MDT Day 2: AU ‘09

Multi-Day Teach Day 2: AU ‘09

Subject Area: English 11/12 – Contemporary Lit

Title of unit (of which this lesson is a part): Women & Men & Relationships

Lesson Title: Understanding and Writing Parody

Purpose/ Goals	Students should be able to use tone effectively in their own writing.  This skill will help them to use their writing to achieve their goals.  If they can effectively use tone, then they will be able to influence their audience to feel and react they way they want.  They also need to understand how the author can use certain words in order to manipulate his or her audience into feeling a certain way about a subject matter.
Objectives:	I can identify tone and tone words in a piece of text.   I can explain what a parody is and give examples. I can use tone words in a piece of text to make it more descriptive. I can explain how word choice affects the overall tone in a text.
National & Ohio Standards	What are the specific national (professional organization) and/or state standards, key ideas, performance indicators, and major understandings that you will address in this lesson? Explain how this lesson meets these standards in a brief narrative.   Writing Applications Benchmark -       Write responses to literature that provide an interpretation, recognize ambiguities, nuances and complexities and that understand the author’s use of stylistic devices and effects created Students will be writing a response to a piece of text that provide and reinterpretation of the text by changing the original tone that was intended by the author.  They will be keeping specific traits of the original stylistic devices and effects to maintain an homage to the original. Writing Process Benchmark -       Use a variety of strategies to revise content, organization and style, and to improve word choice, sentence variety, clarity and consistency of writing. Students will be exploring how word choice effects tone in a piece of writing.  They will experiment with changing the tone of a text by manipulating the word choice. Writing Conventions Benchmark -       Demonstrate understanding of the grammatical conventions of the English language Students will be writing a parody of a poem or article using standard conventions of English spelling and grammar. Communications Oral and Visual GLI -       Evaluate how language choice, diction, syntax and delivery style (e.g., repetition, appeal to emotion, eye contact) affect the mood and tone and impact the audience. Students will be examining how word choice can influence their audience Reading Applications: Literary Text Benchmark -       Analyze how an author uses figurative language and literary techniques to shape plot and set meaning. Students will be looking at tone words, and how the word choice of a piece of writing can influence the overall meaning of the piece. Reading Applications: Informational, Technical and Persuasive Text Benchmark -       Analyze an author’s implicit and explicit philosophical assumptions and beliefs about a subject By analyzing tone students will begin to understand how to determine the author’s implicit assumptions and beliefs -       Analyze the features and structures of documents and critique them for their effectiveness The tone of a piece influences the way an audience responds to it, and thus how effective the author is in communicating his meaning.  Students will be focusing on tone and how it influences meaning in this lesson.
Assessment	Summative   The summative assessment will take place at the end of the lesson
	Summative   I will be assigning the students a creative writing assignment that will assess their understanding of parody and ability to incorporate tone words into their writing in order to convey an overall tone that is different than the tone of the original piece they’re parodying.  The specifics of the requirements for the assignments are laid out in the rubric. Formative I will be asking for student input through the lesson to help determine if I’m conveying the concepts clearly enough.  This will let me know if they know enough to answer questions.  If no one volunteers answers, then I will first try to reframe the question and ask specific students for input.  If they still don’t seem to understand the concept, I will try re-explaining the material, and then continue by putting them in groups to work. When students are working on their writing assignment, I will be circulating and checking in to see how individuals are coming along.  If any students are having trouble I will help them to look through their packet to find tone words they’d like to replace.

