The unit begins for both the Advanced Placement students and the others in the two sophomore classes with a visit to the Yale Art Gallery. This “warm-up” activity helps students visually understand the representations of Native American culture before they start reading any texts. The other goal responds to our school mission statement of celebrating the arts in each student and in all we do to awaken a diverse community of students-artists to their individual power as creator, thinkers, and leaders for the twenty-first century.
First of all the teacher creates groups of four students with different abilities so that they can learn from each other. Most likely, one of the sophomore classes has honors students and regular students since this school is trying to implement a new teaching method based on mastery learning. This also means that students can challenge themselves in the course of the unit and show mastery of the required skills even before concluding the regular school year. Each group analyzes one the following paintings that the Yale Art Gallery has in its collections of the American Indians:
Indian Summer
by Joseph McNamara, 1992-19993,
Indian Summer
by Roy Dean De Forest, 1984,
Indian Dance
by Edwin Austin Abbey 1897,
Bicentennial of Indian
by Fritz Scholder (Luseino) 1974 (students can also visit Fritz Scholder website for more images of his paintings
10
), and Indian Family by Nathaniel Currier
11
(I do not have the year), and one of the following photographs by Edward Curtis:
Kills in Timber – Oglala, The Ancient Araphao, The Blackfoot Country, On the Little Big Horn – Apsaroke,
and
Bull’s Shoe’s Children, Piegen.
12
Each group has to first observe the painting and the specific details (the students usually have five to eight minutes so they can also start taking some notes) and then they have to describe all the details they see. When they have finished, each group shares out their observations. After sharing, students can ask clarifications or any other appropriate questions. The next task is to focus on the colors, lines, and shapes used by the artist to convey the image. They also have to add what they think the artist was trying to convey with any of the colors, lines, or shapes drawn in each painting, and the purpose and message of the painting. According to the students in the group, they also have to determine the audience the artist is trying to address based on some specific details they notice in the painting. Each group spends about twenty minutes or more and then they share out their analysis. Clarifying questions and other reflections may follow.
When the students return from the trip to the Yale Art Gallery, they write a short essay in response to the following prompt, “After observing the painting assigned to your group, discuss the artist’s message and purpose. Add also your reflections on your initial understanding of the American Indians.” They complete this essay in class and then, as homework, they complete their initial study with a research project. The first part includes the research, description, and analysis of three or more artistic pieces from the collection on line of the Metropolitan Museum. Some suggestions can be:
Dream of Vision of Himself Changed to a Destroyer or Riding a Buffalo Eagle
by Black Hawk (1880-1881) or
Wind Spirit
by Frances Blackbear Bosin (1995)
13
. They have to respond to the same question the teacher has asked for the painting at the Yale Art Gallery. The second part of the project is to research, describe, and analyze artifacts or paintings from the Connecticut tribes, Pequot and Mohegan. They can conclude the research project with one of the following documents: a video illustrating the results of their work or a detailed documented essay of the project.
A. The Red Convertible by Louise Erdrich (Turtle Mountain/Ojibwe)
14
for Advanced Placement students
After concluding the warm-up activities, the students read
The Red Convertible
by Louise Erdrich as homework first, so in class they have the opportunity to reread it (rereading is an important strategy to clarify misinterpretations and to improve the overall comprehension) and start a close analysis of the text. While they are rereading, they have to take thoughtful annotations of specific literary techniques and/or devises used by the author to characterize the two brothers, Lyman and Henry Lamartine. Specifically, the students start looking at how the short story is structured: does it start chronologically or it does not? Then, the story is clearly divided in three parts so it is important to understand why the author has chosen this technique and how the same technique helps characterize the two brothers. They also take notes about the syntax displayed in the story: possible fragments, simple and/or complex sentences, where and why (always as tools used by the author to characterize Lyman and Henry). Setting is another important component and the students have to determine how the place (where the brothers grew up, the family, the places they visited, and the river) and the time when the different scenes take place affect the characters and develop the themes. Other important notes should include the point of view, tone, possible changes, imagery, and figurative language.
