Uplan+Rationale





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Rationale: Divergent In the transition from middle school to high school, high school to college, and college to adulthood students are faced with a number of decisions, challenges, and experiences that will have an impact on their lives. It is important that in these periods of transition adolescents have an outlet in which to hold dialogues about these experiences unique to their age group. These outlets often times cannot be found solely in the home. Students need to speak with other students in similar circumstances. Using texts like // Divergent // in the classroom to begin these dialogues can be exactly what is necessary  to get students critically thinking about their experiences,  and sharing them with the class or even just hashing these thoughts out on their own. The transitions teens go through are expansive. middle school to high school they have to decide where they will fall on the social and academic latter. What clubs/ sports are best for them? What friend groups will impede on their success? Not to mention their home experiences. From High school to college they need to pick a major, school, decide if they are meant for college, and do all this while disregarding possible wishes of their friends, partners, and parents. From college to adulthood students are looking at breaking away from attachments to childish desires, monetary independence, and complete independent living. These are all things our main characters are going through in Divergent. Students will be thinking about their thinking to make rational educated choices. They will be able to separate their feelings from those adopted from others. Sons and daughters will and should already be thinking about these big decisions. They may question the idea of college or joining the family business, but this is a process of growing up. Students will undoubtedly be better off for thinking about these choices. Trise was miserable in her first faction. She needed to know there was more. She needed to know who she really was. Sometimes this takes asking questions, and in the end they will be stronger better functioning people because of it.Writer Jim Burke in his article “Canon Fodder” states, “Students look to literature, as we all do, to discover ourselves in it, and to experience different dimensions of the human condition that they may or may not realize they are a part of”(58). In this unit we will be reading the text //Divergent.// In this science fiction novel the main character Beatrice is in the transition period within her society. At age 16 the children of this society must choose the faction in which they will live and work for the rest of their lives. Each faction serves a different purpose in this society. Abnegation, Beatrice’s faction, are the selfless and serve as the government and other selfless services. Amity are the peaceful and serve in agriculture. Candor are the honest they work in positions that the virtue of honesty is most prized. Dauntless are the brave and serve as the guards of the city limits. Erudite are the intelligent and work in education and research. In this text readers see main character Trice going through several important life changes that will bring her to adulthood. She is facing a lot of the same challenges our students are facing, or will face at some point in the pursuit of their independence and search for their true identity. Trice must leave her family behind. This means stripping herself of the identity they have provided her with and finding her own. This all begins with a choice of which faction to join much like the choice of which college to go to or which major to join will begin a high school student’s journey into finding themselves. Trice chooses the Dauntless faction and there is no turning back. She chooses a new name, learns new skills, makes new friends, and must completely revamp herself for her new life as Dauntless. Trice soon finds that there are some internal aspects of her abnegation upbringing that are harder to leave behind than others. She comes to understand that these are aspects of her true identity. Trice faces bullying in her search for her new life and even falls in love. As Trice goes through this internal revamping her society is going through a large change of its own. The old ways of the faction system are being questioned and manipulated. The honorable abnegation are not as impartial as they once seemed, and the Erudite are suiting up for the battle of a lifetime. Trice must now see the world as it truly is. Not everyone fits into a cookie cutter label, her parents aren’t perfect, there are people in this world that can hurt her, and she has to fight for what she believes in. This text can open avenues in learning about critically thinking about one’s society both in current events,historical events, and future outcomes. It brings to light issues of labeling people in society and stereotyping. It also comments on independence and one’s identity within their society. We will use readings from number of different cultures to gain a better knowledge of culture, both material and non-material. It is important students understand the norms, values, and beliefs of our culture and other cultures in history and today. In learning about this students will better understand what really makes people different, and it will have students questioning how different we really are if its simply socialized norms that separate us. These ideas are important in the text because Trise's society is so similar yet different to our own and it is really easy to miss this. Each faction has a secret subculture that separates them, and the factionless have aspects that akin them to the Native Americans in our society and the untouchables in India. We will specifically be looking into native american, Indian, Aztecan, and African tribal cultures. This will offer a number of diverse cultures both historically and in present society. The unit will use short stories, news articles, videos, and poetry to look closer into diversity. This unit goes across content to social studies, history, and U.S./ world cultures. Additionally, a look into diversity of individuals will be taught. Students will learn about different learning styles and intelligences and how this makes us all diverse. They will learn their own learning style and intelligences like the teens in //Divergent.// They will see how they are divergent because multiple styles may fit them, and learn how it feels only to take part in one. They will then decide the pros and cons of a society run on this principle.  This text is relevant to the field of ELA because it uses literary elements to comment on social issues. Students will see how this text is allegorical in the names of factions and the way they behave and interact. They will be able to learn more about allegorical texts by reading Native American fables that demonstrate allegory, and they will learn how to create a text using this method. The students will be presented with the text in a way that will have them questioning why the author chose to write about this dystopia. Another wonderful aspect of this text are the many ways in which students can connect with this author. She has blogs, fan pages, and interviews that are recent and all about //Divergent// and her writing process. Additionally, there is soon to be a movie and third book out for this series. Creating relevance for students beyond what I mentioned above. Students will want to read this text and hear from the author. They will be ready to read the next book and watch the movie. This text is written by an author that is current, successful, and young. Students can see with novels like these that literature is alive (Salvner, Gary). Student writers can see themselves in this author, and find value in the further study of her career.

The Big question of this unit is: What steps must we take to become independent? Our goals in this unit will be:


 * Students will be able to describe material and non-material culture for for multiple diverse societies.
 * Students will be able to describe their learning styles and multiple intelligences as well as others.
 * Students will be able to describe the meaning of divergent and why the author chose this title
 * Students will be able to evaluate the use of various literary techniques used in this text
 * Students will be able to demonstrate the writing of an allegorical text
 * Students will be able to analyze the steps taken in the novel to access Beatrice’s identity
 * Students will be able to analyze the steps students in our society take to access their identity
 * Students will be able to analyze the steps in gaining independence.
 * Students will be able to describe the political unrest seen in this text and how this relates to historical and current issues in our society
 * Students will be able to evaluate the authors website, blog, and suggestions for furthering writing
 * Students will be able to write a letter to the author


 * Changes to Rationale:**
 * I really tried to be more specific in what I wanted to do for the whole unit. At the beginning I tried to answer possible parent questions about making students question, possibly, too much. I added a new section on diversity that will get students to delve deeper into their own diversities as it pertains to learning. I also added an aspect of learning about other cultures because after some thought with my assessment I wanted students to be able to better understand our world, Trise's world, and how it was created. I think that this will show the world's cultural diversities and commonalities so that students can better create their own world while understanding that their creation can't exactly be some made up Eutopia. There has to be problems to solves and ways a society solves these problems. I am slightly concerned in finding exactly what I want to give students to read to show these cultures, their differences from ours, and their institutions. I also want to change my goals/objectives for the unit somewhat.**

for my assessment I changed the requirements to include aspects of world creation. Students will be learning about the creation of a world like the one ask for they will be creating a backstory/ world of their own in class first after learning about world creation. They will then create their own story using the lifestyles they created in the world. The students will then create a story of their own using characteristics of a coming of age tale and a selection of Science fiction, fantasy, or dystopian writing. they can use aspects of all three but must be clear on what genres they are using. I cut out the overt requirements about culture as they will be learning about these and including them in their world creation activity that goes with their final assessment. I also created a rubric for them to use as a guideline for what they should do.
 * Changes to assessment:**