Key assignment Text Set - Holes

Holes – A Text SetSTANLEY QUINN FORD JR.

Statement of Inquiry

AS SOCIAL CITIZENS, WE HAVE A RESPONSIBILITY TO CHALLENGE AUTHORITY AND SOCIAL NORMS WHEN THEY ARE DEEMED UNFAIR.

Statement of Inquiry – Rationale The Statement of Inquiry, “As social citizens, we have a responsibility to challenge authority and social norms when they are deemed unfair,” as supported by the text set will allow students to build a knowledge base about a concept that is historically and currently relevant and that affects or will affect their lives. The notion of challenging authority or norms is a reoccurring trend throughout history as individuals and groups across time have fought for equality or simply to change the social status quo. Although students may have some background knowledge about this concept, this anchor text and the supporting texts will allow them to expand their knowledge base. They will also be able to apply this knowledge directly to their lives. At some point during their adolescence or adulthood, they might be present in an uncomfortable situation that might require them to challenge some level of authority or some social norm that they may find unfair. Having vicariously experienced and studied this concept through literature, history, and media sources will allow them to handle the situation in a proper manner.

The Anchor TextHOLES BY LOUIS SACHAR

Anchor Text – Holes – Louis Sachar (Literary)

Overview of Text:

Teenage Stanley Yelnats is wrongfully accused and punished for a crime that he did not commit. For his punishment he is forced to dig 5ft X 5ft X 5ft holes at Camp Green Lake. As Stanley meets and forms relationships with his other campmates, he starts to realize that there is more to this camp than meets the eye. Using memories of the stories his family has shared with him, Stanley seeks to uncover the mystery of Camp Green Lake and challenge fate to shed his family of their generational curse.

Connection to Statement of Inquiry:

In several parts of Holes, there are instances where characters challenge authority or norms (or they could have) and it has an impact on the novel and the lives of the characters. These are some of the scenes that will be heavily examined and analyzed in order to build that concept knowledge.

Holes – Rationale Holes will be an excellent novel to use with my 6th graders. Because of its lower Lexile Level, the text will be very accessible to nearly all of the students in my

classroom (even those that are not yet at their on-grade reading level). The word-length and sentence-length/complexity are on a level that my students should find manageable. The writing style is of a contemporary nature and the story is told smoothly as it would be if listened to out loud. This straightforward and easy-going style will propel students to move through the reading. As a bonus, it is a novel full of bite-sized chapters that keeps the story moving as to alleviate any boredom that students might associate with reading. My students should generally be able to access most of the ideas and concepts of the book. The only thing that may need to be prefaced or retroactively explained are the racial issues that occur towards the end of the book. Students will need to understand that the social climate in the early 1900s was not favorable to those with darker skin.

The challenge and rigor that will be worked in the text come from the complexity of the text on a qualitative measure and the ancillary texts that will be paired with it to explore the themes within the book. Students might need support with some of the vocabulary within the text, so pre-reading activities will occur. Students will need to pay close attention to the flashback scenes and draw in from their life experiences and their knowledge of the world in order to fully understand the novel’s plot. This novel is full of themes, symbols and motifs that my readers will find interesting to discover and discuss. The symbols and motifs that can be explored throughout the novel are the importance of the onions, the yellow-spotted lizards, and the flashback scenes. While there is not one clear lesson that the author was teaching throughout the book, several lessons can be teased out and supported through other texts such as: the idea of challenging authority and social norms; the importance of family and friendship; pre-determinism vs choice; and crime and punishment. The supporting texts will allow us to focus on some of these issues while ultimately building student knowledge around the Statement of Inquiry.

Finally, this novel makes a great choice for my students because it contains enough complexity to cover numerous TEKS. This book will present my students will a chance to build stronger reading skills in practicing using context clues and practicing summarizing for the main idea and supporting details and the 5 stages of plot. It will engage them with making inferences and exploring literary features like flashbacks. They will also get the opportunity to complete two writing assignments: one a narrative and the other a persuasive essay. Other standards such as analyzing poetry and media and building connections between texts can be covered through our supporting texts. By the end of this unit, hopefully students will more equipped to face the social challenges they will encounter in their near and distant future!

