As an end-of-unit assessment, class members craft a formal, multi-paragraph essay identifying a similar idea found in Rainer Maria Rilke's collection, Letters to a Young Poet, and David Mitchell's Black Swan Green. Writers state and use evidence from the stories to support a claim about how Rilke and Mitchell developed these similar ideas.

Concepts

expository essays, main ideas, literary analysis

Show More Show Less

Additional Tags

english language arts

Show More Show Less

Instructional Ideas

• Review with writers the format of expository, multi-paragraph essays

Classroom Considerations

• The final session in an 11-lesson unit that uses Rainer Maria Rilke's collection, Letters to a Young Poet, and David Mitchell's Black Swan Green as anchor texts
• The unit, the second in a module of three, builds on the protocols and routines established in the first unit
• A link to the third module in the series is provided

Pros

• The eight-page packet includes the plan, model paragraphs, a review of the essay format, and the rubric for the essay
• The homework assignment that asks class members to prepare a five-minute summary of their out-of-class Accountable Independent Reading (AIR) text provides a bridge to the next unit in the module

Cons

• The plan presumes class members have experience crafting in-class formal essays

Common Core

RL.9-10.1 RL.9-10.2 W.9-10.9.a