: Word Doc *and* PDF. Because the Word doc is fully editable, you'll be able to CUSTOMIZE the materials to suit your teaching style and/or the skill levels of your students — year after year! If you don't have Microsoft Word, you'll still be able to access the entire unit as a PDF — which is easy to navigate and quick to print!

As someone who great up in the midwest, I love teaching Cather's masterpiece about life on the Nebraska prairie. And I also love hearing from teachers who share a passion for great literature. If you have any questions while teaching this novel, please don't hesitate to reach out via email. Wishing you an amazing experience with My Ántonia!

Happy teaching!

Adam Jernigan, Ph.D.

adamjernigan@gmail.com

P.S. Don't forget to click “follow” for email updates on new products by Rigorous Resources. New products will be 50% OFF for the first 24 hours!

Rigorous Resources is your one-stop shop for resources on American literature. Every unit was designed by a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago with a research specialization in American literature. Feel free to check out these complete units on canonical texts by diverse American authors:

Complete Unit on Tommy Orange's There There

Complete Unit on Arthur Miller's The Crucible

Complete Unit on Frederick Douglass's Narrative

Complete Unit on F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby

Complete Unit on Nella Larsen's Passing

Complete Unit on Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God

Complete Unit on J. D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye

Complete Unit on Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun

Complete Unit on Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye

Complete Unit on Gene Luen Yang's American Born Chinese

English Language Arts
Close Reading
Literature
$34.99
$16.99
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The Pit and the Pendulum Literature Guide

By Language Arts Excellence

This literature guide features a comprehensive mini-unit for Edgar Allan Poe's tale of terror and torture, The Pit and the Pendulum. The packet provides an excellent basis for comprehension and vocabulary acquisition for the short story and encourages students to think critically about Poe's use of sensory details, literary elements, figurative language, and symbolism. A full answer key is provided along with two bonus student-tested lesson plans and full procedure for conducting a P&P Socratic Seminar in your classroom. The wide range of activities in this guide will keep your students engaged and help them to gain a deep understanding of one of the most horrifying tales in American literature.

Product Includes:

  • Attractive Cover Page for Student Packet
  • Anticipation Guide - "Creative Quick-Write"
  • Vocabulary Worksheet
  • The Pit and the Pendulum Sensory Detail Activities
  • Sensory Detail Chart
  • Sensory Detail Analysis Open Response
  • Comprehension Questions
  • Literary Elements Chart
  • Figurative Language Worksheet
  • Symbolism Activity
  • Snap-Chatter Worksheet
  • The Pit and the Pendulum Socratic Seminar
  • Full Answer Key for Teacher Use
  • Suggested Lesson Plan for Anticipation Guide
  • Suggested Lesson Plan for Sensory Detail Study
  • Suggested Lesson Plan for Symbolism Worksheet

While this literature guide is Common Core aligned for eighth grade, it is appropriate for students in eighth-twelfth.

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We've gone digital! Check out the paperless version to support distance learning: The Pit & the Pendulum Digital Literature Guide

Looking for a fun way to end the study of this tale? Check out The Pit & the Pendulum ESCAPE ROOM

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More resources to round out your Edgar Allan Poe unit:

⭐ Introduction to Edgar Allan Poe PowerPoint

⭐ Introduction to Edgar Allan Poe Scavenger Hunt

⭐ Edgar Allan Poe Escape Room

⭐ Edgar Allan Poe Bell Ringer Journal Prompts

⭐ Edgar Allan Poe Crossword Puzzle

⭐ Edgar Allan Poe Brochure

⭐ Edgar Allan Poe's Obituary

⭐ Edgar Allan Poe Quote Posters

⭐ Edgar Allan Poe Resource Bundle

But why stop with one story? We have enough Edgar Allan Poe resources to frighten your students for months!

⭐ The Raven Literature Guide

⭐ The Tell-Tale Heart Literature Guide

⭐ The Black Cat Literature Guide

⭐ The Masque of the Red Death Literature Guide

⭐ The Cask of Amontillado Literature Guide

⭐ The Fall of the House of Usher Literature Guide

⭐ Edgar Allan Poe Short Story BUNDLE

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The Complete Maus UNIT PLAN: Discussion Questions, Reading Quizzes, Writing Prompts, Answer Keys, & More | Art Spiegelman

By Rigorous Resources for High School English

This 175-page EDITABLE curriculum has everything you'll need for profoundly stimulating lessons on Art Spiegelman's The Complete Maus!! Invite your class to engage in student-driven discussions without compromising on intellectual rigor. The pre-reading handouts, discussion questions, vocabulary lists, and analytical writing assignment will challenge your students to dig beneath the surface of the text and generate profound interpretive insights!!

The graphic novel is an aesthetically innovative genre in which meaning is created through the interplay of image and text. How do we read a novel in which two narrative channels — one verbal, the other visual — interact? And how do graphic novels challenge readers to expand the set of interpretive techniques that make up “close reading”? This bundle will help students understand complex questions about literary genres, aesthetic form, social and political history, and the responsibilities that come with representing historical atrocities like the Holocaust.

Here are some highlights from the 175-page curriculum:

Pre-Reading Activity: Open this unit by reading and discussing Art Spiegelman's early 3-page comic, "Maus" (which was published in an underground comics magazine called Funny Animals in 1972). In addition to the 3-page comic itself, this unit features a double-sided Image Analysis Worksheet in which students encounter questions that will deepen their engagement with Maus. Answer key included. (10 pages)

Discussion Question Handouts: Thirty-five pages of deeply thought-provoking discussion questions! One double-sided handout containing 8-10 questions for each of the book's 10 sections. The discussion questions are the beating heart of these lesson plans. Every discussion question is grounded in concrete textual details and challenges students to arrive at lucid interpretive insights! The questions could be used to focus students’ thinking prior to beginning a discussion, to foster in-class writing such as stop-and-jots, or to assign written reflections for homework. Guaranteed to elicit student engagement and foster profound discussions! (25 pages)

Discussion Question Answer Keys: The answer keys to the discussion questions are informed by cutting-edge scholarship by historians and literature professors who specialize on topics like the Holocaust and Spiegelman's Maus. Of course, there is rarely a single "correct" answer for any question; rather, the discussions questions are made up of higher-order questions designed to foster lively exchanges and interpretive debates among students. They challenge students to build interpretive arguments that require the support of carefully selected textual evidence. (50 pages)

Quick Writes: A "quick write" can be used at any time in a class to get students to pause and reflect on the text in writing. Introduce a quick write before you begin a discussion to allow students to collect their thoughts. Or roll one out toward the end of a discussion to let students capture and refine their best ideas. (10 pages)

