Strategies
I think one of the best ways to reveal culture to students with limited prior knowledge on the subject lives in film. Films reveal characters with whom we can laugh, cry, empathize, or fear. Films allow us to look at characters critically in a shortened period of time. They also include fashion, setting, customs, actions, traits, etc. that might takes hours of research and teaching to give to my kids. However, considering the lower achievement level of my students and their lower reading levels (some come to me at a third grade reading level), film cannot be the only outlet for our learning. In order to build their reading skills, they need to practice. The more my students practice, the more comfortable they will feel reading not only to themselves, but also aloud to others. With all this in mind, I intend to mix both films and literature to adequately facilitate the learning and academic growth of my students during this unit.
Organization
I plan to teach the unit in culture sections. I would like to travel first to China with my students (as I feel this culture is the most foreign to them), then Middle East, Latin America and ending in our "backyard," the United States. With each new culture, we will begin with a informational scavenger hunt day (or culture awareness day) for facts on cultural customs, important holidays and phrases, clothing, setting, and statistics on poverty as it influences children my students' age. This scavenger hunt can be done in a number of ways, in all of which I plan to incorporate cooperative learning (or working together rather than independently). One excellent way of introducing students to important information for a unit that will act as "prior knowledge" later includes center activities. In centers, students get into groups of 3—4 people and travel around the room to various tables, each with a different goal in mind. This is how I plan to initiate the culture awareness day. One center may ask students to research fashion by looking through informative texts (see appendix for materials) while another may ask students to interpret a graph about the types of jobs popular in China. In this way, my students not only will learn a significant amount of information on the region in one day by moving through the centers, but will also receive practice on interpreting and analyzing informational texts and their structure (glossary, headings, graphics, captions, graphic aids, etc.). For each new region a "culture awareness day" will take place in which students will actively seek knowledge about the specific region we will study and then be able to keep these notes for future reference (while we work through the character activities). While I may not always use the center activity for each region (doing the same exact activity bores students after a while), the day will always include forms of cooperative learning to maximize teamwork and communication skills.
After the students have had a taste of the culture and understand the extent of poverty in that region (also done on cultural awareness day), we will then begin whichever element of characterization the students need. As in most districts, Charlotte—Mecklenburg Schools always advises its teachers to give some sort of pretest in order to determine the level of understanding for each of the students. This helps to best modify for each students depending on who needs the most assistance with the concept of characters. The data I receive based on the pretest of character will determine the amount of time necessary for each of the six above mentioned functions of characterization. Some may only require one day of study, while others may require a bit more. In any case, I will model the element using film. For example, if my class focuses on character actions, then we will watch a film clip from our designated region in which we specifically pinpoint character actions and what they tell us about the character. In many ways, regardless of what element we work on, the students will need to infer some personality traits based on what they see in the films. As we watch the clip of the film, the students will have a specific task or set of questions in front of them in which they must takes notes during the clip. I plan to also play the clip at least twice considering 1) my students will need two viewing to see all the details and 2) many of the films use subtitles and my students do not read incredibly fast. After we watch the clip at least twice, I will then model an example of characterization for the students. If we work on tone one day, I will give an example of tone I witnessed during the viewing of the film. Then together (guided practice) the entire class will find further examples of tone in the film and discuss what that tone suggests about the character. If the tone sounds grumpy, why is the character grumpy? What might cause that character to use that tone with that person? Therefore, with each region, the teacher modeling and guided practice of characterization will be done using film where students can easily identify and examine the traits of the characters through what they see. However, independent practice will require reading, which will be describes below.
Lexile Level Literature Circles
Lexile levels are a scientific way of determining a person's reading ability. It takes into account the level of vocabulary, sentence construction, and phrasing. As the Lexile Framework states, "A higher Lexile reader measure represents a higher level of reading ability on the Lexile scale" (20). By the time students reach sixth grade, they should already read at a Lexile level of 900. However, many of my students come to me with the Lexile level of your average fourth grader (700L) (21). Why is this significant? If a student comes into your classroom at a given reading ability, having them read text significantly above their Lexile or reading ability will be incredibly frustrating. The vocabulary will be too difficult; the sentences may be confusing. In order for my students to grow, I think it is important to give them instructional reading (for independent practice) that is at or slightly above their Lexile level. The reading will not frustrate them, but instead, may challenge them enough to promote progress at a comfortable pace. Keeping this in mind, I have designed this unit to accommodate my various readers by offering independent practice with each lesson at a Lexile level appropriate for the student by creating Literature Circles.
