A Glimpse of The Grapes of Wrath
Author: Catharine Niuzzo Honaman
Editor: Stephanie Nardei
Time:
5 classes
Preparation 1 hour to read the lesson and to look through the
Time:
supporting web sites
Materials:
Rent a copy of the 1940’s movie of The Grapes of
Wrath
The first chapter of The Grapes of Wrath
Abstract
The students explored the Native American sense of place and have a
deeper understanding of their own relationship with the place in which they
live. This lesson familiarizes students with John Steinbeck’s famous
portrayal of the life of the Midwestern farmers forced to move from their land by the Dust Bowl
conditions during the Great Depression.
Purpose – This is the Engage lesson. There are two purposes for this lesson and this is the
second learning cycle:
 To connect ideas introduced in the initial learning cycle about our sense of place with
material learned this quarter in American history about migrations in the history of the
United States.
 To illustrate how the human experience is strongly tied to understanding and working
productively with the chemistry concepts being currently studied in science class.
Objectives
Students will be able to:
1. Place the location and time in history in which The Grapes of Wrath takes place;
2. Identify the major characters in The Grapes of Wrath and describe how their lives were
changed by an environmental disaster;
3. Write a timeline of the significant events in The Grapes of Wrath highlighting how a
change in the environmental conditions triggers events in human experience;
4. Identify and explain two important themes in The Grapes of Wrath that relate to a sense
of place and how the environment has a direct affect on people’s lives.
National Language Arts Standards:
Standard #2
Students read a wide range of literature from many periods in many genres to build an
understanding of the many dimensions (e.g., philosophical, ethical, aesthetic) of human
experience.
Standard #3
Students apply a wide variety of strategies to comprehend, interpret, evaluate, and
appreciate texts. They draw on their prior experience, their interactions with others readers and
writers, their knowledge of word meanings and of other texts, their identification strategies, and
their understanding of textual features (e.g., sound-letter correspondence, sentence structure,
context, and graphics).
Arizona State Standards:
VP-P1. Analyze and evaluate visual media for language, subject matter, and visual
techniques used to influence attitudes, decision making, and cultural perceptions.
WRITING, Grade 11
Concept 5: Literary Responses
c. analyzes the way in which the theme, or meaning of a selection, represents a
view or comment on life, providing textual evidence for the identified theme
Teacher Background
You need to have a general understanding of the Great Depression and know the plot of John
Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath. Of course, the more you know about both of these topics the better
a resource you will be for this lesson.
Related and Resource Websites
Detailed summary chapter by chapter, plus maps and a character list:
http://www.ac.wwu.edu/~stephan/Steinbeck/grapes.html
In-depth analysis chapter by chapter of the book:
http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/grapesofwrath/summary.html
Grapes of Wrath novel on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Grapes_of_Wrath
Grapes of Wrath film on Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Grapes_of_Wrath_%28film%29
The 1st three chapters of the novel:
http://pulse.pharmacy.arizona.edu/resources/fertilizers/wrath.pdf [PDF]
Activity
1. The students explored the Native American sense of place and have a deeper
understanding of their own relationship with the place in which they live. At different
times in American history people from many different backgrounds have been forced to
relocate. Ask students to describe what happened to the population of New Orleans in
the summer of 2005 after Hurricane Katrina.
2. Natural disasters have often necessitated massive human migrations, and the history of
the United States has notable examples of this. Ask students to think of other times
people have moved from their homes due to climatic conditions or natural disasters. One
example is the Great Depression. The Midwest experienced a terrible drought at the
same time the economy bottomed out. Ask students to define the Great Depression and
describe what happened to family farms in the Midwest. Do they know who the Oakies
were? These were the farm families who lost their land (through foreclosure due to failed
harvests) and were forced by hard economic times to migrate to California to become
sharecroppers.
3. Have students read the first chapter of The Grapes of Wrath. As they read ask them to
write down:





Where does the story take place?
Describe the area in May.
Describe the area beginning in mid-June.
What environmental disaster occurred?
How would living in the conditions described at the end of the chapter affect a
person mentally, physically, and economically?
4. After students have finished reading the first chapter and writing down the answers to the
above questions, discuss what they learned about the setting of The Grapes of Wrath.
The students now know that the story takes place in Oklahoma. You can tell them this is
the beginning of the horrible Dust Bowl conditions that occurred during the Great
Depression. Some of the students may have already read The Grapes of Wrath or know
about it marginally; these students can be resources for the class. For those who have
not read the novel ask them to predict what kinds of themes they can expect from a book
whose beginning they just read.
5. Some possible themes suggested by the first chapter may be:

People verses nature

Endurance in times of great tribulation

People’s reliance on family and their community

Nature as a reflection of the human world (the Dust Bowl happened at the same
time as the Great Depression)
6. After the students established the somber tone and possible themes of The Grapes of
Wrath have them watch the movie over the next three days. While they are watching this
classic they need to work on the following:

A timeline of the important events in the story highlighting how a change in
environmental conditions triggers events in the human experience

A list of characters:
i. The major characters – describe their personalities and physical
attributes
ii. The minor characters – describe how they move the plot along or give
insight into one of the major characters

A description of the setting in the various locations and times

An explanation of how this story illustrates two themes:
i. How is “a sense of place” explored in this story?
ii. How the environment has a direct affect on people’s lives and is tied to
their physical wellbeing and disease?
7. Viewing the movie should take approximately three class periods. So the first day of class
should be spent in preparation for viewing the movie in the context of looking for the two
themes of The Grapes of Wrath that relate to a sense of place and how the environment
has a direct affect on people’s lives.
The next three days will be spent watching the movie and taking notes. The last day of
the lesson will be in class discussion pulling together the four literary elements:
 character
 setting (time and place)

plot

theme
8. The Grapes of Wrath presents a stellar example of how the setting of an environmental
disaster affects the physical location, the characters, and the plot of a novel. The themes
are intricately woven through the events triggered by changes in the physical
environment. Ask students how watching the movie in black and white intensified themes
and underscored the desperation of the times. Did seeing the story filmed in the 1940’s
make them feel as if it was almost a documentary since it was so close in time to the
actual events? What other benefits were there to seeing the movie?
Closure
In the first learning cycle the Native American sense of place was explored in detail. In examining
the forced migration of peoples due to political policy the component of environmental health
issues connected to place was introduced. This learning cycle deals with the Great Depression
and its impact on mainstream Americans who were forced to leave their “place” due to an
environmental disaster. In looking at how the characters in The Grapes of Wrath were affected
by their migration from Oklahoma to California ask students to speculate how the change in living
conditions, both connected to location and to financial status, affected characters’ health in The
Grapes of Wrath. Could any of these illnesses or physical problems be connected to
environmental health issues?
Embedded Assessment
Students learning for this lesson can be assessed by each student’s class participation, how well
he or she stayed on task while watching the movie and taking notes on it, and the quality of the
written work. You may wish to put further requirements on the written work if you intend to collect
it for more in-depth evaluation.
Homework
None assigned