Image Analysis Worksheets: Three double-sided worksheets challenge students to analyze 10 visually complex panels from Maus. Students will reflect on how Spiegelman builds meaning by through the use of aesthetic strategies such as visual parallels, visual puns, symbolism, strategic ambiguity, the interweaving of past and present, etc. Help students figure out what it means to "close read" a graphic novel. Answer keys included. (10 pages)

Quotation Race Worksheet: Students work in pairs to identify the speakers of 30 key quotations from Maus. Introduce this fun activity when you need to mix things up, or to refresh students' memories in preparation for the AP exam. Answer key included. (4 pages)

Vocabulary Lists: Lists of 8 vocabulary words for every chapter, complete with definitions and sample sentences with the words as they are used in Maus. A total of 80 words. (10 pages)

• Reading & Vocabulary Quizzes: Daily quizzes with 10 questions on the nightly reading homework plus another 5 questions on the vocabulary words. If you choose not to have your students study vocabulary, you can still use the portion of the quiz devoted to reading comprehension. Grading these quizzes is simple and quick. They’re an easy way to log 10 grades into your gradebook. Answer keys included. (40 pages)

Analytical Writing Assignment: Challenge students to take their interpretations one step further by writing an analytical paper on Art Spiegelman's complex graphic novel. Let students choose from one of four thought-provoking sample topics — or invite them to develop a similar topic of their own. Writing schedule and rubric included. (4 pages)

The resource packet will come to you in two separate formats: Word docs *and* PDFs. Because the Word doc is editable, you'll be able to customize the materials to suit your teaching style and/or the needs of particular students — year after year. If you don't have Microsoft Word, you'll still be able to access the PDF version, which is easy to navigate and quick to print!

Finally, because I believe that teachers on TeachShare should be able to see what they'd be getting before they make a purchase, the preview for this resource provides access to 50 pages from this 170-page bundle. Click on the green “preview” button to see exactly what you’ll get....

Thank you for choosing “Rigorous Resources”!!

Happy teaching!

Adam Jernigan, Ph.D.

adamjernigan@gmail.com

P.S. Don't forget to click “follow” for email updates on new products by Rigorous Resources. New products will be 50% OFF for the first 24 hours!

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The Pit & the Pendulum Activity Bundle

By Language Arts Excellence

This resource features a bundle of all of our lesson plans, materials, and activities for Edgar Allan Poe's chilling tale of terror and torture, The Pit and the Pendulum. Each product is thoughtfully crafted and allows students to think outside the box by delving deeply into the story's themes, characters, vocabulary, and plot development. Lessons have all been classroom-tested and allow for differentiation while encouraging optimal student engagement. This activity bundle provides a week's worth of material to bring the story to life (if you dare!).

Included in this Bundle:

The Pit and the Pendulum Literature Guide: This literature guide features a comprehensive mini-unit for The Pit and the Pendulum. The packet provides an excellent basis for comprehension and vocabulary acquisition for the short story and encourages students to think critically about Poe's use of sensory details, literary elements, figurative language, and symbolism. A full answer key is provided along with two bonus student-tested lesson plans and full procedure for conducting a P&P Socratic Seminar in your classroom. The wide range of activities in this guide will keep your students engaged and help them to gain a deep understanding of one of the most horrifying tales in American literature.

The Pit & the Pendulum ESCAPE ROOM: This meticulously-crafted resource features all of the materials you need to conduct a full-length Escape Room for The Pit & the Pendulum. Planning an escape room may seem like quite the daunting task, but this product provides everything from the basics and set-up instructions to signs and answer keys so that yours runs smoothly from start to finish. The activity involves movement, energy, creative thinking and most of all, collaboration. Your students will be having so much fun that they won’t even realize the higher order thinking skills they are applying in the playing of this game!

The Pit and the Pendulum Socratic Seminar (also included within Literature Guide): This resource features lesson plans and materials to conduct a formal set of Socratic Seminars for P&P. Socratic Seminars (or "Fish Bowl" Conversations as referred to in this resource) are higher order ways of assessing whether your students are able to understand and react to your class texts. These seminars rely on the power of inquiry and allow students to take the lead in their learning and discussion. The only problem? They require a great deal of preparation. Fortunately, this student-tested resource includes everything you need to conduct a structured and formal set of Socratic Seminars in your classroom surrounding the short story... and no preparation is required by you at all.

The Pit and the Pendulum Sensory Detail Lesson Plan & Materials (also included within Literature Guide): This product features 3 engaging, differentiated activities that focus on the rich sensory details of Edgar Allan Poe's ultimate tale of torture. The activities span before, during, and after reading the story with the intent to not only identify the sensory details, but to analyze their importance and how they add to the reader's experience with the tale. The activities support multiple learning styles so that all students walk away from this difficult story with an entirely new appreciation for Poe's incredible use of the English language while having fun at the same time!

**Bonus File: Edgar Allan Poe's Obituary - Halloween Lesson Plan: Students get the chance to create the epitaph for the gravestone of one of the most revered authors in American literature. The activity encourages students to be thoughtful with their knowledge of Poe but also to be creative with their inscriptions. This can be done in or outside of class and also works as a great emergency substitute plan during the month of October. To be festive, I love to give this assignment on the anniversary of Edgar Allan Poe's actual death day, October 7.

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The Crucible UNIT PLAN: Reading Quizzes, Discussion Questions, Writing Prompts, Answer Keys, & More | Arthur Miller

By Rigorous Resources for High School English

This 150-page EDITABLE unit on Arthur Miller's The Crucible promises to elicit dynamic engagement from all students without compromising on intellectual rigor. The daily discussion questions, vocabulary lists, literary devices quiz, and analytical writing assignment will challenge your students to dig beneath the surface of the text and generate profound interpretive insights! This unit was designed to have more than enough rigor for honors, IB, and AP courses!

Hold your students accountable for completing the nightly homework by beginning every class with a quick vocabulary and reading quiz. Challenge students to analyze how Arthur Miller constructs each of the main characters by engaging in short in-class writing exercises focused on pivotal passages. Invite students to explicate textual details using a wide range of interpretive lenses: historicist, psychoanalytic, feminist, etc. Facilitate dynamic discussions that inspire students to arrive at a whole new depth of insight!!

Everything you’ll need to teach Arthur Miller's masterpiece is included in this bundle. The abundance of materials will give you lots of options to play with, and will make the experience of teaching The Crucible not just easy but invigorating!

