Sean T. Griffin
This unit is designed as a way to help students make a bridge from literature to real life through the examination of architecture and place in the development of fictional characters and plot. I will ask students to look at several short stories, which I have paired up with poems. This is literature that my eighth graders would be reading normally, but the difference is that I am trying to emphasize techniques authors use to create a sense of place. Journal writing will be emphasized as we look closely at how fictional characters are influenced by the architecture and setting in which they live. In a final project students create their own "life maps" in order to see how different settings or places have influenced their own lives.
(Developed for English, grade 8; recommended for Middle School English, grades 7-8)
