Ryan Copeland Term IV Integrated Assignment Three lessons Writing Bio-Poems Goals: Students will deepen their understanding

of identity by writing a bio-poem, which moves beyond basic descriptors and asks students to express their hopes, fears, accomplishments and other aspects of their identities in written form. Materials and preparation: Identity charts from previous day My own bio-poem Bio-poem guidelines Thesauruses Notebook paper Pens or pencils Revision guidelines Laptops Arrangement and management: The classroom will be set up as normal, with students in their usual desks. This lesson will primarily consist of independent work. We will follow a writers workshop format, with the students working quietly on their writing at their desks. They will go through the usual classroom revision process: self-revision, peer revision, and then teacher revision. This is an established routine with which they will be familiar. Lesson Plan: This lesson will take part on the second day of this unit on personal identity. I will present the lesson to the students by asking what they think a bio-poem might be. (What type of writing comes to mind when you hear/see bio?) After this brief discussion, I will ask a student to pass out the bio-poem guidelines, which lays out the format and components of this assignment. I will review these guidelines with them, and then read my own bio-poem aloud, so they have an example of how it should look and sound. I will provide time for clarifying questions about the assignment. This introduction should take about 10 minutes. Then, I will turn the students over to work independently. I will encourage them to use their identity charts from the day before to get some ideas. I will circulate through the room to check in with students and address any questions or needs. The expectation is that students will be writing quietly, although total silence is not expected. Because bio-poems are not particularly long, students should be finishing with their rough drafts and transitioning into the revision process after about 20 minutes of focused writing. They will then go through each stage of the revision process, which will take another 15 minutes. After it has been revised, they will take a laptop from the laptop cart and type their final drafts. Because they type slowly, this final stage will likely take another 20 minutes.

At this point, we will have been working for just over an hour. I will allow an extra ten minutes for students who are finished to share their poems. Meanwhile, students who are still working will have time to finish up. Students who finish early and have already shared their poem with a few others can either read quietly or go on First in Math. Any students who still do not finish their final drafts will be able to stay in the classroom during prep to finish. Total time: 75 minutes Assessment of goals: Throughout the process of writing, I will be checking in with students to see how they are faring with the assignment. The bio-poem itself will ultimately serve as the final assessment. I will be checking to see that they followed the format, challenged themselves to use powerful language, and included items that really are an important part of their identities in other words, evidence that the student gave this piece of writing some thought and truth. I realize that this may be difficult to assess. When all the students have completed their biopoems (which may not be until the following day), I plan to discuss whether the poems or the identity charts are a better expression of identity. This will serve as a formative assessment to see whether and to what extent students have used these activities to engage with the issue of personal identity. Anticipating student responses: Frankly, I dont expect too many management issues only because I am implementing a lesson structure and writing process that is very familiar to the students. There should be few questions about the expectations for their behavior or responsibilities. Furthermore, between the guideline and the example, I would like to believe that students will be confident in the expectations for the poem, as well. I will be able to clear up any points of confusion as I circulate through the room. One potential concern is that students may feel uncomfortable sharing anything very serious about themselves, and thus take a defensive attitude toward the assignment. This could result in shallow or silly poems. Of course, my goal is not to have students share intimate secrets, but I would like them to be able to use poetry to write something meaningful. Fortunately, I will be able to read rough drafts during the revision process, and thus can conference with students who might be taking an unserious approach. Accommodations: We do have three students in our class with reading and writing skills that are well below grade level. However, they have been able to participate in most of the writing assignments throughout the year; they simply need a bit more scaffolding throughout the writing. I may have to spend some extra time with them to make sure that they understand the assignment and to help them generate ideas for their writing. Any writing errors will be addressed during the revision process.

Still alive? Using media to introduce contemporary racism Goals: Students will be able to express, in writing and speech, their opinion on whether racism still plays a role in contemporary society, based on video clips and images from Katrina, as well as their own experiences. Materials and preparation: Newspaper photos from Katrina, with captions Laptop Promethean Board ABC News What Would You Do? video clip Notebook paper Pencils or pens Classroom arrangement and management issues The students will be seated in their usual desks, facing the Promethean Board. Later in the lesson, they will need to find a partner with which to chat. This can be fairly easily accomplished since most of the desks are in pairs. In terms of management, my primary concern with this lesson is how the students will react to a frank examination of racism, specifically racism toward black Americans. Throughout this year, the students have expressed a keen interest in black history, including Jim Crow-era racism. However, its presentation as history potentially buffers the emotional impact upon the students. Will the students feel angry, confused or otherwise uncomfortable with this discussion? My hope and expectation is that they feel motivated and engaged by dealing with such a meaningful issue, but I must anticipate a different response. Lesson plan: I want to begin this lesson by tying it to the previous discussions about historical racism that we have had through the year. (What are some examples of racism that weve looked at this year? Segregation, slavery, and Dr. Kings assassination are some examples.) Then, I will ask for a simple show of hands: Raise your hand if you think that theres no more racism today. Now raise your hands if you think that racism still exists in some way. I will ask some students to share their justifications either way. After a few students share aloud, I will ask each student to write down their opinion as a one-paragraph response on a piece of paper. They will hold on to the piece of paper when finished. This opening discussion and writing activity should take about 15 minutes. Next, I will play the clip from What Would You Do? This clip shows, with a hidden camera, people responding to situations in which nothing is changed but the race of the actors involved. The excerpt I will show takes place in a parking lot of a suburban park. The scenario is that a group of teenaged boys is vandalizing a car; in the first scenario the boys are all white and in the second they are black. Passersby respond differently to the two groups of boys. Between scenarios, I will pause the video and ask students to predict whether things will go differently when the teenagers are black. We will then finish the video