Holes – Quantitative & Qualitative Measures

Lexile Measure: 660L

Grade Band Level: 2-3

Word Count: 47,079

Text Structure

Organization – Moderately Complex

Use of Visual Features – Slightly Complex

Knowledge Demands

Life Experiences – Moderately Complex

Cultural Knowledge – Moderately Complex

Meaning

Purpose – Moderately Complex

Language Features

Conventionality – Moderately Complex

Vocabulary – Moderately Complex

Sentence Structure – Moderately Complex

Holes – Connections to Standards – During Reading

6.10(A) Summarize Main Ideas and Supporting Details – Scholars will keep a reading journal in which they compose summaries of the chapters they have to read at home. This helps scholars self-manage their own comprehension of the novel.

6.2(B) Use context to determine or clarify the meaning of unfamiliar or multiple meaning words – Scholars will learn the different types and skills as it relates to context clues that they can use to help them determine unfamiliar words. There will be guided practice mini lessons that students work together on to understand the meaning of particular words from the novel.

6.17(D) – Write responses to literary and expository texts and provide evidence from text to demonstrate understanding & 6 Fig.19(D) – Make Inferences about the text and use textual evidence to support understanding – Scholars have to use the CER method to answer short answer questions about the text to show their comprehension of the text and their ability to make inferences and support them with text evidence. These questions will be posed periodically throughout the study of the novel. 6.8(A) Explain how authors create meaning through stylistic elements and figurative language & 6 Fig.19(D) – Make Inferences – Scholars have to trace and document the different flashback scenes throughout the novel. At the end of the novel, scholars will be required to explain why the author included the flashbacks and how they contribute to the overall meaning of the book.

Holes – Connections to Standards – After Reading

6.6(A) Summarize the elements of plot development – After the novel is finished, students have to diagram the events in the story to the plot development graphic organizer that they are familiar with. 6.3(A) Infer implicit theme of a work of fiction & 6.28 Scholars work productively with others in teams – Several thematic statements related to the novel will be projected onto the board. Scholars will work in groups to provide examples from the text that match each statement. Several quotes from the novel will also be projected on the board. These same groups will have to infer the themes of those quotes. Groups will not know what statements or quotes they will be required to share out loud, so they must be prepared for them all.

Holes – Connections to Standards – After Reading

6.15(A) Write imaginative stories that include focus, plot, POV, specific and believable setting, dialogue & 6 Fig.19(D) – Make Inferences about the text and use textual evidence to support understanding – Scholars have to create an extra chapter to the book that explains what happened to characters in between leaving and the camp and seeing the commercial air on TV (a big gap of time that the author intentionally leaves out).

6.10(D) Synthesize and make logical connections between ideas within a text and across two or three texts representing similar or different genres & 6.26 Listening & 6.27 Speaking – Scholars will participate in a Socratic Seminar in which they debate and discuss important themes and topics from the unit as it relates to the Statement of Inquiry. Students must draw from our readings to bolster their arguments.

Holes – Sample Text-Dependent Questions

1. Why does the author include several flashbacks scenes throughout the text? - 6.8(A) & 6 Fig.19(D)

2. How does the author build the theme of “the importance of family and friendship” within the text? - 6.3(A)

3. What does the word cluster mean as used on page 150, on paragraph 5? - 6.2(B) & 6 Fig.19(D)

4. In the exposition (first few chapters) of the novel, what do we learn about Stanley’s personality? - 6.6(A)

5. How do the secondary characters (the boys in Tent D) in the novel challenge Stanley’s self-esteem? How does Zero bolster it? - 6.17(D)

Text and Media Support

ANCILLARY TEXTS WITH A THEMATIC CONNECTION

Supplemental Texts & Media1. Conformity (Informational) vs. Students’ work ethic affected by peer groups, desire to be popular

(Informational)

2. How the Children of Birmingham changed the civil-rights movement (Informational) & Children’s Crusade of 1963 (Photographs) & JFK Letter Against Children Demonstrators (Letter)

3. I am Malala – Malala Yousafzai (Non-Fiction)

4. Protests follow President Trump's order to ban travel involving Muslims (Informational)

5. Social Norms – Luna Brown (Poetry)

6. To This Day Project – Shane Koyczan (Slam Poetry)

7. Video – India Arie (Song Lyrics)

8. The Outsiders – S. E. Hinton (Literary)

Conformity (Informational) vs. Students’ work ethic affected by peer groups, desire to be popular