Here are some highlights from this 150-page editable curriculum:

Pacing Guide: Suggestions for how to pace the reading homework and organize the classwork for Arthur Miller's The Crucible. (2 pages)

Pre-Reading Handouts: Two pre-reading handouts provide students with crucial background information about the Salem Witch Trials of 1692 as well as the HUAC Hearings of the 1950s. (4 pages)

Discussion Question Handouts: Twenty pages of higher-order discussion questions guaranteed to inspire profoundly thoughtful class discussions! This unit features double-sided handouts with 8-10 discussion questions for each section of The Crucible. The discussion questions are the beating heart of these lesson plans. They challenge students to build interpretive arguments that require the support of carefully selected textual evidence — leading to keen interpretive insights! (30 pages)

Discussion Question ANSWER KEYS: The answer keys to the discussion questions are informed by the best scholarly articles on The Crucible. Of course, there is rarely a single "correct" answer for any question; rather, the discussions questions are made up of higher-order questions designed to foster lively exchanges and interpretive debates among students. They challenge students to build interpretive arguments that require the support of carefully selected textual evidence. (50 pages)

Vocabulary Lists: Lists of 10 vocabulary words to accompany every nightly reading assignment, complete with a definition and a sample sentence with the word as used in The Crucible. A total of over 80 SAT-caliber words. (8 pages)

Vocabulary & Reading Quizzes: Daily quizzes with 10 questions on the nightly reading homework plus another 10 questions on the vocabulary words. Even if you choose not to have your students study vocabulary, you can still use the portion of the quiz devoted to reading comprehension. Grading these quizzes is easy and quick! They’re a great way to log 8 to 16 grades into your gradebook. Answer keys included. (32 pages)

Literary Devices Quiz: This quiz challenges students to identify the types of literary devices — metaphor, simile, metonymy, symbolism, personification, hyperbole, etc. — used in 33 quotations from The Crucible. The curriculum also includes a glossary with definitions of the literary devices as well as examples of how they're used in Miller's play — so you can review the devices with students before they tackle the worksheet. The worksheet can be used either as a quiz or as a fun exercise. Answer key included. (5 pages)

Quotation Race: Students work in pairs to identify the speakers of 25 quotes. Introduce this fun activity when you need to mix things up — or to review for the AP Exam. Answer key included. (4 pages)

FRQ3 Practice Essay: Designed for AP Lit teachers, this in-class practice essay will allow students to rehearse the "FRQ3" essay from the AP Literature and Composition Exam. The assignment asks students to choose from among three recent FRQ3 prompts that featured The Crucible as one of the recommended works of literary merit. (5 pages)

Analytical Writing Assignment: Challenge students to take their interpretations one step further by writing an analytical paper on Miller's wonderfully complex play. Let students choose from one of three profoundly thought-provoking sample topics — or invite them to develop an original topic of their own. Rubric included. (7 pages)

This unit is filled with dozens of visual images that shed light on important scenes from Miller's play: lithographs representing the Salem Witch Trials, transcriptions of suspects being interrogated by John Hathorne, photographs of Arthur Miller testifying before HUAC, etc. But what really distinguishes this unit is how the discussion questions, close-reading exercises, and writing assignment are all designed to deepen students' thinking and help them arrive at profound interpretive insights!

The entire resource packet will come to you in two separate formats: Word docs *and* PDFs. Because the Word docs are editable, you'll be able to customize them to suit your teaching style and/or the needs of particular students — year after year! If you don't have Microsoft Word, you'll still be able to access the entire unit in PDF format — which is easy to navigate and quick to print!

Thank you for choosing “Rigorous Resources”!!

Happy teaching!

Adam Jernigan, Ph.D.

adamjernigan@gmail.com

P.S. Don't forget to click “follow” for email updates on new products by Rigorous Resources. New products will be 50% OFF for the first 24 hours!

Rigorous Resources is your one-stop shop for resources on American literature.

Every unit was designed by a Ph.D. with a research specialization in American literature. Feel free to check out these complete units on canonical texts by diverse American authors:

Complete Unit on Tommy Orange's There There

Complete Unit on Frederick Douglass's Narrative

Complete Unit on F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby

Complete Unit on Nella Larsen's Passing

Complete Unit on Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God

Complete Unit on J. D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye

Complete Unit on Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun

Complete Unit on Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye

Complete Unit on Gene Luen Yang's American Born Chinese

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The Fall of the House of Usher Activity Bundle

By Language Arts Excellence

This resource features a bundle of all of our lesson plans, materials, and activities for Edgar Allan Poe's tale of the original haunted house, The Fall of the House of Usher. Each product is thoughtfully crafted and allows students to think outside the box by delving deeply into the story's themes, characters, vocabulary, and plot development. Lessons have all been classroom-tested and allow for differentiation while encouraging optimal student engagement. This activity bundle provides a week's worth of material to bring the story to life!

Included in this Bundle:

  • The Fall of the House of Usher Literature Guide: This resource features a comprehensive Common Core-aligned literature guide for use while reading the story. The packet provides an excellent basis for comprehension and vocabulary acquisition for the short story and encourages students to think critically about Poe's use of literary elements, figurative language, plot elements, and symbolism. Also included is a creative "Snap Chat!" activity that will bring the story to life in the 21st century. A full answer key is provided along with two bonus student-tested lesson plans. The wide range of activities in this guide will keep your students engaged in this difficult story and help them to gain a deep understanding of one of the most shocking tales of American literature.

  • The Fall of The House of Usher Anticipation Guide and Lesson Plan (also included within Literature Guide): This resource features an anticipation guide for the story and a detailed lesson plan that I believe is the absolute best way to approach a new story. Using a non-intimidating method called "Numbered Heads", this activity will get your students thinking, writing, conversing, and reporting about themes you will be encountering during your study of The Fall of the House of Usher and your overall Poe unit. This lesson is particularly useful for Poe's tale which can be difficult for students to understand at first. I am confident that your students will enjoy this thoughtful, engaging activity and beg you to begin reading Poe's tale of the most haunted of houses!

  • The Fall of the House of Usher ESCAPE ROOM: This meticulously-crafted resource features all of the materials you need to conduct a full-length Escape Room for The Fall of the House of Usher. Planning an escape room may seem like quite the daunting task (and it is!), but this product provides everything from the basics and set-up instructions to signs and answer keys so that yours runs smoothly from start to finish. The activity involves movement, energy, creative thinking and most of all, collaboration. It is the perfect activity for Halloween, Poe's Death Day on October 7, or any day you want to shake it up with your students without sacrificing learning. Your students will be having so much fun that they won’t even realize the higher order thinking skills they are applying in the playing of this game!

