The Cask of Amontillado
Student: Alexa Cawley
Date: 11-22-10
Subject: English
Topic: Literary Elements
Grade: 11
Allocated Time: 45 minutes (1
class)
Student Population: This class contains 22 students: 12 females, 10 males. 4
students are ELL’s and are accompanied by an ELL teacher. Each student has read
The Cask of Amontillado.
PA Academic Standards:
1.3.11.C.
Analyze the relationships, use, and effectiveness of literary elements
(characterization, setting, plot, theme, point of view, tone, mood, foreshadowing,
irony, and style) used by one or more authors in similar.
Goals for Understanding: To apply the knowledge of setting, plot, theme,
foreshadowing, and irony to this short story.
Instructional Objective: Students will take the literary elements they have learned
and apply them to Edgar Allan Poe’s, The Cask of Amontillado.
Student Behaviors
To analyze and apply literary
Sources of Evidence
Textbooks
elements to The Cask of
Amontillado
To raise hand before speaking
Criteria for Evaluation
Students are prepared with
their textbook and notebook
We can prove literary
elements are found in the
Students exhibit an
short story through various
understanding through
examples.
answering questions
To take notes on literary
elements and how they apply
Students are taking notes
to The Cask of Amontillado
Students are participating
To participate in class
discussion
Teaching to the Objective
Estimated
Time:
Teaching to the Objective
Differentiation
:(Required for
each section)
Introduction/Motivation/Prior Knowledge:
10
minutes
“How can we apply foreshadowing, irony, plot, theme, and point of view
Visual
to The Cask of Amontillado?”
learners:
They have already read The Cask of Amontillado.
write literary
Review some of the best points of the short story:
elements and
We never learn what Fortunado does to Montresor that makes
other KEY
him want revenge
TERMS on

Montresor pretends to be Fortunado’s friend
chalkboard

Montresor lures Fortunado and gets him drunk

Fortunado has no idea he is about to be led to catacombs and

buried in a niche
Allow
students to
Review: ask students to give definitions of:
arise their
hand and ask
Foreshadowing: To present an indication or a suggestion of beforehand
Irony: The use of words to express something different from and often
opposite to their literal meaning; literary style employing such
contrasts for humorous or rhetorical effect
questions
Allow ELL
Plot: The pattern of events or main story in a narrative or drama
Theme: An implicit or recurrent idea
Point of View: told in first person, by Montresor (I, me, my)
teacher to
help ELL
students at
any time
Developmental Activities:
“Poe uses multiple literary elements in this creepy short story. As a
class, we are going to discuss how he uses them.”
Plot: Montresor, the narrator, makes a plan to kill his supposed friend
Fortunato, for insulting him.
Walk around
the room for
volunteers to
make sure
students in
Theme:

Main theme: Revenge (repeated several times in the opening
paragraph); he is determined to "not only punish, but punish
the back row
do not feel left
out
with impunity."
25
minutes

Foolishness and Folly: They can cost you your life. The story
amplifies human foolishness and folly to extremes so hideous
and cruel they become vices. ”The Cask” only has two characters.
By the end of the story, their combined silliness culminates in
Contextualize
content
knowledge for
students who
tragedy and pain for them both. The tragedy is what makes us
need personal
think more profoundly about their foolish ways – in the hopes
examples
that we can avoid ending up, even in some metaphorical way,
like them.
**Give a personal example of this or ask a student to give an
example on how being foolish can get you in a lot of trouble. Ex)
drinking, taking situations too far
Irony: There is a lot of irony so give one or two examples and ask
students to give the rest.

Opening line: "The thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as
I best could; but when he ventured upon insult, I vowed
revenge." Total opposite of “sticks and stones may break my
bones, but words will never hurt me.” He can take the physical
pain, but cannot handle insult.


Montresor's expressed concern for Fortunado’s well-being is at
odds with his true intentions.
“How did Montresor know that no servants would be present?”
He had informed them that he would be gone all night and
"given them explicit orders not to stir from the house." That, he
knew, would be enough "to insure their immediate
disappearance" as soon as he left. That is a combination of
verbal and situational irony.



Use 1,2,3
system if
talking gets
too loud
Montresor expresses concern for Fortunado’s cough and
Fortunado replies: “the cough is a mere nothing; it will not kill
me. I shall not die of a cough." Ironic: he dies/Montresor knows
he will die.
Fortunato toasts "to the buried that repose around us," unaware
that he will soon join them. "And I to your long life," responds
Montresor knowing that life is shortly to end.
Montresor argues he is a Mason, but when asked for a “sign,”
Montresor pulls out a trowel.
mason n. One who builds or works with stone or brick
Foreshadowing: Allow the students to get in pairs, with the person
sitting next to them, and be prepared to give an example of
foreshadowing in the story.


THE MASONS situation: Fortunado disputes with Montresor
and says he is not a true Mason because he does not know
the secret handshake and asks for a sign. Montreso replies
with a trowel, foreshadowing that he is going to bury
Fortunado with it.
All throughout the catacombs are the bones of other men
who were chained and left for dead. Here the reader gets the
Allow
students to
work in pairs
for peer
assistance

idea that Montresor and his family have done this sort of
thing before and that this might be how he intends to do it to
Fortunato very soon.
Another is the name of the wine they drink on the way to get
to the Amontillado. It is a variety of sherry called "DeGrave",
an obvious foreshadowing that the cellar is shortly to
become "the grave" of Fortunato.
For students
10
who need a
Closure:
minutes

more modern
To make sure students are connecting the story and its literary
example: a
elements, ask questions and evaluate responses.
video

Find out if students liked the story and ask for questions.

Play short, comical video (if class went well, and there is time)
and discuss what you can about literary elements throughout
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jk4CG3X3nw0&feature=fvsr
Assessment:

Self evaluation (reflect)

Grade notebooks, with a checkmark, for sufficient note-taking.

Ask questions
Follow-up:

Provide a worksheet

Ask questions the following class to see what they could remember
Materials: Textbooks, notebooks, laptop with projector.
Resources:

Textbook: The Case of Amontillado

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jk4CG3X3nw0&feature=fvsr
The Cask of Amontillado
Literary Elements
Name:
Date:
1) Montresor uses a lot of irony. List 3 examples:
2) Montresor foreshadows many of the events that take place. List 3 examples:
3) What was the plot of the story?
4) Name one of the themes we discussed in class.