For my low level readers, The Breadwinner, by Deborah Ellis, will be used. This story depicts the life of a girl in Afghanistan forced to dress as a boy to get food for her family when they begin to sink into poverty after the military takes her father. At 630L, this would be the perfect novel for my low readers that will give them practice finding the characterization element we modeled in class at level that will not frustrate them. They will also be able to contribute knowledge of Middle Eastern culture and poverty based on this realistic fiction book.
For my middle or proficient readers, Esperanza Rising, by Pam Munoz Ryan, will be used. This story follows Esperanza and her mother as enter a Californian work camp from their forced evacuation of home in Mexico. At 750L, this novel will allow students to determine and analyze elements of characterization while also contributing to their knowledge of Hispanic culture and poverty.
For my higher readers, Maniac Magee, by Jerry Spinelli, will be used. This story travels along with Jeffrey Lionel Magee, who runs away from a hostile home life in search of something better. Living on the streets, he find a whole new world and learns a little about the confrontations of race along the way. At 820L, this book will allow my higher readers to not only investigate the characters and their motivations, but also think abstractly about the themes in the story such as racism, sharing, selflessness, and poverty.
As my unit continues, I will always model the objective for my student through film as mentioned above. However, they must be able to pull out this strategy in their reading as well as their viewing. Therefore, in my guided practice, after I we have discussed as a class the element of characterization in the film, I will then give them strategies to convert this to their reading. If we investigate tone, then while they read their assigned chapters in their Literature Circles, they should look at detailed adjectives and active nouns. If the author describes a character ‘shrieking' rather than ‘exclaiming' it will impact the tone. Each day the students will know how to search out their character elements in their assigned Literature Circle chapters and then will be given an assignment correlating to that element. In some cases, the assignment for the end of class (or exit ticket) may be collaborative with their circle group. In other cases, I may want this practice to be strictly independent to check for understanding and gathering growth data. At the end of class, students will be able to share what they found with one another as a whole class because although each group will research different characters, they all unite in the theme of poverty and the character element the students sought. This also will allow my students to learn about characters in other novels which will, perhaps, intrigue them enough to read it on their own! Regardless, the exercise of practicing the objective using a text at or slightly above the students' Lexile level will not only moderately and comfortably challenge them, but will also give them increased knowledge in the culture they read and the way in which poverty influences their characters.
Final Assessment
My school advocates diversifying instruction and for that reason emphasized allowing students to choose their final product as a means of assessment at the end of a unit. To allow for this type of differentiation, I have created three types of assessment which all reveal the student's understand of character and the implications of environment and the elements of characterization on the person's personality, motivations, and actions. The students will use the main character from the novel studied in their Literature Circle to complete the final product, which will be due at the end of the unit, but introduced at the beginning to give the student ample time for completion.
The first is a Character Diary in which the student must write from the character's point of view. The narrative must display the character's tone and mood through using accurate and descriptive adjectives as well as explain elements of the character's culture in relation to events in the text. The student will be required to write one journal entry per chapter of the book which will describe the character's thoughts during the events of that particular chapter.
The second is an Author Interview Podcast where the students will be able to work with a partner to complete the final product. In this assessment, two students will create and hand in a final, typed script of the recorded Podcast where one acts as an interviewer and the other takes the position of the author of the novel. The interview should contain information related to decisions of the author on character development and why the setting influences the actions and personality of the main character. The recorded Podcast will also be uploaded to the classroom website for others to hear.
The third product is a Pathway Board Game in which the student must create a board game which takes us along the journey of the character in her/her novel. This assessment must include the game board, trivia cards (for moving forward, for example), playing pieces and rules. The design of the game board should be representative of aspects within the novel (the setting, the character's interests, etc.). The trivia cards must indicate the student's understanding of the character and his/her actions throughout the novel.