  • The Fall of the House of Usher Socratic Seminar: This resource features lesson plans and materials to conduct a formal set of Socratic Seminars for The Fall of the House of Usher. Socratic Seminars (or "Fish Bowl" Conversations as referred to in this resource) are higher order ways of assessing whether your students are able to understand and react to your class texts. These seminars rely on the power of inquiry and allow students to take the lead in their learning and discussion. The only problem? They require a great deal of preparation. Fortunately, this student-tested resource includes everything you need to conduct a structured and formal set of Socratic Seminars in your classroom surrounding The Fall of the House of Usher... and no preparation is required by you at all.

  • Full Text of the The Fall of the House of Usher

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College Application Essay Writing: How to Write a Common App Personal Statement

By Rigorous Resources for High School English

This 30-page EDITABLE curriculum has everything you'll need to help students write write phenomenal college application essays! This is the PREMIERE bundle for any English teacher, college counselor, or tutor working to help students master the Common App essay!

The materials in this bundle were designed by a Ph.D. who has taught English at top-ranked high schools and colleges for over 20 years. He has worked closely with former college admissions officers from Harvard, Brown, and NYU. This 30-page unit features all the wisdom he's gathered over a decades-long career in secondary and higher education. The unit is packed to the brim with writing tips and formatting advice that will help your students craft truly remarkable college essays!

Here are some highlights from the 30-page curriculum:

How to Get Started (Handout #1): Tips for how to get started on one's college essay and overcome writer's block. (1 page)

Strategies for Crafting Vivid & Lively Prose (Handout #2): While the question of what students choose to write about will be important, the question of how they write will be equally important since a writer's style can reveal a lot about their personality. This handout features advice on how students can write essays using vibrant and virtuosic prose that will enamor any admissions officer. (2 pages)

The Opening Line: Attention-Grabbing Hooks (Handout #3): The opening paragraph is the single most important part of a college essay. How will your students capture the interest of admissions officers? How will they make a memorable first impression? This handout offers several suggestions for how to focus an opening paragraph, followed by concrete examples of opening paragraphs by top essayists like Annie Dillard, Frank McCourt, Louise Erdrich, Naomi Shihab Nye, and others. (4 pages)

How to Format a College Essay (Handout #4): This handout offers advice for the structural organization of college essay, with tips on what should be included in each paragraph. The strategy offered here will enable students to showcase their skills at descriptive writing, narrative writing, informational writing, and reflective writing — all in less than 650 words! (1 page)

Sample Essays: Show your students eight successful college essays written by students who were recently admitted to top-ranked colleges and universities. These were the favorite essays that wowed admissions committees at Harvard University, Johns Hopkins University, Cornell University, Hamilton College, New York University, and Tufts University. (18 pages)

Writing Assignment: This carefully scaffolded writing assignment will help students to get practice at writing narrative essays in response to actual prompts on the Common App from 2023-2024. (1 page)

Writing Rubric: Use this rubric to evaluate the narrative essays that your students write in response to to the prompts from the Common App of 2023-2024. (1 page)

This resource packet will come to you in two separate formats: Word doc and PDF. Because the Word doc is editable, you'll be able to customize the materials to suit your teaching style and/or the skill levels of your students — year after year! If you don't have Microsoft Word, you'll still be able to access the materials in PDF format, which is easy to navigate and quick to print!

Because I believe that teachers should be able to see what they're getting before they make a purchase, the preview for this resource provides access more than a dozen actual pages from the resource. Click on the green preview button to see exactly what you’ll get....

Thank you for choosing “Rigorous Resources”!!

Happy teaching!

Adam Jernigan, Ph.D.

adamjernigan@gmail.com

P.S. Don't forget to click “follow” for email updates on new products by Rigorous Resources. New products will be 50% OFF for the first 24 hours!

Feel free to check out these other resources on writing:

How to Write an Analytical Essay

How to Write an Poem Analysis Essay (AP Lit FRQ 1)

How to Frame Quotations or Embed Evidence

Figurative Language Stations

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The Fall of the House of Usher Escape Room Bundle - In-Class and Digital

By Language Arts Excellence

This bundle includes the in-class and digital version of our Fall of the House of Usher Escape Rooms!

There is no wonder why escape rooms are so popular; they are highly engaging and encourage people to work together and think creatively in order to solve different puzzles... all while trying to beat the clock. Now, you can facilitate our popular Fall of the House of Usher Escape Rooms in the classroom and at home for distance learning with this meticulously-crafted bundle. Planning an escape room may seem like quite the daunting task, but this product provides everything from the basics and set-up instructions to signs and answer keys so that yours run smoothly from start to finish. All tasks are skills-based so that with these fun lessons, learning is not sacrificed. Whether they are in school or at home, your students will be having so much fun that they won’t even realize how much they've learned about the short story.

How does it work?

In this digital escape room, students will try to escape out of the haunted house of Usher by solving 5 different skills-based puzzles, discovering a hidden message, and finding clues along the way.

  • Plot Diagram: In the first task, students must order the plot events of The Fall of the House of Usher on Freytag's Pyramid. Once solved, corresponding letters reveal the first code.
  • Figuratively Speaking: In the second task, students must identify 9 types of figurative language within the short story. Highlighted boxes in the correct answers will reveal the code.
  • Criss-Cross: In the third task, students must solve a crossword puzzle with questions about literary elements and plot events of the story. Shaded boxes on the crossword once unscrambled will reveal the code.
  • Vocab Match Up: In the fourth task, students must fill in the blanks with vocabulary words from The Fall of the House of Usher. When matched correctly, shaded boxes reveal the code.
  • Hidden Message: In the fifth and final task, students must decipher an encrypted message (a quote from The Fall of the House of Usher) using clues they collected during the first four tasks. When the message is written on the scroll and brought to you, they can finally escape the haunted house of Usher.

