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This post is a continuation of Free Unit for Lord of the Flies-Part 1.
Days 8 & 9
Today I gave the kids a reading quiz. I took the questions from this LOTF unit test (paid product).
After the reading quiz, I asked kids to think about their reading strategies, tools & techniques and to reflect on if those techniques aided their comprehension (ie: were they able to do well on the quiz, as far as they could tell?)
After the quiz, we started watching The Stanford Prison Experiment. This is rated R and I had to have the kids get their parents to fill in permission slips. I am sure I prefaced the activity with a lecture, but my notes have been lost in the ether.
While the kids were watching, I asked them to answer these questions that I got from The Stanford Prison Experiment website.
For homework, I asked students to start reading Chapters 7 & 8 from Lord of the Flies, but these chapters were not officially due until the class after next.
Day 10
On Day 10, I continued with my knowledge-building spree. I am sure there’s a better place for these activities but this is where they ended up this particular year.
Today, my students and I watched a 30-minute video about Freud. I did not save the link and this unit is from 9 years ago, but any youtube video should work, as I just had kids write down the definitions of “Id,” “Ego,” and “Superego,” and apply them to the characters in Lord of the Flies. They used this note-taking guide. This is another handout I must have used a different year with questions about Freud & his life.
For homework, I asked students to finish reading Chapters 7 & 8. If there was time left in class, I gave them time to work on this.
Day 11
Today we started with a journal.
Journal: William Golding depicts Simon as being much different from the rest of the boys on the island. Write a paragraph about what makes Simon so unique. Do you know any real life Simons? What makes them so special?
Next, I gave kids a reading quiz on chapters 7 & 8. I attached the quiz but could not find the answer key and was too lazy to remake it. You got this!
After the quiz, we did a close reading of Simon’s interaction with The Head. I find this passage to be creepy as hell so I love hearing what the kids have to say about it. I walked the kids through the first few sentences, showed them how to annotate, and then released them to do the rest in their groups as part of Challenge # 4. The group that collectively had the best annotations and answers won this particular round.
This activity takes a while.
For homework I asked students to read chapters 9 & 10.
Days 12-13
Today I did a lesson on symbolism, and I started by having the kids read the poem “Myopia” by Jerene Cline.
Myopia
They gave me glasses
and I saw clearly
Sometimes I long
for the kind old mist.
-Jerene Cline
Once we read it out loud, I asked kids to write for five minutes about potential symbols in the poem and their meanings. We then shared out.
After the discussion, I did a read aloud of the passage where Simon staggers out of the woods, gets killed and then washed away. I asked the kids to talk through some of the imagery and try to piece together what happened in this scene. Kids are usually confused at this point in the book so I take a few minutes to walk through it before getting into the symbolism lesson.
The rest of the lesson is a symbolism & analysis activity that I have for sale in my TpT store.
Homework: Read Chapters 11 & 12 (finish the book).
Days 14 & 15
Today I gave the students a reading quiz on chapters 11 & 12 with questions from my Lord of the Flies test on TpT.
After the quiz, I did a read aloud of the passage where Piggy gets killed and answered any questions the kids had. Along with the passages involving Simon, this one is also a tough one for kids to wrap their heads around.
After the Q & A, we started an activity titled “What is Evil?” I put students in groups and asked them to do the following:
-define evil
-rank people from least evil to most evil (I have since lost the list that I gave to
the kids to sort through but I am pretty sure it was from Jim Burke’s The
English Teacher’s Companion (3rd ed). …as was this whole activity.)
-decide where Jack, Roger, and Ralph would fit on the list of least evil to most
evil
After the kids had some time in their groups to complete the above steps, we did a whole class share out. I started by summarizing some of the patterns that I noticed in their discussions. Then I cleared one of my big white boards and had kids share their definitions of evil as well as their “most evil” and “least evil” choices. We talked through any strong disagreements and where everyone placed Jack, Ralph, and Roger on the evil scale.
Their exit response was to write an informal paragraph in which they identified a theme related to evil that was supported by evidence from Lord of the Flies and the day’s discussion.
Homework: Study for unit text.
Day 16
Today I did a lesson on the difference between allusion & parody. For parody, I just defined the word on the board and listed the characteristics.
I then showed students the “Das Bus” episode of The Simpsons, which is a parody of Lord of the Flies. We watched it and then talked about what made it a parody.
After watching “Das Bus,” I lectured a bit more on allusions. The slides from this lecture are on sale in my TpT store.