In class, they start with a closer look at the title. They analyze the two major words of the title, “red” and “convertible,” and reflect on how the word “red” conveys both the tragedy these two brothers experience and the strong bond that kept them tightly together. The word “convertible” can lead to a deeper discussion of the specific characteristics of a convertible car compared to a non-convertible car and the connections to the characterization of the two brothers. In groups of three or four students, they connect the various connotations for the word “red” and the word “convertible” to specific moments in the short stories. This activity is very important for the students in this AP group because they need to strengthen the reading strategies to comprehend and analyze literature. A class discussion will follow together with the response to the following prompt:
“The title of the short story is symbolic of the relationship between Lyman and Henry. In a well-organized essay, discuss what these symbols reveal of the two brothers and of the social values they hold.”
The next class activity is to teach how to analyze an excerpt from the same short story. This step is important because the second essay they have to write at the AP exam is the close reading of an excerpt from a short story or a novel. The first passage for this activity tells about Henry’s return from the Vietnam war and his difficulties of integration, “When he came home, though, Henry was very different, and I’ll say this: the change was not good … Then I walked out before he could realize I know he’d strung together more than six words at a time.”
15
After reading and annotating, the students respond to some specific questions:
-
Lyman says that when Henry came home he was different, “the change was no good.” However, he immediately adds, “you could hardly expect him to change.” What does Lyman imply? Also, what does it suggest about Lyman?
-
Why does Lyman say, “you could hardly expect him to change.” Why does he change the point of view and what does the connotation of “hardly” suggest?
-
What are the changes Lyman notices? What do they suggest? How do these changes affect the relationship between the two brothers and the family?
-
What does the metaphor, “the sound of a choking man,” reveal? What does it suggest about Lyman’s attitude? Why?
-
The same sound “stopped up the throats of other people around him.” What does this convey about Henry?
-
Lyman bought a color TV but he regrets it. Explain why and what it conveys about Lyman and Henry.
-
How does the figurative language used to describe how Henry reacts in front of the color TV set characterize him?
-
How does Lyman react when he sees his brother biting his lips? Why? What does this scene reveal about both brothers?
-
Lyman uses a simple sentence, “Blood was going down his chin.” What is the effect of this syntactical choice?
-
What is the effect of the imagery the same sentence conveys?
-
The mother does not trust any doctor outside the reservation because “they just give them drugs.” Lyman does not seem to agree at first but then he does, and adds, “… so let’s just forget about it.” What does it reveal about him?
-
How do you interpret Lyman’s decision to damage the red convertible? What does this action add to Lyman’s characterization? Specifically, what literary devices support your interpretation?
-
What does Henry’s reaction to the damaged car reveal? How? So what can you conclude about this character?
-
What does this event reveal about Lyman?
After this close reading activity, each group analyzes how the point of view characterizes the two brothers and reveals the problems they face and/or try to solve. They also reflect on how the point of view helps convey thematic ideas. They will be prompted as follows:
-
What message does the story convey about the idea of authority?
-
Do you notice any form of isolation or loneliness? If so, how is it revealed and what does it illuminate of the work as a whole?
-
Does the story imply the idea of change or hope? If not, why?
-
What other thematic ideas does the short story convey? Discuss these themes.
They analyze how setting affects the characters and what it illuminates of the work as a whole. They also identify and analyze the personal conflicts of the main characters and the conflicts of the society depicted in the story.
Before concluding this part, the students read some historical excerpts to better understand how the Native Americans interact or do not interact with American society, and the degree of assimilation in today’s society. These excerpts are assigned as homework readings and are listed in the Lesson Plans Section of this unit. Another reason for assigning non-fictional excerpts in this class derives from the fact that these AP students have potential skills but they need a lot of instruction in the form of supporting strategies to overcome the difficulties in comprehension and analysis. They are, in fact, at what Jean Piaget calls the concrete-operational stage. They cannot think abstractly and do not understand what can be inferred from a written or visual text. The goal is to move them from this initial stage to the formal-operational one in which they are able to solve abstract problems.
16
To conclude this part with the Advanced Placements students, the students write an essay in response to the following prompt: “After reading the short story,
The Red Convertible
by Louise Erdrich (Mountain Turtle/ Ojibwe), write a well-organized essay discussing Lyman’s characterization through literary devices like point of view, figurative language, or syntax.”
B. The Sliver of a Full Moon by Mary Kathryn Nagle (Cherokee)
17
for Advanced Placement Students
Since this play has not been published yet, the students listen to the reading of the play as homework first and take notes of the most relevant facts, feelings, and reactions they notice. In class, they start from their initial reactions to the play and then they listen to it again. One of the first prompt to which they respond as initial activity is: “What is the most important problem these women experience? How do they react? Do they find support? If they do not, what causes this lack of support? What illuminates the work as a whole?”