In-Class Escape Room Includes:

- Escape Room Basics

- Detailed Day-Of Instructions

- Escape Room Print Checklist

- Student Teams Chart

- Welcome Sign for Your Door

- Materials for 5 Tasks: task signs to be folded upright, task instructions (2 per page for easy printing), and necessary information to be kept at stations

- Student Answer Booklet

- Teacher Answer Keys

- Visual "Keys"

- Escape Room Reflection for homework or in-class writing activity

- Theme Reflection for homework assignment or in-class writing activity

Digital (Paperless) Escape Room Includes:

- Instructions for how to access and share escape room and answer key through Google Drive

- Materials for 5 Tasks: digital task signs, detailed task instructions, and worksheets

- Digital Student Answer Booklet

- Digital Teacher Answer Key

*Note that this is the digital version of the escape room; tasks are identical, just reformatted for digital experience. Requires use of Google Slides.*

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The Complete Persepolis UNIT PLAN: Discussion Questions, Activities, & Writing | Marjane Satrapi

By Rigorous Resources for High School English

This 75-page EDITABLE unit has everything you'll need for profoundly stimulating lessons on Marjane Satrapi's The Complete Persepolis. Invite your class to engage in student-driven discussions without compromising on intellectual rigor. The discussion questions, quick writes, daily quizzes, and final writing assignment will challenge your students to dig beneath the surface of the text and generate profound interpretive insights!

The graphic novel is an aesthetically innovative genre in which meaning is created through the interplay of image and text. How do we read a novel in which two narrative channels — one verbal, the other visual — interact? How do graphic novels challenge readers to expand the set of interpretive techniques that make up “close reading”? This bundle will help students understand complex questions about literary genres, aesthetic form, coming-of-age novels, cross-cultural encounters, and the social and political history of Iran!

Hold your students accountable for completing the nightly homework by beginning every class with a quick vocabulary and reading quiz. Facilitate dynamic discussions that motivate students to become attached to the thrill generating shared knowledge. Challenge students to explicate textual details using a wide range of interpretive lenses: formalist, historicist, psychoanalytic, feminist, etc. Inspire students to arrive at a whole new depth of insight!

Everything you’ll need to teach The Complete Persepolis is included in this bundle:

Unit & Pacing Guide: Suggestions for how to pace the reading homework and organize the classwork for Satrapi's graphic novel. (2 pages)

• Graphic Novel Glossary: A glossary of literary elements that are unique to the genre of the graphic novel: panel, tier, gutter, etc. Help your students learn to use the correct terminology when referring to the different features on any given page. (1 page)

Discussion Questions: Eighteen of higher-order discussion questions guaranteed to inspire profoundly thoughtful class discussions! This unit features double-sided handouts containing 8-10 questions for each of the novel's 9 sections. The discussion questions are the beating heart of these lesson plans! They challenge students to build interpretive arguments that require the support of carefully selected textual evidence — leading to keen interpretive insights! The questions could be used to focus students’ thinking prior to beginning a discussion, to foster in-class quick writes, or to assign written reflections for homework. Guaranteed to elicit student engagement and foster profound discussions! (18 pages)

Quick Writes: A "quick write" can be used at any time in a class to get students to pause and reflect on the text in writing. Introduce a quick write before you begin a discussion to allow your more reticent students to collect their thoughts. Or roll one out toward the end of a discussion to let students capture and refine their best ideas. (9 pages)

Image Analysis Worksheet: A two-page worksheet inviting students to analyze 10 visually complex panels from Persepolis. Students will reflect on how Satrapi builds meaning by drawing on a distinctive palette of literary and artistic techniques: symbolic imagery, dramatic irony, high contrast, patterning, juxtaposition, etc. Students are challenged to analyze how the visual aesthetics of different panels contributes to the book's meaning. Answer key included. (4 pages)

Quotation Race Worksheets: Students work in pairs to identify the speakers of 25 quotations. One worksheet features 15 memorable quotes from the main characters. A second worksheet features 10 challenging quotations from secondary characters. Introduce this fun activity when you need to mix things up. Answer key included. (4 pages)

Vocabulary Lists: Lists of 10-12 vocabulary words accompany each nightly reading assignment. Every word comes with a definition as well as a sample sentence with the word as used in Persepolis. A total of over 100 words. (9 pages)

Vocabulary & Reading Quizzes: Daily quizzes with 10 questions to follow each nightly reading assignment. Each quiz contains 7 questions on vocabulary words plus another 3 questions on reading comprehension. Grading these quizzes is simple and quick — an easy way to log 9 grades into your gradebook. Answer key included. (18 pages)

Analytical Writing Assignment: Challenge students to take their interpretations one step further by writing an analytical paper on Satrapi's wonderfully complex graphic novel. Let students choose from one of five profoundly thought-provoking sample topics — or invite them to develop a topic of their own. Rubric included. (3 pages)

Writing Schedule & Rubric: A writing schedule with instructions for completing each stage of the writing process. Rubric included. (2 pages)

Yes, this complete teaching unit covers both volumes of Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis. In fact, the pagination in this unit corresponds to the page numbers in Satrapi's compilation, The Complete Persepolis. While I would highly recommend that you teach both volumes of Persepolis — as the two volumes complement one another in important ways — you can still utilize this top-quality unit if you're only teaching one volume of Persepolis.

This resource packet will come to you in two separate formats: Word docs *and* PDFs. Because the Word docs are fully editable, you'll be able to customize the materials to suit your teaching style and/or your students' skill levels — year after year! If you don't have Microsoft Word, you'll still be able to access all of the materials in PDFs, which are easy to navigate and quick to print!

My store is called “Rigorous Resources” because the units feature rigorous content guaranteed to yield an abundance of interpretive insights. The preview for this resources provides direct access to over 30 pages of materials. Click on the green “PREVIEW” button to see what you’ll get. . . .

Thank you for choosing Rigorous Resources!

Happy teaching!

Adam Jernigan, Ph.D.

adamjernigan@gmail.com

P.S. Don't forget to click “follow” for email updates on new products by Rigorous Resources. New products will be 50% OFF for the first 24 hours!

Rigorous Resources is your one-stop shop for top-quality resources on highly engaging texts. Every unit was designed by a Ph.D. in English with over 20 years of teaching experience. Feel free to check out these comprehensive units on literary texts by diverse authors:

Complete Unit on William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet

Complete Unit on William Shakespeare's Julius Caesar

Complete Unit on J. D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye

Complete Unit on Khaled Hosseini's The Kite Runner

Complete Unit on F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby

Complete Unit on Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God

Complete Unit on Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun

Complete Unit on Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye

Complete Unit on Art Spiegelman's The Complete Maus

Complete Unit on Gene Luen Yang's American Born Chinese

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Masque of the Red Death Activity Bundle

By Language Arts Excellence

This resource features a bundle of all of our lesson plans, materials, and activities for Edgar Allan Poe's chilling tale of plague and pestilence, The Masque of the Red Death. Each product is thoughtfully crafted and allows students to think outside the box by delving deeply into the story's themes, characters, vocabulary, and plot development. Lessons have all been classroom-tested and allow for differentiation while encouraging optimal student engagement. This activity bundle provides a week's worth of material to bring the story to life!

