Essential Lesson Structure: Charting

This one ended up being harder to do than I thought. Aimee Coates and I were working on STAAR test prep again. We wanted to work up these essential lesson structures with Tea Party, Charting, and Card Sort to show how you could use the same passage with any of the structures. When I started to create the materials for this example, I was stumped for a while. And then, the connections started to come. I had already read and explored the passage to develop the Tea Party example, but I hadn't worked all the way through the 25th paragraph. It wasn't until I had all the pieces plotted, and text highlighted that I began to really see the connections. For the purposes of this TEK, examining the influences of the setting on the plot, I think this lesson structure is probably my favorite choice.

Exploration and Gathering Information: 

1. For this activity, it is best that plot diagram has already been taught and students have already read the passage. We used the same text as the previous post. The one on Anne of Green Gables.

2. Students work in small groups and draw the Freytag's Pyramid on the chart paper.

3. Students have one marker per group. The teacher calls out an element or definition (setting, conflict, etc.) while students take turns passing the marker, and plotting the correct term on the chart. Tip: Give each group a different color marker. You'll see the reason when we get to the Refining and Reflecting stage of the lesson.

Consolidating and Collaborating: 

4. Students work in small groups to annotate the chart with the details from the text that belong with each element. Note: I have them take turns with the marker. This information is all in blue on the chart. (I forgot to take a picture before I added the next steps.) For this lesson, I really wanted to focus on what happened in the setting because it is critical in deeply understanding the rest of the text. What happens in the setting, really  - I'm sorry, but  - it sets the stage/scene for what happens next. I created a small character sociogram between Anne and Marilla to tease out the important details and text evidence phrases that clarified their personal conflicts.

As I worked through this process, I realized that this helped me focus more on the main conflict of the story. Many times, kids get an idea in their head and don't adjust the ideas when text evidence presents itself. I was guilty of this as well. Throughout the first reading, I'm pretty sure I did the same thing. I kept focusing on the conflict between the Aunt and Anne and lost some of the influence of how that relationship colored every other relationship Anne would develop. I had totally missed something important about why Diana was so important. More later on that.

Then, I plotted the rising action. It wasn't until this point that I realized that at first reading, I hadn't ever really figured out what the climax was. And I didn't really even consider that the author left us hanging. Sometimes, I think that when we give kids a form, they expect everything to have a space, a blank to be filled. Stories don't all work that way. I loved how this helped kids see where the climax really showed up. (I've had kids ask - when does the rising action end and the climax begin. This excerpt makes that pretty clear.) 

Note also the amount of summarizing and inferring can be done - "Anne does silly things at when she is introduced." 

Refining and Reflecting: 

5. Now students are ready to make the connections between the elements on the chart. Here's what it looked like when I placed it on the chart. 

I kept looking at paragraph 25, wondering what in the heck this paragraph was doing. At first, I thought it was overly done description just added in because it was a classic text. But what was it doing? I went back to the setting and reread the parts about the flowers on the hat and realized what was going on: Anne loved flowers. This garden was a treasure. It was Diana's garden. Maybe Diana would be someone who was more like her - even though her Aunt didn't approve! From there, the connections and similarities just flew as I was able to draw out more text evidence. 

If I were teaching this, I think I would model it first with how the setting influenced and increased the tension for the conflict in the story. Then I'd let the small groups tackle the rest together. We'd see what others discovered. I bet there are more ideas than I listed here. 

Whole Class Debrief: 

At this point, we'd post everyone's ideas and let each group read the posters of other groups. Each group would have a different colored marker. 

• Star: Most Interesting Idea - Groups would be ready to discuss why they felt this way. 
• Question Mark: Confused or Check - Groups would mark ideas they think need to be supported better, explained, or corrected Groups would compose a question on a sticky note they could use in the whole class discussion. 
• Plus Sign: Added detail, quote, information - Groups would add missing detail, provide text evidence, or alternate ideas to consider. 

Using the highlights from the annotations, each group would take a turn bringing up ideas to discuss as a class. 

For independent practice or closure, students would use one of the rehearsal and practice strategies or evidence from learning strategies from the Lead4Ward  I'm leaning toward 3 Way Thinking, One Minute Paper, or Ping-Pong Summary to describe what they have learned about the influence of setting on plot and how a reader can think through those connections.