Adrian Prieto

Lesson Plan: Becoming The Composer to Salinger’s Nine Stories

Approx. Time- 1 hr. 45 min

I. Anticipatory Set
a. Ask the students: “How many of you have a favorite movie? Which of those
movies incorporate memorable soundtracks?”
b. Today, you will be prompted to create your own epic soundtrack that correlates
with the emotions that the characters in any of J.D. Salinger’s Nine Stories
conveys using songs of your choice and the multimedia site Spotify.
II. Objective
a. Following instructions, students will be able to create a multimodal/essay format
hybrid project that showcases their individuality, creativity, and understanding of
the text.
III. Purpose
a. CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.9-10.7 The absence in the media that is being
referred to is the music that the student will be accumulated to accompany the
text.
b. CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.9-10.1.C This standard is in reference to the essay
portion of the assignment, in which the student will justify why they chose the
music that is accompanying the text.

IV. Input & Modeling

a. Students will read J.D. Salinger’s novel Nine Stories, or at the least one of the
stories to get a feel for which story that they want to portray in music form.
i. Approx. time: 15-60 min dependent on the student
1. A Perfect Day for Bananafish
a. Focus on Seymour Glass’ personality
b. Focus on his relationships
c. Brainstorm ideas for songs
i. Listen to small excerpts
ii. Film modeling
1. Show a montage of iconic songs that changed the film
a. Breakfast Club
b. Star Wars
i. Instrumental vs. Lyrical
ii. Whether lyrics coincide with the story or not
iii. How to Use Spotify
1. Students sign up
a. Go through a quick tour of Spotify
b. Show an example of personal playlists that have a common
theme
i. Brainstorm ideas for themes for the playlist
V. Check for Understanding
 a. Before moving on to the guided practice, allow for any questions from the
students to make sure that they can make the connection between the importance
of music to evoking emotion and connecting themes in the text.
b. Allow time for questions concerning navigating Spotify
VI. Guided Practice
a. Go over the prompt in detail
i. Discuss the time frame (2 weeks)
ii. Allow for any objection due to inability to use necessary multimodal
materials.
b. Go through the process of the project starting with:
i. Reading at least one story out of J.D. Salinger’s Nine Stories.
ii. Choose the story that will yield the most interesting and inventive playlist
iii. Create a six song playlist on Spotify
1. Incorporate an essay that has at least one paragraph that justifies
the choice of the song and use examples from the text (either
dialogue, descriptive language, etc.)
VII. Independent Practice/Assessment
a. Turn in by the approved due date:
i. Part A- Spotify Playlist consisting of six songs that correlate to the text
(any song in the known world [or available to Spotify] without questionable
language)
ii. Part B- Essay portion with a paragraph that justifies song choice
1. Either hand-written, Emailed or printed True or false section with
factual events from the texts, as well as the lives of the authors.
VIII. Closure
a. Grading in accordance to the rubric