The Giver
by Lois Lowry
Reading 7
Introduction
Bell Work
• What is a Utopia?
• What is a Dystopia?
• Pay careful attention to the underlined
words on the following slide. On a piece
of notebook paper, write down what you
think each word means. Note what it is
from the passage that makes you think
this.
• Massive dehumanization, totalitarian
government, rampant disease, post-apocalyptic
terrains, cyber-genetic technologies, societal
chaos and widespread urban violence are some
of the common themes in dystopian films which
bravely examine the ominous shadow cast by
the future.
• Maybe, people speculated, if any society were
completely reorganized, it could be regenerated
and, ultimately, perfected. Utopia was sought in
America through the creation of model
communities within the greater society.
Introduction
Lois Lowry speaks…
About growing up
About the importance of education
about “The Giver”
Novel Journals
Introduction
• As you read the novel, you will be asked
to record your thoughts.
• You will set up a Novel Journal.
• The front page should have your name,
the title of the book you are reading, and
your class period.
• You will add to this journal each day, so
bring it to class! Better yet, leave it in the
room!
• Label each page with the title from that
day’s slide.
Introduction
Anticipation Guide
• You will complete an anticipation guide
over The Giver.
• This will start you thinking about some of
the big questions the novel addresses.
• Likert scale
• Explanation of opinion
Introduction
Essential Questions
• We will consider the following questions
during our study of The Giver.
– What are the characteristics of a community?
– How do members of the community affect one
another?
– Is belonging to a community a good thing?
– Should the government restrict personal
freedoms for the good of the community?
• Record these in the first page of your
journal.
Theme/Motiffs
(note where these come up in the book)
•
•
•
•
•
Individual vs. Society
Freedom vs. Choice
Feeling and Emotions
Coming of Age
Memory
Pre-reading Chapters 1-2
Rules
• As you listen to Chapters 1 and 2, write
down at least 3 rules from the community
in your novel journal.
• You will share these rules with your
teammates & the class once we are
finished reading.
Chapters 1-2
Journals: Rules (write)
• What rules did you notice? Discuss in
partners in your team.
• With your partner, write in your novel
journal some rules that we have to follow
in our community. Which one is your least
favorite rule and why?
• Individually, write down a rule that you
have broken. Turn this in to me. Do not
write your name on this paper!
Chapters 1-2
Learning Activity – Setting
(write)
• Setting is… (write it in your journal!)
• Haiku – in your journal
– select a key scene from the novel where the
setting is described.
– reread the passage and copy the important
descriptive words.
– choose 2-3 images that stand out.
– arrange words in Haiku form: 5-7-5
Chapters 1-2
Learning Activity – A letter
home (write)
• You just read chapters 1 and 2 that
described Jonas’ family and their lives.
Pretend you just went on a visit to Jonas’
house.
• Write a letter to one of your family
members describing the experience and
the way Jonas and his family live.
• Compare how your life is similar or
different than Jonas’ life.
Pre-reading Chapters 3-4
Bell Work (discuss)
• In your journal, write a few sentences
answering the following question. Support
your opinion with inferences (at least 2)
you have made from the text.
• Is Jonas’s community a utopia or a
dystopia?
Pre-reading Chapters 3-4
Euphemism
• a word or phrase used in place of a term
that might be considered too direct, harsh,
unpleasant, or offensive
• examples:
– pass away (die)
– break wind (fart)
– be sick (vomit)
– pink slip (get fired)
• other examples??
Pre-reading Chapters 3-4
Learning Activity: Language of
Utopia
• People in Jonas’s community use a lot of
special words. You’ll have to use context
to figure out their meaning.
• Identify eight words and their meaning by
going back and looking at the first two
chapters.
• As you read chapters 3 & 4, be on the
lookout for more special words.
Chapters 3-4
Journals: Assignments
1. List at least three assignments that have
been mentioned in the book so far.
2. Which of the assignments, if you had to
choose, would best fit your personality?
3. What can you infer about this community
based on these assignments?
Chapter 5-6
Bell Work
• Packet Check
• Work on the activity sheet from Mr. Reed
• We will go over it as a class.
Chapter 5
Journals: Choices
1. What choices you can make in your daily
life?