Included in this Bundle:

  • The Masque of the Red Death Literature Guide: This literature guide features a Common Core-aligned mini-unit for use while reading The Masque of the Red Death. The packet provides an excellent basis for comprehension and vocabulary acquisition for the short story and encourages students to think critically about Poe's use of literary elements, figurative language, and symbolism. Also included are 12 reader response task cards for literature circles and a creative social media activities that will bring the story to life in the 21st century. A full answer key is provided along with three bonus student-tested lesson plans. The wide range of activities in this guide will keep your students engaged and help them to gain a deep understanding of one of the most horrifying tales in American literature.

  • Masque of the Red Death Anticipation Guide & Lesson Plan (also included within Literature Guide): This resource features an anticipation guide for the story along with a meticulously-explained lesson plan that is in my opinion, the absolute best way to approach a new short story. Using a non-intimidating method called "Numbered Heads", this activity will get your students thinking, writing, conversing, and reporting about themes you will be encountering during your study of The Masque of the Red Death.

  • The Masque of the Red Death Social Media Activities (also included within Literature Guide): This resource features two fun, interactive activities to bring The Masque of the Red Death into the 21st century! In this 45 minute lesson plan with accompanying materials, your classroom will transform into a real life "twitter-world" in which students will create twitter accounts for hypothetical characters in the story and interact with one another through their twitter pages. The Snap Chat worksheet is perfect for an engaging homework or sub-plan that your students will look forward to working on and sharing with their friends.Your students will thank you for offering such fun ways to connect with Poe's twisted tale and will not even realize how much they are learning by digging deep into the text. Both work perfectly for a Friday or even on Halloween when students need a mental break and a chance to tap into their creativity!

  • The Masque of the Red Death Socratic Seminar: This resource features lesson plans and materials to conduct a formal set of Socratic Seminars for The Masque of the Red Death. Socratic Seminars (or "Fish Bowl" Conversations as referred to in this resource) are higher order ways of assessing whether your students are able to understand and react to your class texts. These seminars rely on the power of inquiry and allow students to take the lead in their learning and discussion. The only problem? They require a great deal of preparation. Fortunately, this student-tested resource includes everything you need to conduct a structured and formal set of Socratic Seminars in your classroom surrounding the short story... and no preparation is required by you at all.

  • The Masque of the Red Death ESCAPE ROOM: This meticulously-crafted resource features all of the materials you need to conduct a full-length Escape Room for The Masque of the Red Death. Planning an escape room may seem like quite the daunting task (and it is!), but this product provides everything from the basics and set-up instructions to signs and answer keys so that yours runs smoothly from start to finish. The activity involves movement, energy, creative thinking and most of all, collaboration. Because this is a skills-based escape room, it is the perfect way to review the story for the final quiz or test. Your students will be having so much fun that they won’t even realize the higher order thinking skills they are applying in the playing of this game!

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Their Eyes Were Watching God UNIT PLAN: Discussion Questions, Writing Prompts, & Answer Keys | Zora Neale Hurston

By Rigorous Resources for High School English

UPDATED FOR THE 2024-2025 SCHOOL YEAR: Rigorous! Discussion-based! Informed by the latest cutting-edge scholarship!....

This 200-page EDITABLE curriculum has everything you'll need for profoundly stimulating lessons on Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God! Invite your class to engage in student-driven discussions without compromising on intellectual rigor. The discussion questions, daily reading quizzes, literary terms exercises, vocabulary lists, and analytical writing assignments will challenge your students to dig beneath the surface of the text and generate profound interpretive insights!!

Hold your students accountable for completing the nightly homework by beginning every class with a quick vocabulary and reading quiz. Facilitate dynamic discussions that motivate students to become attached to the thrill generating shared knowledge. Challenge students to explicate textual details using a wide range of interpretive lenses: historicist, psychoanalytic, feminist, etc. Inspire students to arrive at a whole new depth of insight!!

Here are some highlights from the 200-page editable curriculum:

Discussion Question Handouts: Thirty pages of deeply thought-provoking discussion questions! One 2-page handout featuring 8-10 questions for each of the novel's 9 sections. The discussion questions are the beating heart of these lesson plans. Every discussion question is grounded in concrete textual details and challenges students to arrive at lucid interpretive insights! The questions could be used to focus students’ thinking prior to beginning a discussion, to foster in-class writing such as stop-and-jots, or to assign written reflections for homework. Guaranteed to elicit student engagement and foster profound discussions! (30 pages)

Discussion Question Answer Key: A sixty-page answer key featuring in-depth answers to almost every discussion question. The answer key has been informed by articles and books by Hurston scholars such as Henry Louis Gates Jr., Mary Helen Washington, Hazel Carby, Carla Kaplan, and others. Of course, there is rarely a single "correct" answer for any question. Rather, the discussions questions are designed to foster lively exchanges and interpretive debates among students. They challenge students to build interpretive arguments that require the support of carefully selected textual evidence. Your students are likely to come up with better answers than mine! (60 pages)

Vocabulary Lists: Lists of 10 vocabulary words for every nightly reading assignment, complete with definitions and sample sentences with the words as used in Their Eyes Were Watching God. A total of 90 SAT-worthy words. (9 pages)

Reading & Vocabulary Quizzes: Daily quizzes with 10 questions on the nightly reading homework plus another 10 questions on the vocabulary words. If you choose not to have your students study vocabulary, you can still use the portion of the quiz devoted to reading comprehension. Grading these quizzes is simple and quick. They’re an easy way to log 9 grades into your gradebook. Answer keys included. (36 pages)

Literary Devices Quizzes (x3): These three quizzes challenges students to identify the literary devices used in sixty quotations from Their Eyes Were Watching God. For example, the quiz on figurative language features thirty quotations that contain the following figures of speech: metaphor, simile, personification, symbolism, apostrophe paradox, and more. The quiz on sound devices features fifteen quotations that contain alliteration, assonance, consonance, and onomatopoeia. This bundle also features a glossary with definitions of the literary devices as well as examples of how each device is used in Hurston's novel — so you can review the devices with students before they tackle the quiz. Answer key included. (8 pages)

Quotation Race: Students work in pairs to identify the speakers of 25 key quotations from Their Eyes Were Watching God. Introduce this fun activity when you need to mix things up, or to refresh students' memories in preparation for the AP exam. Answer key included. (4 pages)

