As part of an 8th grade Language Arts multicultural curriculum, we've planned a five-week semi-interdisciplinary unit that revolves around the city of New Orleans with particular emphasis upon Hurricane Katrina. In collaboration with their Social Studies teachers, our students will learn about the political, social, economic, and literary history of New Orleans and how it informed the crisis that developed in the wake of the hurricane.
To read more about this interdisciplinarity or view the New Orleans Social Studies unit website, please visit the COLLABORATE tab on the menu bar above or use the link in the sidebar to the right.
OVERVIEW OF TEACHING & LEARNING METHODS
Via the readings, discussions, and activities chosen for this unit, we aim to probe beneath the surface of New Orleans, providing students with a deeper, more meaningful understanding of the city’s inhabitants; the racial, political, and socioeconomic dynamics of New Orleans; and how those were exacerbated after Hurricane Katrina and by the hurricane itself. We also believe that - having completed this unit - students may better appreciate how they are themselves affected by the events that transpired in New Orleans during and after Hurricane Katrina.
READING STRATEGIES
We expect that both the unit’s subject matter and the principal text format will be largely unfamiliar to students in an academic context; therefore we selected reading activities and strategies to most support student learning and encourage greater comfort with the material.
Literature circles will be heavily used throughout the unit in which students will read, discuss, and work on assignments and projects. Groups will consist of five students each, and class dynamics must be considered to determine whether these groups should remain consistent across all five weeks or change in any frequency to suit the task at hand.
During in-class readings, we will use both directed reading–thinking activities (DRTA) and reciprocal teaching strategies to foster student agency. While the unit begins with teacher-directed reading, it quickly transitions to collaborative read-alouds with volunteer student readers, and finally to student-directed reading and learning. During teacher-led reading, the teacher will model strong reading strategies such as elaborating, predicting, and questioning such that students will pick upon said strategies to aid in their own private reading. It is hoped that these class discussions will eventually evolve into collaborative reasoning activities in which the students themselves initiate discussion topics, clarify text-related ambiguities, evaluate one another’s arguments, and engage in critical, independent thinking with minimal if any direction from the teacher.
Thus by the time student groups begin on their final unit project, they will feel confident in their understanding of the text and ability to examine it critically in a social context.
WRITING STRATEGIES
At this age, students sometimes feel self-conscious or inadequate with respect to their writing abilities. To bolster student creativity and confidence, the writing in this unit is far more focused on content rather than form. Of course any consistent or grievous errors will be addressed, but writing assignments will primarily be assessed by expressiveness, thoughtfulness, and engagement with the given material or activity.
Throughout the unit students will utilize a dialogue journal in which they will consistently return to seven core questions to help guide and inspire their interaction with the principal texts used, A.D.: New Orleans After the Deluge in particular. As they write in response to these prompts, students will develop a deeper understanding of the text as well as critical thinking skills for use with future texts and readings. Their responses will also act as initial research and source material for their cumulative unit graphic novel project.
Free-writes and informal written responses are also used liberally within the unit. Students will be presented with a great deal of new or challenging information, be it intellectually, morally, or thematically, over the course of these five weeks. We thought it best, therefore, to give them an outlet for their thoughts and reactions uncomplicated by formal strictures or constraints. Students will be encouraged to take any of their free-write and develop it into a more conventional essay for extra credit should they so choose.
The final graphic novel project also serves as an avenue of creative expression, both written and artistic. Just as we treat Neufeld’s graphic novel as text with all the nuances of classically-taught materials, we hope to show students - as they work on and present their group projects during the last weeks of the unit - that they can create their own critically engaging aesthetically-based texts.
We hope these strategies will encourage students to write more, take more writing risks, and therefore grow as writers. While we do not directly address formal concerns in this unit, it could serve as an opportune time to observe any recurring errors or slips and plan in advance to address them in the following unit.
TECHNOLOGY-USE
While technology is used amply during instruction, we think it more important to incorporate student-use of technology into our unit. Students do not use technology often, but when they do, they use it extensively and with agency.
Students complete a three-day WebQuest midway through the unit during which they perform self-directed research about New Orleans, its inhabitants, and its history. This research is performed on myriad websites in the computer lab; research groups are also given the option to use computer programs and online applications to produce the city brochure required at the end of the WebQuest. All students are given training in these programs and applications to help inform their decision.
Similarly, students are given the choice to create their graphic novels via computer-based or internet programs and given appropriate training to facilitate comfort and ease-of-use with said programs.
By unit’s end, therefore, students will have learned how to use several new computer programs and online applications. They will also have had additional practice in quality online research and information gathering to aid in future papers and projects.
STANDARDS & ASSESSMENTS
For a brief list of Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) English language arts standards and assessments met by this unit, please visit the ASSESSMENT tab on the menu bar above. In addition to these, three ISBE standards are included in each lesson plan - found under the LESSONS tab - more specific to the lesson at hand.
HOW TO USE THIS SITE
To explore our unit's website, please use the tabs along the top of the page. The general layout of the unit as well as brief explanations of each component can be found under UNIT PLAN; five complete downloadable lesson plans from the unit can be found under LESSONS; all major unit materials, citations and synopses of said materials, and handouts and worksheets can be found under MATERIALS; the shared English Language Arts/Social Studies lesson and materials can be found under COLLABORATE; links to the unit's WebQuest and a lesson plan for said WebQuest can be found under WEBQUEST; and our chosen standards, assessments, and rubrics can be found under ASSESSMENT. To return to this page, click on the title "New Orleans" at the top of any subpage or the word "Home" located under the main text of each subpage.