Once we had covered parody & allusion, I put students into their groups from the beginning of the unit and asked them to create either three comic strips with allusions to Lord of the Flies in them OR a 3-5 minute parody. The kids who chose parody had to film the parody or perform it in front of the class. The group that best demonstrated their understanding of allusion or parody and Lord of the Flies, won.
Homework: Study for Lord of the Flies unit test.
Day 17
On Day 17, we tied up some loose ends. First, we revisited the life-sized character charts the students made at the beginning of the unit and talked about how the characters changed by the end of the novel.
Next, we went back to the Lord of the Flies close reading from the first day and talked about how the opening related to the ending.
Lastly, I tallied up all of the points on the challenge board and announced the winning group. The winning group got to sign their name on whatever prop I had bought that year the represented our Lord of the Flies unit. One year, I had the winning group sign their names on this ceramic piggy bank that I bought.
Another year I had kids sign a giant conch shell that I had spray painted gold.
Also, I made the winning group GIANT cupcakes in a flavor of their choice, which they enjoyed way, way more than signing the gold conch or piggy bank. I still have the piggy bank and the conch in my classroom.
Homework: Study for Lord of the Flies unit test.
Day 18
On day 18 I finally gave the kids a unit test. Depending on the year I use different tests. If I hadn’t used all of my multiple choice questions for quizzes, I would just give them my Lord of the Flies multiple choice test (paid product in my TpT store). If I HAD used those questions for quizzes through the unit, I would use this other short Lord of the Flies unit test (free) that has a variety of questions & formats but is more annoying to proctor & grade.
So that’s about it for my formal unit. I was finally just starting to feel good about this unit and was looking forward to the next year but then I got switched to AP classes. I haven’t taught Lord of the Flies, and I never really perfected this unit, but I hope these posts give you somewhere to start.
Lord of the Flies Close Reading Passages
A few summers ago, I tutored an 8th grader who was supposed to read Lord of the Flies for his summer assignment. He was a super bright kid and his parents hired me to do some higher level work with the book and that’s when I prepared these close reading passages. At this point I had been teaching AP & IB classes for a while and thought this would be an interesting idea to lead him through the book via important passages, similar to what I used to do for the old IB Lang & Lit standards. We did not get through all of the passages, but they are all typed up here and ready to go if you are doing this unit with older kids or just super motivated kids who love literature: Lord of the Flies close reading passages
Things I Did Not Get To During This Year's Unit
Compare and contrast book characters to movie characters: I don’t show the Lord of the Flies movie because it’s rated R, but it’s fun to watch the first few minutes and talk about how the characters are portrayed in the opening of the movie versus how they are portrayed in the the opening of the book.
1990 Lord of the Flies
1963 Version of Lord of the Flies
Lord of the Flies Literary Analysis Essay Rough Steps
After we studied the novel I had the kids do an analysis paper & have included a very brief (and very rough) timeline below:
Day 1
-Look over Lord of the Flies essay prompts
-Do some outlines together as a class/students take notes
-Group students by prompt number and have them; brainstorm thesis statements
together
Homework: Outline essay
Day 2
-Discuss going from broad to narrow in your introduction (Into paragraph lesson-paid product)
-Workshop time while I check outlines
Homework: Write 1/2 of rough draft
Day 3
-Lesson on body paragraphs (Paid products: PowerPoints on Body Structure)
-Workshop time: Develop body paragraphs
Homework: Finish rough draft
Day 4
-Review the structure of conclusion paragraphs
-Have students look over their conclusions to see if they:
Restated their thesis
Restated their support details
Left the reader with something to think about
-Peer edit-specifically looking for fragments & run ons
Homework: Edit rough draft
·
Day 5
-Submit electronic copy to turnitin.com
Fun Extensions
Humankind by Rutger Bregman: This book features a section about a real-life Lord of the Flies situation, where a group of teenage boys survived on a dessert island for 15 months; things turn out very differently than they do in the novel!
The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins: This is a dark and disturbing novel where kids have to fight to the death. When I taught Lord of the Flies, this book was all the rage amongst my students, so it was fun to look at the similarities and differences between the two books.
A few years later, the book was turned into a full-length movie featuring Jennifer Lawrence.
A plane full of beauty queen contestants crash land on a crescent shaped island...you get the idea. Happy reading!
Please feel free to post any resources that may be helpful to others in the comments section below!
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