Poetry Pairing: Deepen your engagement with the themes in Their Eyes Were Watching God by reading and discussing several poems written by friends of Hurston who were involved in the Harlem Renaissance: Langston Hughes, Claude McKay, and Countee Cullen. This poetry mini-unit Includes two homework packets with a total of 10 poems, discussion questions, answer keys, and poetic device quizzes. (30 pages)

FRQ3 Practice Essay: Designed for AP Lit teachers, this in-class practice essay will allow students to rehearse the "FRQ3" essay from the AP Literature and Composition Exam. The assignment asks students to write a 40-minute in-class essay in response to one of three recent FRQ3 prompts that featured Their Eyes Were Watching God as one of the recommended works of literary merit. (5 pages)

Analytical Writing Assignment: Challenge students to take their interpretations one step further by writing an analytical paper on Hurston's wonderfully complex novel. Let students choose from one of five thought-provoking sample topics — or invite them to develop a similar topic of their own. Rubric included. (4 pages)

My store is called “Rigorous Resources” because all of the units feature content-rich lessons guaranteed to boost your students' close-reading and critical-thinking skills. At the same time, these lessons are filled with dozens of historically relevant visual images: paintings and photographs by preeminent African-American artists, portraits of Hurston, and much more. But what really distinguishes this unit is how the discussion questions, literary device quizzes, and writing assignments are designed to help student arrive at an abundance of interpretive insights!

The entire resource packet will come to you in two separate formats: Word docs *and* PDFs. Because the Word docs are fully editable, you'll be able to customize every page to suit your teaching style and/or the needs of particular students — year after year! If you don't have Microsoft Word, you'll still be able to access the PDF files, which are easy to navigate and quick to print!

Thank you for choosing “Rigorous Resources”!!

Happy teaching!

Adam Jernigan, Ph.D.

adamjernigan@gmail.com

P.S. Don't forget to click “follow” for email updates on new products by Rigorous Resources. New products will be 50% OFF for the first 24 hours!

Rigorous Resources is your one-stop shop for resources on American literature. Feel free to check out these complete units on canonical texts by diverse American authors:

Complete Unit on Tommy Orange's There There

Complete Unit on Arthur Miller's The Crucible

Complete Unit on Frederick Douglass's Narrative

Complete Unit on F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby

Complete Unit on Nella Larsen's Passing

Complete Unit on Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun

Complete Unit on Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye

Complete Unit on Gene Luen Yang's American Born Chinese

English Language Arts
Close Reading
Literature
$49.99
$19.99
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Emergency ELA Lesson Plan BUNDLE

By Language Arts Excellence

Why is it that calling out sick can actually mean more work as you scramble to come up with a plan for your substitute teacher?

This product features a bundle of 6 (mostly) print & go emergency lesson plans that are ideal for days prior to and returning from vacations, between units, emergency sub plans, or simply those days when you just "can't." (And let's face it, we've all been there!)

Each lesson plan maintains a high standard for student learning and engagement with minimal preparation on your end. Plans are varied yet cohesive and allow for differentiation within your classroom. It is recommended that you read through each lesson plan prior to the start of class to make sure that you have all materials ready as photocopying and in some cases moderate set-up is required. While plans work well for substitutes, you may find that they are so much fun that you will want to experience them with your students yourself!

Purchasing these resources as a bundle saves 20% off the cover price!

Products included in this bundle:

⭐ "Still I Rise" (Angelou) Lesson Plan & Materials -- A best-selling product!

This lesson plan on Angelou's poem can be used in a variety of ways throughout the school year. For instance, the lesson is the perfect jumpstart for your unit on slavery, Civil Rights, poetry, or Women's Rights in America. It can also be used as a stand-alone lesson to get your students to reflect upon and discuss overcoming their own personal obstacles. Given the theme of the poem, the lesson even acts as a great medium for discussing how to to rise above bullying in a society where bullying is sadly so prevalent. These meticulously laid-out materials and lesson plan will have your students thinking, speaking, reading, and writing all in one class period and interacting deeply with one of the most beautiful and resounding works of American poetry.

⭐ We Didn't Start the Fire Activity

This step-by-step two-day lesson plan encourages students to consider what defines their generation and then create their own lyrics to Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start the Fire." Every year, this lesson has been a huge hit with my students especially on the last two days of school. Your students will appreciate your taking the time to allow them to step back and reflect upon their world. You will love it because no preparation is needed at all for this very memorable activity!

⭐Shakespeare's "Death Lines" Activity

In this full-length lesson plan, students will closely examine the final lines of Shakespearean characters before their deaths (if you know Shakespeare, there are quite a few!). Following a mini-lesson on the importance of these final words, students will take part in the classic game, Mafia, with a unique, Shakespearean twist. I invented the take on this game several years ago and it has become one of my students' and my favorite days of the whole school year. There is truly nothing like seeing students having a great time while studying Shakespeare. I am confident that your students will love it too!

⭐"Literature Talk" Lesson Plan

This product features an engaging "Literature Talk" activity that will have your students thinking, writing, speaking, and moving all in one class period. In this activity, they must choose between 6 different quotes about books and articulate why the quote aligns with their own perspective. They will have a chance to discuss their opinions in small groups and as part of a full class discussion. The full-length lesson plan can literally be used any day of the school year and is sure to spark thoughtful discussion among your students.

⭐Collaborative Writing Activity

"Collaborative Story Time" is a communal story-telling activity in which students practice using Freytag's Pyramid plot structure in their own narrative writing. In this activity, each student begins a story inspired by a unique evocative photograph. They are prompted to write the exposition of the tale by introducing the setting and main characters. After the allotted amount of time, the story is then passed to another student who is prompted to write the inciting incident or conflict and begin to detail the rising action. The paper is passed from student to student twice more until the story is resolved. When the stories are finished, the worksheet is returned to the original student who can then make edits and is responsible for producing a final draft.

⭐Poe's Annabel Lee Poetry/Song Pairing

Who in the world knows more about love and loss than Edgar Allan Poe? This resource features a full-length lesson plan and accompanying materials for a song/poem pairing of "Annabel Lee" by Edgar Allan Poe and popular song, "Sad Beautiful Tragic." Lesson plan is Common Core aligned and centers around rhyme scheme, repetition, figurative language, and theme. This student-tested activity is the perfect addition for any unit on Edgar Allan Poe and is guaranteed to enlighten your students on the timelessness of Poe's poetry in an engaging and contemporary way.