After this initial approach, each group selects a specific scene and analyzes it for tone, conflict, language and/or details, figurative language or imagery. They also take notes of the major literary devices and then discuss their effects in conveying the themes of the play. Their next step is to create specific questions for close reading. They can use the questions previously used for the excerpt from the short story as a model. This activity is very important to help them learn how to analyze a piece of literature on their own, a skill that is primary for the exam they take at the end of this course. In class, each group shares out both the questions and the responses. In the meantime, they read other brief excerpts (they are listed in the Lesson Plans section of this unit) containing historical information on how some tribes have achieved the authority to prosecute non-Native people inside their reservation.
They conclude this part of the unit with an essay in response to the following prompt: “In literary works, the law of a country may be a hindrance to justice favoring therefore a state of suffering. Use the play you have just discussed, and in a well-developed essay analyze how the law can create injustice and what it reveals about the perpetrator and the victim of this injustice.”
C. Homeland by Jayne Fawcett (Mohegan)
18
for Advanced Placement Students
While working at the short story and the play, the students also read, discuss, and analyze some poems written by Native American writers for a better understanding of the unit themes. They begin with this poem,
Homeland,
which underlines the displacement and loneliness the speaker feels in spite of the rich heritage that seems to be lost “in pathless woods unknown.” The first activity is to read and annotate for poetic devices: rhyming, allusions, imagery, figurative language, and tone.
Immediately after, the students write their initial reflections in response to the following prompt: “What is your understanding of the word “homeland” and the feeling it may arise? What is your homeland and what values does it hold for you? What do you expect from your homeland? Why?” They also have to compare and contrasts their understanding of homeland, the values it holds to the speaker’s understanding and values of homeland. In class or as homework, they further analyze the poem by responding to the following questions:
-
What does the allusion, “My Kingdom Come” add to the meaning of the poem?
-
Why does the speaker identify “the Home” with his/her “lineage”?
-
What is the “heritage” the speaker receives? Why?
-
What does the speaker recognize to his/her “Heritage”? Why?
-
Why is the speaker stating, “you’re not alone” and immediately after, “Where is My Home”? What is the effect of this juxtaposition?
-
The speaker repeats the word “hundred” twice. What does that convey? What is the effect on the reader?
-
What does the image of the owl and lonely wolf convey?
-
What does the speaker mean when he asserts that the “lonely wolf” replies “Pretend”? What is the message it conveys?
-
What is the tone of the poem? Do you notice any changes in tone? If so, where and what are the effects?
Other poems that the students read and analyze are:
Repatriation Soliloquy
by Alice Azure (Mi’kmaq),
I Found Him on a Hill Top
by Ella Wilcox Sekatau (Narragansett),
Sad Country Songs
by John Christian Hopkins (Narragansett),
Attic Dawn,
and
Pan’s Song
by Jayne Fawcett (Mohegan)
19
. They read the poems and analyze them as homework first (the specific questions for these poems are in the lesson plans section). In class, they discuss each poem and determine the theme or themes for each of them. They conclude this part on poetry with two essays in response to the following prompts:
-
Choose one of the poems we have read and discussed in class, and write a well-developed essay in which you analyze the speaker’s experience and how the same speaker conveys the significance of this experience through specific poetic devices.
-
The poems
Homeland
by Jayne Fawcett (Mohegan) and
Sad Country Songs
by John Christian Hopkins (Narragansett) reflect on similar concerns. Read them carefully and then write an essay in which you compare and contrast the two poems, analyzing the poetic techniques each writer uses to explore his/her particular situation.
D. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie (Spokane/Coeur d’Alene)
20
for the Sophomore Students
The first activity the students complete before reading the novel is to reflect on the title in response to the following prompt: “What does the author mean with “Absolutely True Diary”? What is a diary? What is the effect of the word “absolutely”? Would the meaning change without the word “absolutely”? What do you think it is about? The students write their responses in their journal, share their reflections, and the teacher takes notes on the board. They can also be challenged with another prompt to analyze the meaning and effect of “Part-Time Indian”: “How can an Indian be Part-Time? What do you think the author mean with “Part-Time”? Can you predict what story it can tell? Also, look at the drawings on the cover of the novel. What do they suggest? What do you expect? Why?”
