Sean T. Griffin
The unit I am designing is meant to be used with my eighth grade students, but as with many teaching units, it can be adapted to match any grade level by simply shifting the curriculum being used in various spots. The eighth grade students in New Haven partake in a wide variety of learning activities throughout the year that begins with a focus on fiction, the short story, and the novel.
This focus at the beginning of the year is the perfect place to start my unit- a unit that will seek to utilize the lessons learned in fiction to lessons learned in real life. Students will be expected to keep, share, and display the materials they create in this unit in their writing journals, their "All about Me" folders and, eventually in their artistic self-portraits that become a sort of climax to the learning in the unit.
Walter Dean Myers and Harlem
One of the core novels that students are required to read in eighth grade is Monster by Walter Dean Myers. Walter Dean Myers is a very popular writer who grew up in Harlem and writes urban fiction that involves the coming of age struggles of today's youth. Myers' novels such as Scorpions, Fallen Angels, The Dream Bearer, and The Glory Field focus on teenagers trying to fit in and find their place in a harsh, confusing, and fast-paced world. In Monster, Myers' protagonist, Steve Harmon, tries to escape his world (the book's setting switches between prison walls, the streets of Harlem, and a courtroom) by writing a screenplay, the text of which makes up much of the novel. Using a variety of fonts and writing styles, Myers explores identity, truth and, fiction as the accused accomplice in a robbery/murder struggles in prison after being caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. What Myers is exploring in his book Monster is really what our seminar is attempting to examine: how do we see ourselves, and how does that differ from how others see us? In this unit I will try to lead students to see characters and themselves from a different perspective and ultimately to share, either consciously or unconsciously, through writing and art- through reflective, direct formulation and the process of creative expression-their newfound point of view.
I start out the unit with an exploration of Myers, Harlem, and the notion of belonging. I talk a little about Myers and his background by using the internet to spend a day searching images of Harlem and explore the author's background before reading. (see sources for web site ideas) Working in pairs, students will sometimes receive instructions as simple as "find three facts on Harlem." Students search the internet, find interesting facts, and then share their findings with the whole class. Once students have some background knowledge I introduce the poem, Harlem, written by Walter Dean Myers. An award winning poem, illustrated by the author's son (as is Monster), Harlem is a poem I like to use with students every year. Scholastic puts out a paperback version with a recorded reading by Sean Combs. Students of all ages love to listen to it and I have a student turn the pages on the oversized book to share with students the incredible artwork, reminiscent of Jacob Lawrence's work, which accompanies the book. After listening to the poem I have students write their own "Hometown Poem" that will be their first piece in their "All About Me" folders.
How much a teacher decides to ask students to revise this piece or any other pieces that the students work on is up to that teacher. The Writing Workshop explanation discussed earlier in the unit can be applied to any of the students' writing. All of the writing in this unit can be taken to whatever degree of writing workshop that teachers are comfortable with. On the other hand, everything written here does not have to be a polished piece of writing. What we are really trying to do is use the writing as a vehicle to get to the end product (autobiographical artwork) as well as make some real realizations as well.
That being said, I think the hometown poem is a great piece to run through writing workshop, especially early in the year. It will be easier for students to grasp and serve as a sort of workshop on writer workshopping. I remind students that images are a big part of what makes some poetry work and point out some images in the Myers poem. Students highlight and circle the images in the poem on copies of the pages. Next, I ask students to think about their own hometowns. What sorts of images come to mind when they think of their hometown, their neighborhood, their street, their yard? Students brainstorm in their journals, and then I ask them to link the images in a rough first draft of their hometown poem. As is customary with writing workshop, I give students a mini lesson on what their goal should be during the peer edit session that will follow the completion of a first draft. In other words, we don't just exchange poems and say, "check your partner's work for mistakes," but rather we try to pinpoint the focus of the peer edit session; have students look at form, or sensory images or, use of literary devices in the poem. In this particular case, since we started looking at Walter Dean Myers' work as images, I will have students look in each others work for sensory images. Of course before they do that it is important that classes go over what a sensory image is in class: how do they work? What senses do they appeal to? How do students know? Once again, it is up to teachers what mini-lesson is used to focus the students' peer edit session. Once students have given each other feedback on their first draft and have written their second draft, a teacher-student conference helps students polish up the poem before he or she starts to type the final draft.
At this point teachers can still branch off to a variety of activities just focused on the hometown poem; students can illustrate their own or each other's poems; students can use the poems for a class anthology on what home means to them; students can read the poems out loud or memorize them in a performance opportunity. In this unit I will ask students to share and then keep the poems in their "All About Me" folders.