Classroom Activities
In this section of the curriculum unit, I would like to share three activities which will help my students achieve academic success in this character and culture unit. My hope is for these activities to be easily modified and manipulated to fit any Language Arts classroom regardless of grade level.
Character Highs and Lows Timeline
As a part of any Language Arts curriculum standards, students must recognize and use chronological order. For many students this is a fairly simple concept, however others find it frustrating. For that reason, the Character Highs and Lows Timeline allows students to not only practice their chronological ordering skills, but also evaluate events in relation to the character's emotions or feelings about the event. In its original form, the timeline is meant to start from the character's birth at the start point; however, most novels do not begin with the character's birth. Therefore, for the sake of my unit, I will have students begin wherever the novel starts in the life of that particular person. As important events occur for the character in the novel, students must plot that event on the timeline, adjusting the spaces between the points on the timeline accordingly. The student must also simultaneously rank the events in relation to how the character felt about them. I illustrated the character of Parvana from Breadwinner below:
As you can see, this type of timeline requires student justification. You will notice I placed points two and three relatively close to one another because I did not think much time passed in between those two events in the story. However, between points four and five more time has passed and thus the line lengthens. The student must also justify the placement of the points vertically. I assumed Parvana having to dress as a boy and work in the marketplace to be her lowest point because it was so incredibly dangerous for her to do so. Students must interpret events in the story based on the character's point of view in evaluating where on the vertical axis the points should go. This can get tricky when you have several "happy" events or "sad" events and must decide "Which has more joy for the character?" or "Which one of these was worse for the character?" I plan to have students do this timeline simultaneously with the reading of the novel, but you could also do it at the end in relation to a plot map (exposition, rising action, climax, falling action, resolution).
Film Clip Analysis
The second activity crucial to my students incorporates film and character terminology and the student's assessments of these elements used in a specified film clip. Before watching any film clips, I plan to work with the students on the film and character vocabulary, probably through the use of matching words and definitions and having students create their own examples of each, with a visual to help them remember what each term means.
Then the fun begins! When watching the film clip, I will give each student an index card with a specific vocabulary term written on top. This will be the element the student will focus on in the clip. The reason for only giving the students one term is twofold: 1) my students have a hard time watching for two things at once and 2) it allows them to share their ideas and findings with a partner. I will tell my students just to watch the first time through, and then take notes during the second viewing (in case they see someone differently). My students should still have the notes from the vocabulary lesson to use if still unsure of a vocabulary term; this instills the importance of proper note taking and allows them to feel able to participate even if slightly unsure of a word's meaning. Afterwards, my students will turn to a partner in their collaborative groups (my students sit in groups of four usually) and share their responses for two minutes. Then, we will open the class to a discussion of the information, with the students sharing their partner's information. This is essential. I want my students to grasp their own concept, but also build on that knowledge with what they learned from their partner - remembering that new information and sharing it with the class will help aid this effort.
While my students share their answers, I will have "graffiti walls" (chart paper) around the room where called—upon students can write their answers so that we, as a class, can see what we have interpreted in the film. Simultaneously, students will write this information in a graphic organizer. This is important for my students because if they do not have something in front of them to focus on, they tend to get off track! It also allows them to have notes to keep in their binder for review later in the unit or before their project is due.
Culture Wall
As my students read their novels in Literature Circles, they will take note of any important mentions to cultural traditions of customs represented in that novel. These should be relatively easy to distinguish since my students can readily pick apart customs of their own culture from what an author describes in a novel of a different setting. (Suggestions for guidance will be on the wall including: food, holidays, greetings, family, etc.) These will go in the student's folders (created for this unit), as well as on our culture wall.
At the end of each day, I will set apart time for the class to come back together (after reading different novels) to share the information we found in our reading for that day regarding the characters. I will also encourage my students to share any information they find regarding the cultural customs. This information will be described on the culture wall - a wall decorated into three separate sections, designated as our three different regions of study. As students come up with information for these sections, I will give them shapes of paper to write the fact on and staple attach to the appropriate section. Then a student will be chosen to illustrate that fact to help us remember the information presented. I always try to incorporate some sort of visual representation of information for the various learning styles in the classroom. As we get further in our texts, the culture wall should grow until it is overflowing with information!
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