Lesson Plan Template
Name: Adam Karnes
Subject Area: Language Arts
Lesson Title: Why Metaphor?
Rev 10/1/09
Dr. Thieman
Age/Grade Level: 10th
Unit Title: Literary Devices
Estimated Time: 60 minutes
Purpose/Rationale for lesson: Enable students to understand why and how authors use
metaphor to deepen meaning.
Curriculum Framing Questions:
Essential Question: Why do authors use metaphor?
Unit Question that applies to this lesson: How do authors use metaphor to deepen
meaning?
Lesson or Content Question(s): How does metaphor function within a text? How
do metaphors relate their context? How do metaphors alter the meaning of the thing being
compared to them? What do metaphors do to our feelings about the things being
described?
Goal: Convince students that comparisons make literature more interesting and thoughtprovoking.
Learning Objective(s): Students will explain how specific metaphors relate to their
surroundings, how they alter the meaning of a text, and how they affect the feelings of the
reader.
Curriculum Standard(s): “Identify various literary devices, including figurative
language.” (EL.HS.LI.09)
Materials Needed: Make an appointment to use the school computer lab for this period.
Paper copies of the text for each student. Prezi on understanding metaphors
http://prezi.com/wvclsx3sbcue/understanding-metaphors/
Background knowledge or skills students need prior to lesson: Students will have
completed a prior lesson teaching them the definition of a metaphor and how to locate
metaphor in a text. Students need basic skills using a computer (mouse movement,
keyboarding).
Hook or Introduction to get students’ attention and get them : Show a Prezi introduction
tutorial to get them interested in the medium.
http://prezi.com/explore/
Procedures: List each step or activity in the order they will occur. Your procedures
should clearly list what the teacher is doing and what the students are doing.
Include key concepts and how they are presented. Explain activities that develop higher
order thinking. Provide opportunities for students to communicate their learning orally, in
writing, and/or performance. Provide descriptions of how technology is used in the lesson
if appropriate. Identify transitions from one activity to another and how you will monitor
student learning. You may write a script, use bullet points, or organize procedures in
table format.
1. 10 minutes
Ask each student to log onto a computer. If the number of students exceeds the
number of computers, have two students take turns sharing each computer. Show
the students how to access the Prezi presentation. Explain and demonstrate how to
navigate Prezi.
2. 5 m
Tell the students to each go through the presentation once for comprehension.
http://prezi.com/wvclsx3sbcue/understanding-metaphors/
3. 20 m I think this may work better as an instructional tool in which you have
students watch the Prezi with you and it serves as an outline to help you teach the
material and then have students interact with you as you proceed through the
material
Ask the students to go through the presentation again, but this time they need to
follow the instructions in the presentation with reference to the text. Tell the
students to take notes, either on a sheet of paper, or on the computer. Before they
do this, show them how to get started by answering the first two questions. All
students will be working from the same starting metaphor. (“I am a transparent
eye ball.”) While the students work, move around the room offering help and
encouragement.
4. 10 m
Ask the students to pair up with an elbow partner. Student pairs will discuss their
answers to the questions, paying special attention to when they answered a
question differently. Emphasize the importance of listening to why their partner
answered differently rather than arguing over which answer is better. Mix with
the students and keep the conversation going between students who are struggling
to make progress. I would introduce the first few “slides” of the Prezi, then stop
for students to discuss their responses to a question with their partner and then
move on to the next
5. 10 m
Ask the students to report out. Walk through the question by calling on each
group. (Ask which student is taller. That student is now #1 for their group. Call on
#2 for the first set of questions in each group. If you cycle through all the groups,
continue the questions with the #1 students in each group.) Probe for specific
examples from students of how the metaphors relate to the text.
What is the
text? That is not clear to me. Is it the quote from Emerson?
Here is where having the questions in the lesson plan and not just on the Prezi
would help.
Differentiation/Accommodation: The multimedia nature of this lesson should help to
maintain interest and attention. Visuals and the option to use a keyboard should keep
students engaged. Students will also work with partners to help with comprehension and
involvement. The questions on the Prezi encourage higher level thinking, which will keep
any TAG students engaged. What about students with special learning needs or students
with ADHD? What are the specific accommodations from the articles we read on the
wiki?
Attention to Literacy: Students will be required to read text, explain the meaning of
passages and metaphors in those passages, and creatively apply metaphor themselves.
Closure: Introduce the sample paragraph of an extended metaphor, written by the
instructor. Explain how this models the assignment for writing an extended metaphor.
5 min. Need to include this in the materials
Assessment and Evaluation of Student Learning: Students will write a half-page
(about two hundred words) paragraph employing an extended metaphor (explained in the
lesson). The essay will be creative, either completely fictional or a metaphoric retelling of
a real life experience. Give students two examples in class. (“I was a space explorer in the
year 2492. Call me Christopher Columbus.” OR “My brother could be really sneaky
growing up—a real snake.”)
Special Materials: Quotation by Ralph Waldo Emerson, from “Nature.”
“Standing on the bare ground, my head bathed by the blithe air, and uplifted into infinite
space, all mean egotism vanishes. I become a transparent eyeball-I am nothing; I see all;
the currents of the Universal Being circulate through me-I am part or particle of God. The
name of the nearest friend sounds then foreign and accidental: to be brothers, to be
acquaintances-master or servant, is then a trifle, and a disturbance. I am a lover of
uncontained and immortal beauty. In the wilderness, I have something more connate and
dear than in the streets or villages. In the tranquil landscape, and especially in the distant
line of the horizon, man beholds somewhat as beautiful as his own nature.”