Monster
The book Monster, which will provide a sort of anchor as I navigate through this unit, is a coming of age novel in which a young man, Steve Harmon, is accused of being involved in a robbery in which the owner of a small store is murdered. The novel provides teachers with several opportunities to explore inner conflict and the search for identity which is really at the center of this unit. The book is written as a screen play and a journal; a screenplay because, first, Steve is interested in screenwriting, and second and most importantly for this unit, it provides a sort of escape for Steve. He is writing his own story in order to escape the pressure and discomfort he is feeling being locked up in prison during the trial. The other part of Monster that really fits into my teaching methods is the fact that much of the novel is written as Steve's journal entry. So here is Steve, a young teen in a very difficult and scary situation, at a very difficult and scary part of his life, trying to make sense of everything with two voices: his screenwriting voice, complete with voice over and camera angles, and his journal voice, clear and honest as a journal entry or diary should be. The opening lines of Monster, written as a journal, provide students with a place to start exploring their own fears in their journals:
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The best time to cry is at night, when the lights are out and someone is being
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beaten up and screaming for help. That way even if you sniffle a little they won't
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hear you. If anybody knows that you are crying, they'll start talking about it and
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soon it'll be your turn to get beat up when the lights go out. (1)
Working in the journals
Steve is clearly scared. Have a discussion about fear and loneliness before asking students to go into the seed section of the journals and brainstorm about what scares them. Give them about four to five minutes to make a bulleted list and then have the class share their ideas. Remind students to feel free to add to their own list if they hear something that scares someone else that they had forgotten scares them. Finally ask students to circle, star, or highlight one of the topics, turn to their nurturing section and do a quick write on the topic. Ask students to turn and share with a partner and if anyone would like to share with the class encourage that. It is important early on in the use of journals that students feel comfortable sharing, allowing others to hear their deepest thoughts and feelings. A class must be taught early that it is important to respect others sharing; otherwise the class will shut down with few willing to go out on a limb and share.
As I go through Monster I take advantages of the numerous opportunities students will have to expand on Steve's journal writing. On page forty-five Steve talks about how much he hates the prison. Using the same technique as mentioned earlier (seeds to nurture) I have students share what they hate. On page sixty three Steve comments on a dream he had and how he hoped that others didn't hear him screaming. Again, I have students share their dreams, and nightmares. During the early trial sections of the book students stop reading and write a journal entry for Steve. What would he be thinking about a certain testimony or another character's actions in the courtroom? What would you be thinking if you were in the courtroom? The journals will quickly become filled with thoughts and feelings that intertwine and parallel Steve's.
Letter writing
There are many opportunities here for students to write letters to and from characters that will deepen their understanding of the novel and themselves. One activity that I enjoy doing with students is exchanging letters written from characters' point of views. Students choose a character from the book (Bobo Evans, Steve's mom, Prosecutor Pettricelli, a Jury member) and comment on the case in a letter to another member of the courtroom. It might be wise to preface this exercise with a lesson on courtroom etiquette and how jury members are not allowed to speak to each other, etc. but in fiction it is all right to bend the rules. Once students have written to a character, I have them exchange letters and take some time to write back as a character writing to a character. This piece can also go into the "All About Me" folder.
Another letter writing activity students can partake in is writing a letter to Steve. I take a break in the reading of Monster to read two classic advice poems: "Mother to Son" by Langston Hughes and "Speech to the Young" by Gwendolyn Brooks. Students read the poems in class, discuss the extended metaphor in "Mother to Son" and the images in "Speech to the Young" and then go over the messages being sent. What is the advice being given in these two short poems? How does the advice seem similar or different? Next, students write their own advice poems. They can start out by determining what sort of message they want to impart in their seeds section and then expand into a writer workshop with their advice poems. Finally, students write to Steve to impart some advice to him.
Memoir
As we continue reading Monster I have a discussion with students about why the story is worth telling. What is the "so what" that writer/educator Nancie Atwell asserts is so important to telling a story? Why is Steve's story movie material? I ask students to return to their journals and create a time line of the most important events in their lives thus far. Students come up with at least six or seven important events that had some impact on them, that helped shape who they are today.
Next, students determine which story they would like to tell and I allow them to spend a bit of time writing about that event. Students will be asked to write short memoirs, and I encourage the more adventurous ones to turn their memoir into a screenplay. This writing piece should also follow the writing workshop format and teachers may decide to do a unit on memoir writing before coming to this point in this unit. Students share what they wrote as a class. Finished pieces go into the "All About Me" folders.