Unit+Plan+Genre+Study.duksta

Alyssa Duksta

The unit plans that I chose to study were :


 * “The American Dream” by Jay Blanton, Heather Wicker and Brad Williams (2001),
 * “Mary Shelley’s ‘Frankenstein’ and the Responsibility of the Creator to Their Creation” by Sarah Mann
 * “Animals as Symbols” by E. Michelle Holbert

 The primary reason that I chose these three unit is because I felt that they each had important themes that would really 'stick' with students as they carry on through the rest of their lives' education.. Students would either be able to make the theme relatable to their life (“The American Dream”), use what they've learned when reading other works of literature to appreciate the author's work more thoroughly (“Animals as Symbols”) or gainthe ability to read a piece of literature to appreciate the author's craft instead of the schema that are falsely attached to their work. (“Frankenstein....”)

Of the three unit plans, the one that I found most impressive was “The American Dream.” This unit plans was created in December of 2001, not long at all after the September 11 th  terrorist attacks that changed our country forever. The introduction/ rationale to this unit plan really struck me. Its purpose is to challenge students to think about what The American Dream meant in the past, and how that was different from what it means now. In a world where terrorist attacks, war and violence dawned itself upon young people and have now become an undebatable reality....the challenge of defining the American Dream has changed. I think the subject matter was brilliant in the context that this unit plan was written. It was the perfect time to bring “The American Dream” up as a theme to be throughly discussed in class. It combines the awareness of history and the sociological state of our country on the brink of abrupt change and pairs these themes with the appropriate analysis and study of literary works that present “The American Dream.” I think this reflected that the creators of the unit plan look at the students as capable intellectual beings, and will encourage them to continue being just that.

Although I thoroughly enjoyed reviewing “Animals as Symbols' there was one thing that I think could have been taken care of a bit more carefully. While reviewing one of the assignments the students were to complete, I noticed what I would consider a flaw. One assignment involved making a collection of a variety of specific styles of poems. I wasn't sure what a few of them entailed. I referred back to the lesson plans to see if the teacher would dedicate time to teaching the students how to write the different types, but I did not see any such thing within any of the lesson plans. I would definitely add time to a lesson plan to teach students how to write these poems, instead of simply mentioning them as part of the assignment. I also looked at the texts that would be used, and I was surprised that Richard Adams' “Watership Down” wasn't mentioned. I think that is an important text in analyzing the use of animals to represent deeper meaning in a text.

There were many structural similarities between the three lesson plans, in my opinion. First off, they all included an introduction to their theme. This included the purpose, rationale, context, parental concerns, and demographics of the students involved. This section would also include texts that would be used in class for the unit. Both the “Mary Shelly's 'Frankenstein.'....” and “The American Dream” followed this section with the pre assessment that they would be using to determine where their students are at with the subject material. What was different about the “Animals with Symbolism” was that this was featured after the tentative lesson plans/schedule.

Next, lesson plans would follow. After that would be samples of each major assignment/project that the students would be completing. All unit plans studied included rubrics to go along with their assignment samples.

Although I think that these were all strong unit plans, through looking at the assignment samples I noticed that a major difference was “The American Dream”' unit plan's high level of creativity in their assignments. Students, for one assignment, were asked to pick a way to represent the song they sing as an American. They could represent what their song means to them through lyrics, a short story, essays, etc. I found this neat. That is just one example of a creative assignement. This unit plan was packed with them. I think it may have had to do with the fact that it was the only one that was done collaboratively (with three people). This is not to say that the other two didn't have great assignments, too. However, I felt that “The American Dream” unit went above and beyond.

Criteria:

Some criteria I would use to determine the effectiveness of the structure of a unit plan would be as follows:


 * 1) <span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">Intro:
 * 2) “<span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">Meaningful theme”
 * 3) “<span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">Clarity in purpose”
 * 4) <span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">Clear Goals


 * 1) <span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">Order
 * 2) <span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">Logic
 * 3) <span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">Consideration to Student/grade level​​learning style

<span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">3.) Assignment Appropriateness

 * 1) <span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">Relevance
 * 2) <span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">Authenticity
 * 3) <span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">Clear purpose
 * 4) <span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">considers different learning styles
 * 5) <span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">variety


 * 1) <span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">Overall
 * 2) <span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">Cohesiveness as a whole
 * 3) <span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">Consistant

<span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">The attitudes that each unit plan suggested were ones that I found to align with mine, and that's part of the reason they were attractive to me. For “The American Dream”, it was clear that to the creators...the curriculum of English Language arts should incorporate facets of history and present day challenges that each student can find relatable and meaningful. Students are fully capable of reasoning and thinking like intellectual adults. It just has to be brought out of them.

<span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">For “Animals as Symbols”, one of the attitudes I found to be represented was that literature is not to be studied in a 'scratch the surface' kind of way. You must fully indulge in why the author chose to tell the story the way they did. (in this instance, works with animals as people and major themes as motifs were the author's chosen stylistic decisions.) How the author tells a story tells a lot about them and what they want readers to take away from their work. I agree with the fact that reading a story that includes animals as characters or major themes in a story sometimes makes the story more impacting and breath taking. We're used to reading about human beings and we are human beings. Reading about animals without being able to be an animal allows readers to look at things in a whole different way, since animals are different beings than us. I think studying literary works that surround itself with animals playing a major part is a great way to challenge students to not judge things at the surface. Some students may think that animal books are for little kids. That's not the case. The creators of this unit plan probably look at students as people who are capable of appreciating different perspectives, but have to be introduced to them first.

<span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">For “Mary Shelly's “Frankenstein...” unit plan, it is obvious that the creator wants students to not rely on cliches when studying literature. This is a great facet for English Language Arts. Just as “Animals as Symbols”, this unit begs students to not rely on what they see at the surface or what they have relied on before, but to take on a new appreciation and respect for how an author decided to tell a story. It is mentioned in the unit plan that Mary Shelly didn't portray an entertaining, foaming mouth, vicious monster right off the bat as we are used to in Americanized films and tales of monsters. It is not a typical monster story. It is slow moving, descriptive and careful. It develops instead of showing itslef all at once. This unit plan reflects the instructional practice of submerging oneself into the story....to really see the heart and soul of a piece of work....why the author chose to tell it the way they did. Introducing students to a work that does not fall in line with cliches gives students the chance to appreciate its work. As “The American Dream” did, this unit also incorporates historical context as an importance in studying literary works. (The unit stresses how important this story was to gothic literature. )

<span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">Though the attitudes in the three plans are different, they are the same. “The American Dream” unit focuses on students thinking about their own lives in current society. “Animals as Symbols” beckons students to see how larger than life a story can be simply by incorporating animals, and the unit on “frankenstein” pushes the unfamiliar on a student.

<span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">All of these have one thing in common, though. That is to think outside the box. To add something into their backback of knowledge that they will carry throughout their educational careers. All of these units ask a student to look into the eyes of others...and realize that there's ALWAYS something bigger to think about. Always. <span style="font-family: Times New Roman,serif;">These are all attitudes that I think are positive to the experience of learning, and I clap for them all.