2. What choices can Jonas and the citizens
in this community make?
3. How are your choices different then the
choices Jonas can make?
4. What can we infer about the community
based on what we know about the
choices citizens can make?
Chapter 6
Journals: Ceremony
Read the following passage:
We dressed the baby in the white gown and
went to church for the ceremony. Water was
sprinkled on his head and prayers were said.
A candle was lit. Afterward, we posed for
pictures and ate cake. Our baby was
baptized.
Based on the passage, what is a ceremony?
What characteristics do all ceremonies
share?
Chapter 6
Journals: Ceremony
• What types of ceremonies have you
attended in your life? What stands out to
you as important about each of the
ceremonies?
• Ceremony is defined as: a formal event to
celebrate or honor something; a rite or
ritual.
• How close was your definition?
Pre-reading Chapters 7-8
Bell Work
Journals: Assigned vs. Selected
• Read the following passage from the
novel. Pay careful attention to the
underlined words.
• “Jonas has not been assigned. Jonas has
been selected…The selection must be
sound. It must be a unanimous choice of
the Committee” (48).
• What does assigned mean?
• What does selected mean?
Ceremony of 12
Chapters 7-8
Dear Student,
Today you will go through the Ceremony
of Twelve and be assigned a job from
the world of The Giver. You will be given
the opportunity to write about your
feelings after being given this
Assignment. Finally, we will have a
sharing of feelings as a class.
Thank you for your childhood!
MR. Reed
Chapters 7-8
Learning Activity: Assignment
As you write your response to your Assignment, use the
following questions to guide your thinking.
• Introduce me to your Assignment. What job have you been
assigned? What activities will you be expected to perform for
this job?
• Tell me about your views of this job. Do you think you will
enjoy this job? Do you think this will be a job you will be able
to do successfully?
• Tell me whether or not you think this job fits your personality.
Do you think your personality fits with what you will be
required to do?
• Imagine if you were assigned this job in “real” life, then tell me
about what you think would be the best thing about having this
job and what would be the worst thing about having this job.
• Your written response should be a minimum of 8 sentences
(that’s two sentences for each bullet point!).
Chapters 9-10
Bell Work
• Free write for about five minutes on the
topic of:
• Some questions to spur your thinking: are
memories always good? how do our
memories affect our lives? our future?
Should bad memories be erased?
Learning Activity: Town
Historian
Chapters 9-10
• You are a town historian. You are tasked
with recording the memories of older
people in your community so the city’s
past is not forgotten.
• You will conduct an interview with a local
resident who has resided here for most of
their life.
• You will write a narrative account based
on your interview.
Journals: Memories
Chapter 11
The memories Jonas receives are very
detailed. These details give the reader a
mental picture of what is happening. These
pictures are created using imagery.
• Write down at least 3 of the phrases
from Chapter 11 that help you create
a mental picture.
• Tell me which of the five senses you
used to create the image of this
scene.
Learning Activity: Jonas’s
Characteristics
Chapter 12
• In pairs, discuss the context of the words
used to describe Jonas. Then write down
what you think each of the words means
based on this and the synonyms we
discussed.
Pre-reading Chapter 13
Bell Work
• What is your favorite color?
• Why do you love this color so much?
• What do you think your favorite color says
about you?
Chapter 13
Journals: Color
Jonas now understands that he can see COLOR.
The Giver explains that one time everything had a
quality called color, but that when they went to
Sameness the colors went away.
• What do you think about their decision to
lose color?
• If they lost color, what do you think they
gained?
Chapter 13
Learning Activity: True Colors
• You will complete a survey that seeks to
define your personality based on colors.
• Complete the survey
• Meet up with your classmates who are the
same color as you
• Discuss: do you think your personality
really fits the description for the color you
wound up with? why or why not?
Chapter 13
Learning Activity: Color Jonas’s
World
1. Pick your favorite scene from the book so
far.
2. Draw the scene the way everyone in the
community sees it (black and white,
shades of gray).
3. Draw it again the way Jonas and The
Giver see it (in full color).
4. Write a paragraph explaining what you
think is good and bad about having color
in our lives today.
Pre-reading Chapters 14 and 15
Bell Work
• In your journal, write about a time you felt
lonely. Were you able to make yourself feel
better? How?