(Informational)“Conformity Grade” Band: 7-8th

“Students’ work ethic affected by peer groups, desire to be popular” Band: 9-10th

Before diving into the anchor text, the first task is to prime students and supply them with some background knowledge about social norms and social pressure. They will gain this knowledge by reading the two articles from CommonLit, “Conformity” and “Students’ work ethic affected by peer groups, desire to be popular.” The first article gives an overview of what conformity is, the positive and negative aspects of it, the three types of conformity and how it can play a huge role in society. The second article is an interview from NPR that explains new research that suggests that social pressure can have an effect on teen’s education. Together these articles give both an overview and relay a personal connection to my students. My students, being pre-teens, are going to increasingly face pressure to conform to the norms of their peers as they get older. By studying these texts, they will add key pieces of knowledge to their tool belt about the idea of challenging social norms to get them ready for the unit and the novel. These texts being on the higher end quantitatively allows my students to get exposure to more complex texts since our anchor text is relatively much simpler.

In the classroom… For the classroom: The class will be divided into two large groups. Students will jigsaw the information from texts in order to have both completed during one class period and all the information shared out loud. Because both texts range on the higher end, students will need to work together to completely comprehend them. Having students read 2 different articles allows for differentiation based on skill as well. The first text, being on a 7-8th grade level should be manageable for my lower students because they will be working in groups to read and draw out the key understandings. The second text, being on a 9-10th grade level will give my higher students some enrichment and allow them to grapple with something more complex than usual. After both groups get through reading and summarizing the main ideas and supporting details, they will answer some text-dependent questions, then they will share out their findings with the entire class. The class will then compare each piece’s stance on conformity. Based on what their findings, they will discuss whether conformity can be avoided or not, and if so, how.

TEKS that can be covered:

6.9(A) compare and contrast the stated or implied purposes of different authors writing on the same topic

6.10(A) summarize the main ideas and supporting details in text, demonstrating an understanding that a summary does not include opinions

6.10(D) synthesize and make logical connections between ideas within a text and across two or three texts representing similar or different genres

6.10(B) explain whether facts included in an argument are used for or against an issue

The Children’s Crusade of 1963 (Multi-Media)

“How the Children of Birmingham changed the civil-rights movement” Lexile: 1040L Grade Band: 7-9

Students will analyze photographs from the Children’s Crusade in order to make inferences about what photographs can reveal to their viewers. Students need to be exposed to sources of media outside of just printed text. This is a great way to segway into what will be the lesson that day. Students will read and explore an informational about the Children’s Crusade to get more information about the photographs and connect the idea of standing up to authority with a piece of history that they are already familiar with, while also providing a cross-curricular connection to the humanities. This will allow them to see that kids their age and even younger were involved in movements that helped create a major change throughout the U.S. to end segregation and discrimination. Students will understand that their voices matter. Students will then read and agree/disagree with a statement from former Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy in order to be exposed to an actual historical document. This will cement the idea of the events as real and authentic and allow them to foster healthy debate and discussion within the class. Although the article sits at a higher quantitative level than my students are at, there will be scaffolding and modeling within the lesson so that all students can access the content. Once again, students need to be exposed to texts with higher complexities since our anchor text is much simpler.

In the classroom… Potential Lesson Outline for the Classroom:

Shows pictures of children Involved in the Civil Rights Movement during the Children’s Crusade of 1963. Ask students their interpretation of what’s happening. Read the article “How the Children of Birmingham changed the civil-rights movement.” Discuss what It means for children to have such a strong impact on society. Read the letter written by JFK that said children shouldn’t participate. Ask students for their thoughts. Should they be aloud to participate in demonstrations?



6.13(A) explain messages conveyed in various forms of media


6.28 Listening and Speaking/Teamwork. Students work productively with others in teams. Students will continue to apply earlier standards with greater complexity. Students are expected to participate in student-led discussions by eliciting and considering suggestions from other group members and by identifying points of agreement and disagreement.

I am Malala - Malala Yousafzai (Non-Fiction)

Students will examine excerpts from I am Malala to make a cross-cultural connection to girls and women of Islam challenging the cultural norm of not educating women. Excerpts from this novel will serve as a great compliment to our unit because it allows students to walk in the shoes of someone of a different culture who is doing great things in order to challenge the social status quo. In reading this will understand the value of education and that it is not always accessible to everyone based on your demographics. Although the text is qualitatively simple, the book makes up for it with in the purpose and cultural knowledge categories. Students will need background knowledge about the Middle East, Islam, and Islamic vocabulary in order to have full access to the text. Some prepping and scaffolding will be necessary to fill in gaps, but students need to read this text for the cross-cultural connection.

