English Language Arts Grade 11-12 [2011]

• A Storybook Romance
  This lesson from EDSITEment highlights one episode in the Divine Comedy to provide students with an introduction to Dante's great poem. Learning objectives include (1) To learn about the structure and artistry of Dante's Divine Comedy; (2) To examine the episode of Paolo and Francesca as a poetic interpretation of romantic love; (3) To gain experience in close reading and interpretation of literary allusions.
• Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart
  This lesson, found on the EDSITEment website, introduces students to African novelist Chinua Achebe's first novel, "Things Fall Apart," and to strategies of close reading and textual analysis. Through this lesson, students learn about Nigerian culture and history and compare African oral storytelling traditions with European linguistic and literary forms. From this page, teachers can access all the materials needed to complete this lesson.
• Practical Criticism
  Anthologists and editors prepare the way for poetry readers, selecting works that reward close reading and assisting interpretation through annotation. But on the Internet we can return to poetry in its native state--one set of words among many others competing for appreciation--and read with fresh eyes. The goals of this lesson plan, from EDSITEment, are to analyze the verbal devices through which poems make meaning; to compare one's personal interpretation of a poem with the personal interpretations of others; and to develop standards of literary judgment.
• Tales of the Supernatural
  Monsters have haunted the literary imagination from earliest times (e.g., the Cyclops, Grendel, etc.), but a particular interest in horror and the Gothic form dates back to the 18th and early 19th century. The goals of this plan are to explore the origins and development of a literary genre; to investigate how shared imaginative concerns link the members of a literary period; to examine the evolution of a literary tradition; to compare works of literature from different eras.