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A Raisin in the Sun UNIT PLAN: Discussion Questions, Reading Quizzes, Writing Prompts, Answer Keys, & More | Lorraine Hansberry

By Rigorous Resources for High School English

This 180-page EDITABLE unit has everything you'll need to deliver profoundly stimulating lessons on Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun!! Invite your class to engage in student-driven discussions without compromising on intellectual rigor. The pre-reading handouts, higher-order discussion questions, daily reading quizzes, and analytical writing assignment will challenge your students to dig beneath the surface of the text and generate profound interpretive insights!!

Hold your students accountable for completing the nightly homework by beginning every class with a quick vocabulary and reading quiz. Facilitate dynamic discussions that motivate students to become attached to the thrill generating shared knowledge. Challenge students to analyze textual details using a wide range of interpretive lenses: historicist, psychoanalytic, feminist, etc. Inspire students to arrive at a whole new depth of insight!!

Because every page in this unit is fully editable, that you'll be able to customize the materials to suit your particular students. Best of all, the detailed answer keys in this teacher-friendly unit will set you up to deliver content-rich lessons ever single day!

Here are some highlights from this editable 180-page curriculum:

Portrait of the Author: Lorraine Hansberry (Pre-Reading Handout): Like the characters in her play, Lorraine Hansberry grew up on the South Side of Chicago and faced intimidation when her family purchased a house in a predominantly white suburban community. This pre-reading handout will provoke students to make connections between Hansberry's life and central themes in A Raisin in the Sun — without any plot spoilers. Includes a follow-up quiz with answer key. (6 pages)

Image Analysis Worksheet (Pre-Reading Worksheet): This worksheet challenges students to identify and analyze significant details from a painting in Jacob Lawrence's The Migration Series (1941). What do the details in the painting reveal about the housing conditions that African-American migrants faced when they moved to northern cities like New York and Chicago? Answer key included. (3 pages)

Discussion Question Handouts: Twenty-five pages of higher-order discussion questions guaranteed to inspire profoundly thoughtful class discussions! The unit includes double-sided handouts with 8-10 questions for each the play's 7 scenes. The discussion questions are the beating heart of these lesson plans. They challenge students to build interpretive arguments that require the support of carefully selected textual evidence — leading to keen interpretive insights! The questions could be used to focus students’ thinking prior to beginning a discussion, to foster in-class writing through quick writes, or to assign written reflections for homework. Guaranteed to elicit student engagement and foster profound discussions! (25 pages)

Discussion Question Answer Keys: The answer keys to the discussion questions are informed by cutting-edge scholarship by English professors who specialize on topics like American theater and African-American literature: Imani Perry, Steven P. Carter, Margaret B Wilkerson, James Baldwin, bell hooks, and many others. Of course, there is rarely a single "correct" answer for any question; rather, the discussions questions are made up of higher-order questions designed to foster lively exchanges and interpretive debates among students. They challenge students to build interpretive arguments that require the support of carefully selected textual evidence. (45 pages)

Quick Writes: A "quick write" can be used at any time in a class to get students to pause and reflect on the text in writing. Introduce a quick write before you begin a discussion to allow students to collect their thoughts. Or roll one out toward the end of a discussion to let students capture and refine their best ideas. (7 pages)

Vocabulary Lists: Lists of 10 vocabulary words for each of the play's seven scenes, complete with definitions and sample sentences with the words as used in A Raisin in the Sun. A total of 70 SAT-worthy words. (7 pages)

• Reading & Vocabulary Quizzes: Daily quizzes with 10 questions on the nightly reading homework plus another 10 questions on the vocabulary words. If you choose not to have your students study vocabulary, you can still use the portion of the quiz devoted to reading comprehension. Grading these quizzes is simple and quick. They’re an easy way to log 7 to 14 grades into your gradebook. Answer keys included. (28 pages)

Literary Devices Quiz: This quiz challenges students to identify the literary devices used in thirty quotations from A Raisin in the Sun. The literary devices include metaphor, simile, personification, hyperbole, oxymoron, allusion, and more. This bundle also features a glossary with definitions of the literary devices as well as examples of how each device is used in Hansberry's play — so you can review the devices with students before they tackle the worksheet. The worksheet can be used either as a quiz or as a fun refresher. Answer key included. (5 pages)

Quotation Race: Students work in pairs to identify the speakers of 50 key quotations from A Raisin in the Sun. Introduce this fun activity when you need to mix things up, or to refresh students' memories in preparation for the AP exam. Answer key included. (8 pages)

Q3 Practice Essay: Designed for teachers of AP Literature, this in-class practice essay will allow students to rehearse the "Q3" essay from the AP Literature and Composition Exam. The assignment asks students to write a 40-minute in-class essay in response to one amongst three recent Q3 prompts that featured A Raisin in the Sun as one of the recommended works of literary merit. (5 pages)

Analytical Writing Assignment: Challenge students to take their interpretations one step further by writing an analytical paper on Hansberry's play. Let students choose from one of five thought-provoking sample topics — or invite them to develop a similar topic of their own. Rubric included. (4 pages)

My store is called “Rigorous Resources” because every unit features engaging lessons guaranteed to boost your students' close-reading and critical-thinking skills. In addition, the unit is filled with dozens of historically relevant visual images: portraits of Lorraine Hansberry, stills from the original Broadway production, paintings of the Great Migration by Jacob Lawrence, and much more. But what really distinguishes this resource is how the pre-reading handouts, discussion starters, literary device quizzes, and writing assignment are all designed to help student arrive at an abundance of interpretive insights!!

The resource packet will come to you in two separate formats: Word docs *and* PDFs. Because the Word doc is editable, you'll be able to customize the materials to suit your teaching style and/or the needs of particular students — year after year. If you don't have Microsoft Word, you'll still be able to access the PDF version, which is easy to navigate and quick to print!

Thank you for choosing Rigorous Resources.

Happy teaching!

Adam Jernigan, Ph.D.

adamjernigan@gmail.com

P.S. Don't forget to click “follow” for email updates on new products by Rigorous Resources. New products will be 50% OFF for the first 24 hours!

Rigorous Resources is your one-stop shop for resources on American literature. Feel free to check out these complete units on canonical texts by diverse American authors:

Complete Unit on Tommy Orange's There There

Complete Unit on Arthur Miller's The Crucible

Complete Unit on Frederick Douglass's Narrative

Complete Unit on F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby

Complete Unit on Nella Larsen's Passing

Complete Unit on Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God

Complete Unit on Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye

Complete Unit on Gene Luen Yang's American Born Chinese

English Language Arts
Close Reading
Literature
$49.99
$19.99