In the classroom… Ideas for use in the classroom:

Students will read excerpts from this novel and answer text-dependent questions to check for comprehension. Then students will talk in small groups about the major ideas. They will need to discuss how they can connect Malala’s story back to the unit and back to their own lives.




6.3(A) Infer implicit theme of a work of fiction

6.17(D) Write responses to literary and expository texts and provide evidence from text to demonstrate understanding

Protests follow President Trump's order to ban travel involving Muslims (Informational)

Lexile: 830L Grade Band: 4-5th

To bring the unit to current day issues, students will read an article about the people’s protest against President Trump’s “Muslim Ban”. Bringing the unit study to current news will allow students to bring in their knowledge of situation and to add to it regarding this hot topic issue. It will also allow students to study how people in today’s time are fighting against norms and authority measures that they think are unfair. This will allow the students to see the unit’s statement of inquiry seem very relevant and authentic. This text is about right below level for my students. For students that have a lot of background knowledge about the issue, comprehending the article should prove very simple. For those who have less background knowledge, the text should still be a doable read-through. Scaffolding and small group modeling/instruction can be provided if that proves to be the case. Students need to be exposed to complex informational texts so they can continue to learn how to read them for the knowledge that they possess.


Students can compare and contrast the reasoning for protest in the first two texts vs this one.

Students can have a healthy and respectful conversation/dialogue/discussion/debate on whether the ban was fair or not from their perspective. Should people be protesting? Should they be protesting the President at that?




6.17(D) – Write responses to literary and expository texts and provide evidence from text to demonstrate understanding

6.28 Listening and Speaking/Teamwork. Students work productively with others in teams. Students will continue to apply earlier standards with greater complexity. Students are expected to participate in student-led discussions by eliciting and considering suggestions from other group members and by identifying points of agreement and disagreement.

Social Norms – Luna Brown (Poetry)

Students will read and analyze the poem, Social Norms, in which they will hear from another teenager’s mind about her journey of non-conformity. In this poem, Luna writes about how different she is from her peers. Luna does not like the idea of going out to party, drinking, nor other commonalities of rambunctious teenagers. She grapples with what it means to stand out and do what she thinks is right. This is the same concept that I want students to grapple with in their minds. We have read about challenging social norms on a national society scale, now as we begin the novel, this text and the rest will be spiraled in to make the battle against social norms more personal. Students need to realize that there will be plenty of decisions they will have to make between the right choice which not many people may be doing and the wrong choice which may look popular. The poem should quantitatively and qualitatively simple for all my students. The area for complexity lies in their ability to make the connection back to their own lives.


Students will read the poem, look for any figurative language that adds meaning to the poem and will find the poem’s theme. Students will then discuss in their small groups their interpretation of the theme and how it can be applied to the unit and to their own lives.



6.4(A) explain how figurative language (e.g., personification, metaphors, similes, hyperbole) contributes to the meaning of a poem

To This Day Project – Shane Koyczan (Slam Poetry)

Students will listen to, To This Day Project, a slam poetry segment about bullying. This is a great text to use within the unit because it can be used to start a conversation about standing up to and challenging bullying. Unfortunately, bullying is still a rampant issue within our schools. This is a norm that needs to be eradicated. Students need to be constantly reminded that bullying is something they need to stand up against and report to an adult if they see it occurring. By having students analyze this slam poetry, the way the poet delivers the poem will grip and engage them in a way that will cause the theme to stick. This is a great text to use because although the language used is not that complex, the theme of the poem adds enough complexity to justify its placement within the unit.


Students will listen to the poem and the read text concurrently, look for any figurative language that adds meaning to the poem and will think about the poem’s theme. Students will then discuss in their small groups their interpretation of the theme and how it can be applied to the unit and to their own lives. Students will end the lesson with a reflection on what they can do to prevent bullying at their school.