Community Knowledge and Experience:	Students will have been working on tone in the previous lesson, and have probably experienced parody before.  I will try to tap into this knowledge of what parody is by giving a few examples of my own that they may recognize (Men in Tights, Weird Al) and then asking them if they can think of any examples.
Procedures including:   • Opening •Activities • Closure	Opening: (2-3 min)   Bellringer: Vocab Builder (2-3 min) -       Student will present their vocab word to the class Activities: (43-61min) Overflow from Yesterday: -       If needed finish up presentation of poem strips from yesterday Parody Examples: (5-7 min) -       Ask students to think about what they know about Twilight. -       Play Twilight Remix trailer and discuss how it changes the way the audience is supposed to feel about Edward, ultimately mocking the original. Defining Parody: PowerPoint (3-5 min) -       Hand out guided notes worksheet. -       Ask class to define parody.  I write it into the PowerPoint on the Smart Board.  Then I bring up the formal definition of tone. -       Ask class to explain how parody is used and to give possible examples.  I write it into the PowerPoint on the Smart Board.  Then I bring up the formal explanation of how parody is used, and some of my own examples. Explain Renaissance: (3-5 min) -       Briefly explain that the Renaissance was the rebirth of Greek ideals, and a rebirth of art and culture. -       Address how poets and playwrights competed for prestige and often wrote letters to each other and responses to each other’s work. Read “Passionate Shepherd & The Nymph’s Reply”: (2-4 min) -       Tell students that I’ll be showing them some examples of what they can choose to do for their creative writing assignment. -       Hand out worksheet with poem’s side by side, and ask students to get out their tone word packet from yesterday. -       I will read through both poems. Discuss Tone and Parody in poems: (5-7min) -       After I have read through both poems and I will then ask students to take a minute or two to find words that help to convey the overall tone of the poem.  I will then ask students to share with the class some of the words they came up with. -       We will then discuss how the word choice helps to convey the differing views on love, and how the response poem functions as a work of parody on the original.  Some questions I will use to scaffold this discussion are: What is the tone in each poem? What specific words are used to convey each tone? How does “The Nymph’s Reply” respond to or make fun of the original poem? Read “How to be a Good Wife” and “…Romantic Husband”: (5-7 min) -       Hand out a copy of the “How to be a Good Wife” article and read aloud. -       I will engage students in a brief discussion about stereotypes of women.  The prior knowledge from this discussion will draw from the current unit that the students are working on.  Some questions I can ask are: What is the relationship between the husband and wife? What is the relationship between the wife and children? What is the relationship between the husband and children? What are the expectations for the wife? What are the expectations for the husband? -       I will put up a copy of “How to Be a Romantic Husband” on the Smart Board, tell students this is a previous year’s paper written by a student, and I will read it aloud. Examine student model: (5-7 min) -       I will ask the class to give me examples of tone words in the student paper that help to contrast it with the original article. -       We will then discuss the student model’s merits as a work of parody.  I will guide the discussion with some of the following questions: How does the tone of the model differ from the original? What are some of the descriptive words that help shift the tone? How does the model flip the expectations of the original?  What are some specific examples of this? Explain Writing Assignment: (5-7 min) -       I will ask students to get out the song or poem I asked them to bring in as homework for today. -       I will tell students they have a couple of options for their creative writing assignment.  They will be writing either a response poem, or re-writing the “How to be a Good Wife” article.  They will need to get their original piece approved by me if they choose the poem/song option. -       I will hand out the rubric and descriptive sheet for the assignment.  The assignment will be due on Thursday. Option 1: -       Students can write a response to the poem or song they brought in.  They can also write a response poem to certain poems from the current unit in the text book: The Garden of Love (pg 382) An Ancient Gesture (pg 383) One Art (pg 387) Her Kind (pg 389) Down-hearted Blues (pg 406) My Love Swears That She is Made of Truth (pg 413) To A Stranger (pg 418) Option 2: -       Students can re-write the “How to Be a Good Wife” article Present Ideas: (10-12 min) -       I will give students a few minutes to brainstorm ideas for what they want to do for their creative writing assignment. -       I will then have student come to me to get their idea approved and send them down to the computer lab (where Deb will be) to get started writing their assignment. Writing Lab: (remainder of 4th period) -       In the lab, after everyone has run their idea by me, I will be circulating and making sure students are staying on task. -       I will be helping students who appear to be having trouble with the assignment.  I will direct them to look at their tone words packet and identify words in the original piece to replace. Closure: (1 min) -       I will dismiss students from the lab and remind them that their assignment is due on Tuesday.
Resources	What texts, materials/resources, websites, and equipment will you need? How will you access and/or distribute them? -       Copies of Readings – available as handouts -       Smart Board – in classroom -       Computer lab
Applications, Connections, Extensions	I way to make connections to future lessons would be to address how tone is used in speeches (such as political candidates and agendas) so that students can be more aware of how the media and other sources are trying to affect them.  It’s also important for student to be able to use tone to persuade their audience to agree with them whenever they’re trying to use language to get what they want.  If students know that the language they use and the word choices they make will affect the outcome of their appeal, they will be more empowered.
Inclusive Instruction	I will be modeling or showing examples of every activity so that students can hear the activity being described as well as see it done before they make an attempt at it.  I am also giving students a couple of choices for their final writing assignment so that they can choose a topic that is relevant and interesting to them, as well as at a reasonable level for them.