The right hand sidebar also contains ample information, such as links to the online resources referenced in the unit, additional information about the principal books used, a separate list of all downloadable documents, and the names and online portfolios of those who contributed to the construction of this unit.
To read more about this interdisciplinarity or view the New Orleans Social Studies unit website, please visit the COLLABORATE tab on the menu bar above or use the link in the sidebar to the right.
OVERVIEW OF TEACHING & LEARNING METHODS
Via the readings, discussions, and activities chosen for this unit, we aim to probe beneath the surface of New Orleans, providing students with a deeper, more meaningful understanding of the city’s inhabitants; the racial, political, and socioeconomic dynamics of New Orleans; and how those were exacerbated after Hurricane Katrina and by the hurricane itself. We also believe that - having completed this unit - students may better appreciate how they are themselves affected by the events that transpired in New Orleans during and after Hurricane Katrina.
READING STRATEGIES
We expect that both the unit’s subject matter and the principal text format will be largely unfamiliar to students in an academic context; therefore we selected reading activities and strategies to most support student learning and encourage greater comfort with the material.
Literature circles will be heavily used throughout the unit in which students will read, discuss, and work on assignments and projects. Groups will consist of five students each, and class dynamics must be considered to determine whether these groups should remain consistent across all five weeks or change in any frequency to suit the task at hand.
During in-class readings, we will use both directed reading–thinking activities (DRTA) and reciprocal teaching strategies to foster student agency. While the unit begins with teacher-directed reading, it quickly transitions to collaborative read-alouds with volunteer student readers, and finally to student-directed reading and learning. During teacher-led reading, the teacher will model strong reading strategies such as elaborating, predicting, and questioning such that students will pick upon said strategies to aid in their own private reading. It is hoped that these class discussions will eventually evolve into collaborative reasoning activities in which the students themselves initiate discussion topics, clarify text-related ambiguities, evaluate one another’s arguments, and engage in critical, independent thinking with minimal if any direction from the teacher.
Thus by the time student groups begin on their final unit project, they will feel confident in their understanding of the text and ability to examine it critically in a social context.
WRITING STRATEGIES
At this age, students sometimes feel self-conscious or inadequate with respect to their writing abilities. To bolster student creativity and confidence, the writing in this unit is far more focused on content rather than form. Of course any consistent or grievous errors will be addressed, but writing assignments will primarily be assessed by expressiveness, thoughtfulness, and engagement with the given material or activity.
Throughout the unit students will utilize a dialogue journal in which they will consistently return to seven core questions to help guide and inspire their interaction with the principal texts used, A.D.: New Orleans After the Deluge in particular. As they write in response to these prompts, students will develop a deeper understanding of the text as well as critical thinking skills for use with future texts and readings. Their responses will also act as initial research and source material for their cumulative unit graphic novel project.
Free-writes and informal written responses are also used liberally within the unit. Students will be presented with a great deal of new or challenging information, be it intellectually, morally, or thematically, over the course of these five weeks. We thought it best, therefore, to give them an outlet for their thoughts and reactions uncomplicated by formal strictures or constraints. Students will be encouraged to take any of their free-write and develop it into a more conventional essay for extra credit should they so choose.
The final graphic novel project also serves as an avenue of creative expression, both written and artistic. Just as we treat Neufeld’s graphic novel as text with all the nuances of classically-taught materials, we hope to show students - as they work on and present their group projects during the last weeks of the unit - that they can create their own critically engaging aesthetically-based texts.
We hope these strategies will encourage students to write more, take more writing risks, and therefore grow as writers. While we do not directly address formal concerns in this unit, it could serve as an opportune time to observe any recurring errors or slips and plan in advance to address them in the following unit.
TECHNOLOGY-USE
While technology is used amply during instruction, we think it more important to incorporate student-use of technology into our unit. Students do not use technology often, but when they do, they use it extensively and with agency.
Students complete a three-day WebQuest midway through the unit during which they perform self-directed research about New Orleans, its inhabitants, and its history. This research is performed on myriad websites in the computer lab; research groups are also given the option to use computer programs and online applications to produce the city brochure required at the end of the WebQuest. All students are given training in these programs and applications to help inform their decision.
Similarly, students are given the choice to create their graphic novels via computer-based or internet programs and given appropriate training to facilitate comfort and ease-of-use with said programs.
By unit’s end, therefore, students will have learned how to use several new computer programs and online applications. They will also have had additional practice in quality online research and information gathering to aid in future papers and projects.
STANDARDS & ASSESSMENTS
For a brief list of Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) English language arts standards and assessments met by this unit, please visit the ASSESSMENT tab on the menu bar above. In addition to these, three ISBE standards are included in each lesson plan - found under the LESSONS tab - more specific to the lesson at hand.
HOW TO USE THIS SITE
To explore our unit's website, please use the tabs along the top of the page. The general layout of the unit as well as brief explanations of each component can be found under UNIT PLAN; five complete downloadable lesson plans from the unit can be found under LESSONS; all major unit materials, citations and synopses of said materials, and handouts and worksheets can be found under MATERIALS; the shared English Language Arts/Social Studies lesson and materials can be found under COLLABORATE; links to the unit's WebQuest and a lesson plan for said WebQuest can be found under WEBQUEST; and our chosen standards, assessments, and rubrics can be found under ASSESSMENT. To return to this page, click on the title "New Orleans" at the top of any subpage or the word "Home" located under the main text of each subpage.
The right hand sidebar also contains ample information, such as links to the online resources referenced in the unit, additional information about the principal books used, a separate list of all downloadable documents, and the names and online portfolios of those who contributed to the construction of this unit.
