To Kill a Mockingbird – Thematic Unit
Thematic Unit Index
(Nelle) Harper Lee
To Kill A Mockingbird
Stereotyping in American History:
the 1930sCan teaching strategies to improve reading of novels like To Kill a Mockingbird
counteract problems such as racism in our society?
1. Previous Standards-Based Unit(s) Taught:
This unit on the American novel follows units on the short story and on American history. It can enrich introductory units on the novel.
2. Future Standards-Based Units to Be Taught
This unit anticipates further units on the novel and other forms of fiction.
Prepare for Standardized Tests:
This unit will include relevant aspects of vocabulary, grammar, and spelling.
This unit includes practice in writing brief essays, responding to questions about the novel.
The essay skills include general organization, paragraph structure, and punctuation.
1. Students read and understand a variety of materials. Students will use a full range of strategies to comprehend . . . novels. Students extend their thinking and understanding as they read stories about people from similar and different backgrounds.
2. Students write and speak, with greater detail and supporting material, for a variety of purposes and audiences. Students will choose vocabulary and figures of speech, draft, revise, edit and proofread. Students will apply skills in analysis, synthesis, evaluation, and explanation, and incorporate source materials into their speaking and writing. Students will use the technical vocabulary of the content areas. Students will recognize stylistic elements such as voice and tone.
3. Students write and speak using conventional grammar, usage, sentence structure, punctuation, capitalization, and spelling. Students will expand spelling skills to include more complex words. Students will use resources such as spell checkers and dictionaries to monitor their spelling accuracy.
4. Students apply thinking skills to their reading to recognize an author's point of view and purpose, make predictions, draw conclusions, and analyze. Students will defend a point of view, determine literary quality based on elements such as the author's use of vocabulary, character development, plot development, description of setting, and use of dialogue.
5. Students read to locate, select, and make use of relevant information from a variety of media, reference, and technological sources. Students will use organizational features such as prefaces and appendices. Students will use organizational features of electronic information, such as hypertext and databases, to research and select relevant information and to produce documented end-products, including bibliographies.
6. Students read and recognize literature as a record of human experience. Students will read, respond to, and discuss a variety of novels and non-fiction, content-area and technical material. Students will discuss literature that represents points of view from places, people, and events that are familiar and unfamiliar. Students will distinguish the elements that define a literary "classic." Students will compare the diverse voices of our national experience as they read a variety of United States literature. Students will use literary terminology accurately, including setting, character, conflict, plot, resolution, theme, foreshadowing, and figurative language, and use new vocabulary from literature.
1. Students will read historical materials, as well as employ learning strategies to understand the novel, especially to understand the novel's characters from the South, in the context of racial conflict. Lesson four includes exercises to discover materials explaining historical allusions.
2. Students will discuss and write about tone and other stylistic elements in the novel, using technical vocabulary relevant to novels. The first lesson introduces elements of the novel, and subsequent lessons focus on particular elements.
3. Students will write exit slips daily, and other reflection items, using correct writing and speaking mechanics. Dictionaries are available for developing vocabulary and checking spelling. Students will sometimes use computers with spellcheck, and rubrics are designed to monitor this aspect of their work.
4. Students will discover the author's artistic skills by analyzing structural and thematic aspects of this novel. The third lesson focuses on the significance of stylistic aspects, and subsequent lessons climax in the lesson on theme.
5. Students will use computers to discover webpages relating to the novel, and to write short essays, including bibliographies.
6. Students will discover that To Kill a Mockingbird won the 1961 Pulitzer Prize for fiction. The students will discuss why this novel was awarded and what might determine a "classic." This unit is designed to show the elements that, if well done, could produce a quality piece of literary fiction.
1. Anticipation Guide
2. Elements of Fiction Worksheet
3. Exit Slip - Anticipation
4. Plot Diagram
5. Journaling Chart
6. Exit Slip - Plot
7. Title Quotes
8. Prediction Guide
9. Exit Slip - Author/Narration
10. Historical Allusions - KWL
11. Internet Search - Maps
12. Exit Slip - Setting
13. Vocabulary
14. Courtroom Vocabulary
15. Word Search
16. Crossword Puzzle
17. Computer Lab - Spellcheck
18. Exit Slip - Language/Style
19. Venn Diagram
20. Character Chart
21. Exit Slip - Characterization
22. Imagery - KWL
23. Imagery Content Definition
24. Imagery/Symbolism Chart
25. "Mockingbird" Organizer
26. Exit Slip - Imagery
27. Elements/Theme Worksheet
28. Thematic Quotes
29. Exit Slip - Theme
30. Storyboard
31. Internet Search - TKM
32. Drama/Film Day
33. Exit Slip - Drama/Film
34. Practice Quizzes
35. TKM Unit Exam
36. Guided Reading
37. Cloze Activity
38. Chapter Summary Worksheet
39. Documentation Guide
40. Awards - Internet/Posters
41. Author Notes
42. Minilesson - Point of View
43. Minilesson - Key Image
44. Minilesson - Elements/Theme
45. Portfolio Process
Computers/Projectors
Maps of Alabama
Dred Scott Case (1857)
Mockingbirds
Elements of Fiction
Exit Slip
Journaling Chart
Exit Slip
Prediction Guide
Exit Slip
Maps
Exit Slip
Word Search
Exit Slip
Character Chart
Exit Slip
Concept Definition
Exit Slip
Understanding Fiction
Exit Slip
Internet Links
Exit Slip
TKM Exam Key
TKM
Portfolio Index
Portfolio Title Page
Minilesson - Elements/Theme
Minilesson - Key Image
Classic Notes
Homepage
Graduate Readings
Last Revised: January 21, 2005
Colorado Model Content Standards: History
Pulitzer Prize in Letters (May 1, 1961)
Newbery Medal List, 1922 to the Present