and discuss what we saw. Questions for discussion might include: What did you feel as you were watching this? Is this racism? Have you, or has someone you know, ever had an experience like this? This should take about 25 minutes. From here, I will ask why people might have behaved differently toward the black teenagers. In other words, What makes people racist? Are they born that way, or do they become that way through outside influences? We will take a few minutes to discuss these questions as a group, and then I will pass out handouts that show side-by-side images from newspapers that were taken and printed during Hurricane Katrina. They both depict stranded residents wading through water with food that they had just recovered from a grocery store. One set of residents is white, the other black; the black residents are identified in the caption as looters, however. I will give the students a few moments to look over the images as I read the captions aloud. Then, I will ask them to discuss with a partner whats different about the two images and their captions. After a minute or two, we will bring the discussion back to the whole group. This will take about 15 minutes. Finally, I will ask students to return to their one-paragraph responses from the beginning of the lesson. I will ask them to respond to their responses, so to speak, to see if the video and pictures strengthened or challenged their previous beliefs. They will be given 5 minutes to write, and then they will turn in their papers at the back table. Total time: 60 minutes Assessment of goals: Due to the fact that this lesson is so highly centered on group discussion, student comments and apparent engagement during discussions will serve as the primary assessment of goals. However, there are a few students in the class who tend to keep quiet during group discussions. At other times, I have used Popsicle sticks or even the occasional cold-call to ensure that these students voices are heard. However, given this particular topic of discussion, I feel in this instance that students should have a bit more freedom to remain silent if they choose. I incorporated the written response for that reason, since it will ensure I get some sense of where all the students are regarding this topic. Anticipating student responses: During this lesson, I need to be ready for a wide range of responses. Anger, sadness, confusion, and discomfort are all possible. It is important to note that I do not consider these feelings to be negative outcomes. My goal is not to upset my students, but I also believe that a strong emotional response signifies that students are deeply engaging with the material, and that some learning and growth are presumably taking place. I have facilitated discussions about racism with students before, and have found it very effective and reassuring for the students to explicitly state up-front that, if at any point they feel uncomfortable, they must feel free to say so. Accommodations: As I wrote in the assessment section, I have incorporated a writing assignment into this lesson primarily to accommodate those few students who tend to feel uncomfortable speaking during class discussions. I also anticipate the potential need to summarize what

happened in the video and to read the newspaper captions aloud, to clear up any possible confusion regarding the medias meaning. Do we have different identities for different situations? Goals: Students will be able to analyze the metaphorical language in Paul Laurence Dunbars poem We Wear the Mask. They will apply this analysis to their own thinking about identity, specifically to answer the question of whether we have different identities in different contexts. Materials and preparation: Print-outs of We Wear the Mask Writing paper Printer paper Pens, pencils, markers, colored pencils Scissors Classroom arrangement and management issues: During the reading of the poem and the subsequent discussion, students will be seated at their desks. As they are working on their masks, I may give them the option to pull their desks together and chat as they work, provided that they can keep it under control. I do not anticipate any particular issues with management. Lesson plan: This lesson will function similarly to the shared reading we have been doing throughout the school year. Each student will receive a copy of the poem. Because none of our students are reading at grade level, I will read the whole poem aloud. Then, we will go back reread it, this time with the students each reading an excerpt. I will pause at certain moments in the reading to facilitate a brief discussion of what we have read. This will ensure that students are on the same page and will serve to deepen their comprehension. I will be asking questions that will encourage the students to summarize the text, make inferences, and analyze the figurative language being used. Upon completion of the poem, we will discuss Dunbars use of the extended metaphor of wearing masks. Specifically, we will use this metaphor think about whether they wear masks, so to speak, in their daily lives. Do you ever act differently than you might want in order to fit in? When and where do you have to wear a mask? When and where do you feel like you can really be yourself? This shared reading and subsequent discussion will take 30 minutes. Next, we will move onto the assessment. Typically during such lessons, the students write a constructed response. This is something that they feel quite comfortable doing. However, to incorporate something a little new and different, I will give students the option of a more creative response to the idea presented in the poem: students will be able to draw two masks that represent how they act in two different contexts. They must express their behavior using visual clues that are included on the mask. For example, a student might draw a tightlyclosed mouth to show that they are quiet or serious in a particular setting. For those students who still prefer to express themselves in writing rather than visually, I will also provide a constructed response prompt, which will be a simple compare/contrast essay. Students will

have the choice to do one or the other. They will have 20 minutes to complete their responses, and we will save 10 minutes at the end for interested students to share their masks or constructed responses. Total time: 60 minutes Assessment of goals: Through their masks or written responses, students should be able to show that they understand the use of masks as a metaphor to represent the way that we may have different identities within different contexts. They should include at least four differences between the two masks. Anticipating student responses: I anticipate some possible difficulties with the content of the poem and the expectations of the assignment. The students may have a difficult time interpreting the poem in a meaningful way, but I hope that reading it together will lead to enough scaffolding so that students do not feel lost. I think that it will be very important to clearly outline the expectation for the mask-drawing assignment, too, since the students are rarely asked to express their ideas visually, and it may be difficult for them to understand how to represent their behavior within this somewhat limited format. Having said that, the mask itself is less important than the understanding about identity that it represents, so if students choose to take some creative liberties with the assignment I will not be concerned, so long as it still seems to display some understanding. Accommodations: Again, I am choosing to read the poem aloud myself and then reread it to accommodate for the fact that none of my students is reading at grade level and they would likely have difficulty comprehending the poem on their own. Three of my students also struggle with written expression, and the opportunity to draw rather than write will be a good opportunity for them to express themselves more competently and confidently.