• Read chapters 14 & 15.
• Return to your journal. How is Jonas’s
loneliness different from yours? Are there
similarities? What are they?
Chapters 14 and 15
Journal: Choices
• Go back to your journal from chapter 5 and
look at the choices you are able to make
each day.
• How would your choices be different in this
community? What sorts of things would be
completely out of your hands?
Chapters 14 and 15
Journal: Choices
• Now that we know a little more about the
choices that were made for the community,
let’s stop and think about them. You will
answer four questions about the following
parts of the community.
– Climate Control
– Sameness
– Assignments
– Matching of Spouses
– Family Units
1. What caused the community to choose to
implement these changes? Make an inference for
each.
2. What effect does each change have on the
members of the community? Give examples from
the text and/or make inferences.
3. Which of the choices listed do you think is the
most beneficial for the community? Why? Support
your answer with at least two reasons. You have
to pick one!
4. Which of the choices listed do you think is the
least beneficial, or even harmful, for the
community? Why? Support your answer with at
least two reasons.
Chapters 16 and 17
Journal: Memories – The Good and
The Bad
• Now that we have seen that not all the
memories are good, does that change
your views on the need for one person to
“hold” all the memories for the
community?
• Why do you think Jonas’ first lie to his
parents was important?
• What do you think Jonas means when he
tells Gabe that things could change?
Chapter 18
Journal: Rosemary
• How does Rosemary’s training impact
Jonas’s training?
• Why do you think The Giver tells Jonas
about Rosemary’s failure?
• The Giver says “…I suppose I could help
the whole community the way I’ve helped
you” (106). Infer what he might be thinking
here.
Pre-reading Chapters 19 and 20
Bell Work: Release
• Now that we’ve progressed further into the
novel, what do you think it means to be
released? Support your opinion with
inferences from the text. Write your
answer in your journal.
Journal: Climax
Chapter 19
• Why is Chapter 19 a turning point in the
book?
• What do you think will be the outcome of
Jonas’s new realization?
• What would you do if you were Jonas?
• Make a prediction about what Jonas will
do and then read chapter 20 to find out.
Journal: Escape
Chapter 20
• What do you think about Jonas’s plan?
How does it match up with your
prediction?
• What problems do you foresee for Jonas
as he attempts his escape?
• Answer these questions in your journal
first. Next, you will share with a partner.
Chapters 19 and 20
Journal: Rules Revisited
• Remember the list of broken rules you
made at the start of the novel?
• We are going to revisit those rules now
that we know what release is.
Chapters 19 and 20
Learning Activity: Release
• Complete the assignment about Release
on your own.
Pre-reading Chapters 21 and 22
Journal: Predictions
• Make some predictions about Jonas’s
escape. What problems might he
encounter?
Chapters 21 and 22
Journal: Predictions
• Look back at your predictions for chapters
21 and 22. Do you need to revise them? If
so, do that now.
• In your teams, share your predictions and
the revisions you had to make.
Pre-reading Chapter 23
Bell Work: Final chapter!
• Write what you think will happen to Jonas
and Gabe in the last chapter. Include at
least five sentences.
Journal: The End
Chapter 23
• How will Jonas’s leaving change his
community?
• Given what you know now about utopias
and dystopias, how would you classify
Jonas’ community? Give me at least two
reasons for your choice.
• How does this book affect your views of a
perfect world?
• Why do you think this book has been
challenged by so many people?
Chapter 23
Learning Activity: Letter to
Elders
• You have been chosen by the Council of
Elders to create a new experimental form
of government on an island upriver from
the community.
• This new community will be subject to the
community rules except for changes you
will implement.
• The elders are interested in seeing how
community members would handle going
back to some of the old ways of life.
Chapter 23
Learning Activity: Letter to
Elders
• You will address the following issues in
your experimental community:
– marriage
– family planning
– euthanasia
– career & educational choices
– gov’t monitoring of individual behavior
– elimination of feelings & memories
– book censorship
– necessity for a Receiver
Chapter 23
Learning Activity: Letter to
Elders
• Choose three (3) of the most important
issues and state how and why you would
change them.
• You must justify your reasons in a
proposal to the Council of Elders.
• Must be in business letter format.