6.4(A) explain how figurative language (e.g., personification, metaphors, similes, hyperbole) contributes to the meaning of a poem

6.13(B) recognize how various techniques influence viewers' emotions

6.8(A) explain how authors create meaning through stylistic elements and figurative language emphasizing the use of personification, hyperbole, and refrains

Video - India Arie (Song Lyrics)Students will also listen to and analyze song lyrics to Video by India Arie to analyze what it means to love one’s self and challenge the idea that they have to do something more than necessary to be “beautiful” or “valuable”. Society tells our youth and young adults that they have to change themselves in order to be valued. This song is relevant to the unit because it will help students internalize the idea that they are “good enough” and that they do not have to go out of their way to change something about themselves. They will challenge this culture of change norm. Songs are a great way to keep students engaged while also still targeting the theme of the unit, so that is why this is justifiable.


Students will listen to the song and read the lyrics in order to get an basic understanding of the song. Students will then take some time to analyze the lyrics then share out to their groups about what the song means to them. Students all share their thoughts out loud and students then reflect on how they can apply the song to their lives.



6.8(A) explain how authors create meaning through stylistic elements and figurative language emphasizing the use of personification, hyperbole, and refrains

The Outsiders – S. E. Hinton (Literary)

Using excerpts from our most recent class novel, The Outsiders, students will be able to connect back to that text and explore in more depth what it means for Ponyboy to “stay gold” and fulfill his full potential despite his environment and its norm of gang violence. This is a great text to use because students have already completed it and analyzed it for comprehension and thematic purposes. Returning to the text will allow students to draw new ideas from the text to add to our new unit. The book proved that most students could comprehend the text as it was below their reading level. The complexity in the text comes from some of the more archaic vocabulary, the many themes and background knowledge that students need to access the text. Another reason why this is a good text to use is because the novel focuses on issues that teens can identify with including getting caught up with the wrong crowd and wasting potential. Students will examine what it means for them to challenge any negative norms and to “stay gold” in their own environments.


Students will revisit excerpts from the novel that relate to “staying gold”. Students will review what was meant by this line in the text. They will then apply that reasoning to their own lives. What does it mean for them to “stay gold?” They will need to connect that to our SOI.



6.3(A) Infer implicit theme of a work of fiction

6.17(D) Write responses to literary and expository texts and provide evidence from text to demonstrate understanding

Assessment6.18(A) Write persuasive essays for appropriate audiences that establish a position and include sound reasoning, detailed and relevant evidence, and consideration of alternatives & 6.10(D) Synthesize and make logical connections between ideas within a text and across two or three texts representing similar or different genres

Scholars have to write a persuasive essay to advocate or negate the Statement of Inquiry. An acceptable paper synthesizes information with text evidence and examples from our anchor text AND ancillary texts. The paper must demonstrate their understanding of the entire unit and their ability to synthesize information or will not receive a passing grade. Have students keep track of a graphic organizer by which they can notes over the unit about what they have learned about conformity or challenging social norms from each text. They can use this graphic organizer to help them write their essay.

References Arie, I. (2009). Video [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mq86e4Fhja0

Brown, L. (2015). Social Norms. Retrieved from https://allpoetry.com/poem/11759119-Social-Norms-by-Luna-Brown

CommonLit Staff. (2015). Students’ work ethic affected by peer groups, desire to be popular. CommonLIt. Retrieved from https://www.commonlit.org/texts/students-work-ethic-affected-by-peer-groups-desire-to-be-popular

CommonLit Staff. (2014). Conformity. CommonLit. Retrieved from https://www.commonlit.org/texts/conformity

Hinton, S. E. (1967). The outsiders. New York: Viking Press.

Joiner, L. (2013). How the children of Birmingham changed the Civil Rights Movement. The Daily Beast. Retrieved from http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/05/02/how-the-children-of-birmingham-changed-the-civil-rights-movement.html

Kennedy, R. F. (1963). Statement by Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy. Department of Justice. Retrieved from https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/ag/legacy/2011/01/20/05-03-1963.pdf

Koyczan, S. (2014). To This Day Project. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ltun92DfnPY

Newsela Staff (2017). Protests follow President Trump's order to ban travel involving Muslims. Newsela. Retrieved from https://newsela.com/articles/travel-ban-refugees/id/26347/

Sachar, L. (1998). Holes. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

Yousafzai, M. (2013). I am Malala : The girl who stood up for education and was shot by the Taliban. New York, NY :Little, Brown, & Company.

Education

Key assignment Text Set - Holes