If students need a richer “warm-up” to elicit their interest and curiosity, the teacher can use some of the drawings from the text on page 6, 12, 57, 88, 128, 174, and 213 to describe and discuss. In class, each group receives a copy of one drawing and they have to analyze it by responding to the following questions
-
What do you see? What don’t you see but you expect to see?
-
What is the story connected to this drawing?
-
Can you determine the feelings of the protagonist? Specifically, what makes you state what his feelings are. What could be the problem?
-
Try to briefly write what the plot will tell.
After these initial activities, the students start reading the novel for which the teacher can take three to four weeks, or more according to the students’ reaction or more specific needs (the activities for specific needs are detailed in the Lesson Plan section of this unit). One possible plan is to assign one chapter every day as homework followed by a second rereading in class because there may be a good number students who do not read at home. Modeling is the best method to teach them how expert readers do make knowledge of the text. Therefore, during the in-class reading, the teacher will model how to understand meaning through the context when they encounter difficult and unknown words. She/he will interrupt the reading to say aloud what she/he thinks and how she/he uses specific details to analyze the characters and their attitudes. In the same way, the teacher can teach them how to notice tone and how to identify the connotations of some words, figurative language, imagery, repetitions, and irony. The teacher should model reading and analysis for the first chapters and then the students and the teacher together will be thinking aloud for three or four other chapters, and if necessary even more. After that, the students should have learned how to read and analyze proficiently on their own. The teacher intervenes only if some students continue to struggle.
E. Analysis and Discussion of The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie (Spokane/Coeur d’Alene)
After reading each chapter, the teacher can divide the class in groups of three or four (the composition of the groups should change every time according to how the students reach or do not reach the lesson objectives). Each group has a different task to differentiate for the specific learning strengths and/or weaknesses of the group. Specifically, the teacher can plan to divide the entire novel in five parts (1-53; 54 -103; 104 -149; 150 – 198; 199 to the end), one per group. The students have to first summarize the excerpt, and then they respond to the following analytical questions:
-
What is the first thing that stands out about the protagonist in this excerpt? Support your response with specific text references.
-
Describe the setting in your excerpt and discuss whether this setting has any influence on the protagonist, Arnold Spirit.
-
Discuss how the protagonist interacts or does not interact with the other characters and discuss the reasons behind his choices.
-
Discuss how the author characterizes Arnold Spirit? Look at some literary devices like repetition, figurative language, imagery, and tone.
-
What is the theme or what are the thematic ideas that emerge from your excerpt? What makes you say that? What is the message your excerpt conveys?
The teacher can help respond to these questions with specific strategies that are illustrated in the Lesson Plans Section.
Before concluding this part of the novel, the students engage in a class-discussion on the major themes – poverty, loneliness, fear, and hope – by responding to the following prompts:
-
List the values that you noticed among the characters of the community of this novel.
-
Discuss the effect that these values have for the characters and their community.
-
List all possible differences you notice between Arnold’s experiences and the experiences of today’s teenagers. Discuss these differences.
After this group discussion, the students write a two-to-three pages reflections on the differences and similarities between the protagonist and today’s teenagers. As homework, they can read the short story,
From Here to There
by Elsie Charles Basque (Mi’kmaq)
21
. The students conclude by writing a two pages essay in which they compare and contrast the themes of the novel and of the short story.
F. Poetry
While the students are reading the novel by Sherman Alexie (Spokane/ Coeu d’Alene), they can also read the following poems,
Tarzan Brown
by John Christian Hopkins (Narragansett),
Progress
by Lindsay Marshall (Mi’kmaq), and
For the Children
by Ella Wilcox Sekatau (Narragansett)
22
. The teacher should read each poem aloud along with the students so they learn to hear the tone. They then annotate for poetic techniques like rhyme, figurative language, and imagery. These specific poems are a great opportunity to discuss the themes of the unity more in depth but they can also become models to which the students can refer in order to write their own poems (unit summative assessment). The teacher should use the same poems to teach students how the author uses specific poetic techniques to convey a specific message. To complete the analysis of each poem, the students respond to the following questions:
-
Who is the Speaker? How do you know? Does the Speaker change? If so, what is the effect?
-
What is the problem?
-
What is the message or the moral/theme?
-
Who is the audience the Speaker is addressing? Why?
-
What is the tone?