ELA 8
Unit 1:Urban Setting In America
Anchor Question:
What does the urban setting
contribute to these stories?
Focus Standards:
Rl.8.1 W.8.3
SL.8.1
Rl.8.6
L.8.4
Overview
• Students continue to explore characters and
plots, but this unit takes a unique approach to
examining how setting, directly or indirectly,
affects these story elements. Students work on
citing textual evidence that reveals the setting,
analyze the effect of the setting on individuals
and events, and write their own urban narrative.
This unit ends with an informative/explanatory
essay in response to the essential question.
Introductory Activity for the Year
• Introductory Activity (for the Year): You will be
reading a variety of literature and informational
texts this year, including some genres that you may
not have read before. On the Scholastic Reading
counts website, students will research and create a
spreadsheet of a list of genres (such as adventure,
historical fiction, comedy, ancient history, science
fiction, and fantasy) that interest them.
• Be sure to select titles, and topics, of enduring
interest.
• One of your goals by the end of the year is to read
books from at least four genres that are new to you.
(RL.8.10, RI.8.10)
Vocabulary
• Find the following information for each
vocabulary word: Definition, part of speech,
synonyms. (Graphic Organizer)
• Create an illustration/art piece with all
vocabulary. (Drawing)
▫ Examples: comic, collage, abstract, cartoon,
realistic view, setting
• Vocabulary List: urban, urbanization, suburban,
city, citify, metropolitan, metropolis
• Rubric
Anchor Question:
What does the urban setting contribute to these
stories?
• Teacher reads, Alphabet City and City by Numbers
by Stephen T. Johnson
• Students analyze the books with the following
questions before and after the reading:
▫ What was the author’s purpose in creating these texts?
▫ How can we use these books to begin looking at cities
(urban settings) in a different way?
▫ What are the advantages and disadvantages to using
picture books to examine setting?
• Choose the letter of your first name and last name
and make an initial art piece with a drawing or
pictures from home (magazine/printed) to create
the letters.
• Rubric
Anchor Question:
What does the urban setting contribute to these
stories?
• Different accounts, same event. 9/11 (Graphic Organizer)
• Explore The Building of Manhattan by Donald Mackay. (short
story)
▫ What does it take to build a city like New York City?
▫ What were the two most important factors that helped in the
construction of Manhattan?
▫ How are the people of New York City connected to the buildings?
• Analyze the song, video, and non-fiction text (National
Geographic Story/Blog) by answering the questions before,
during, and after each:
▫ Compare the questions answered about The Building of
Manhattan to the empathy you have for the people who went
through this tragic event. Does that change the way you
think/feel about the victims and/or citizens as they went through
this tragedy?
▫ How does each resource (media) make connections or
distinctions among individuals, ideas, or events?
▫ What is similar and/or different about those connections?
▫ How does the urban setting contribute to this tragic event in our
history?
• Continue on next slide…
Anchor Question:
What does the urban setting contribute to
these stories?
• Now that we have researched the tragedy of 9-11 through a plethora
of resources, I want you to create a memorial to the city of New
York, it’s people, and of coarse the buildings.
• Groups choose an assignment: Rubric(Make changes to rubric)
▫ RAFT: R=The Twin Towers, Audience=People of New York City, F=song
and/or thank you letter, T=You built me, loved me, used me.
▫ Dramatic Skit: Students will memorialize the tragedy of 9-11 through a
dance and/or movements with music and/or words.
▫ Play: Create a short play with characters (human or not) to memorialize
the city, the buildings, and the people of New York. This can include
puppets.
▫ Create a Gift Box: Students will make and decorate a box including gifts
to give to the people of New York today as they remember the tragedy.
Students will verbally present each object to the class.
Anchor Question:
What does the urban setting contribute to these
stories?
• Read and compare the portrayal of the grocery bag in the
short story book, Bag in the Wind by Ted Kooser to The
Evolution of the Grocery Bag by Henry Petoski. Note Sheet
▫ Share comparisons with partners and class.
▫ How does the structure (types) affect the meaning?
• Read haiku poems from Stone Bench in an Empty Park by
Paul Janeczko and concrete poems from Technically, It’s Not
My Fault by John Grandits.
▫ The teacher will show students a tutorial of the different poems as
students take notes and share them with their partners.
▫ Then the teacher will read several haiku and concrete poems as
an example.
▫ Finally, each student will have a copy of one of each type of poem
and analyze its formation. Students will describe how they know
it is one type of poem or the other.
• Write a haiku poem and/or concrete poem about an object
similar to a grocery bag that may be found in an urban setting
like Baton Rouge and recite it to the class with a visual. Rubric
• Video of tutorial
Anchor Question:
What does the urban setting contribute to these
stories?
• Read a The Great Fire synopsis and study guide
and find the character(s), plot(s), theme(s), and
setting(s) from a story about urban America.
▫ Identify: character, plot, theme, setting, implicit,
explicit, implied, stated
▫ Read The Great Fire synopsis and study guide
▫ As you read, fill out the graphic organizer.
▫ How does the setting affect the story? Note pages
numbers and if the information is implied or
stated. (implicit or explicit)
Anchor Question:
What does the urban setting contribute to these
stories?
• Use the following picture as inspiration to
create your own original story with an urban
setting and if time allows, create a photostory.
• Answer the question before, during, and after
your story: How does the urban setting
contribute to the story?
• Assignment directions and tips
• Plan, draft, publish, present
• Rubric
Anchor Question:
What does the urban setting contribute to these
stories?
• Compare and contrast the characters, plots,
themes, and settings in your narrative to the film
of the students choice.
▫ Compare and contrast to the previous story read
with another work with an urban setting.
▫ Compare and contrast the characters, plots,
themes, and settings. Emphasize the affect/effect
of the urban setting on all of the elements.
▫ Create a venn diagram to show the similarities and
differences between the two stories elements.
Anchor Question:
What does the urban setting contribute to these
stories?
• Now write an essay answering the anchor
question: Anchor Question: What does the
urban setting contribute to these stories?
▫ Explore types of essay writing and establish a label
for this one. Use a place mat.
▫ Use the writing process
▫ Use evidence from the different resources used in
this unit such as: books, short stories, articles,
videos, non-fiction text, poetry, etc.
▫ Rubric