Creating Questions for a Harkness Discussion (Literature Based)

Katherine DeBrum

Ask three questions about the text (three per level). These need to be questions that you want to discuss or hear your classmates
discuss. Do not ask questions that you know the answer to just to have something down on paper to turn in.

Level One Question: Who was Kathryn Barlow before she met sam the
onion man?
For the seminar student, these are not mere recall questions;
rather, they establish evidence of basic facts presented in the
author’s proof paragraph. Does the theme applies to the author's life in a
way?
Examples:
● What evidence does the author use to support his
argument that it is man’s responsibility to care for the How does friendship have an impact an individual?
land?
● To what does the author compare his boyhood
experience on the family farm in order to further his
argument that man is forever attached to the land?

Level Two Question: How does friendship have a reflection on how a

person characteristic traits are?
These questions are textually implicit, requiring analysis and
interpretation of specific parts of the text, pointing out what a
specific part of the text actually means, or what language was What evidence does the play provide when looking
used to create the meaning. It’s not about what happened on at the different types of diction shown?
page 47 of the novel; it’s more like, “How does the author’s
description of the dying horse on page 47 of the novel creates a
tone?” what do you think the author's intentions were
when making writing this play?
Examples:
● Why do you think the author relies heavily upon visual
imagery in this passage to convey his love of the land?
● How does the heavy use of repetition contribute to the
effectiveness of the author’s argument that
___________?
● What do you think the author means when he says:
_____?

Level Three Question: How has a personas attitude towards a nature of

friendship affect the outcome of how long it would
These questions are more open-ended and go beyond the text.
They are intended to provoke a discussion of an abstract idea or last.
issue, to connect events/themes in the anchor text to other
texts, other arguments, or to universal issues of How does this play apply to our decisions as a
life/society/mankind itself.
society?
Examples:
● How has man’s attitude toward nature has changed over Has the perception of friendship are workmanship
the last 100 years? change throughout time or are they still the same?
● How has society’s changing perception toward nature
been advantageous? Detrimental?

In one complete sentence, write what the text is about (a
summary of the purpose, message, plot, theme, etc.).
The play is about the value of friendship and the
way that life goes, the impact that causes the
route of where your life goes is essential in the
play whether it's the way you act or do things the
play focuses on a specific aspect of life leaning
Create a textual analysis. This analysis should take into account towards how an individual has control of their own
your previous questions and explore possible answers of your
rather than putting the blame on one person or
level two and three questions. (500 words or more)
another.

The author has many essential points in the play

giving a timeline of where past events have
occurred the writer made it crucial to the reader
know that this play was going to focus on an
individual's life rather than multiples. Throughout
the play he focuses on an individual person named
stanley although there are different actors in the
play as well he makes sures to get all the details in
about stanley in the writing. Stanley a young boy
accused of stealing a pair of shoes has been taken
and along the way he meets his new roommates in
which they seem to be friendly at first. In the end
he realizes that these roommates were not his
friends, all but one. Throughout the play friendship
has been displayed with one of the other
characters named Zero, Stanley has a mutual
friendship with Zero and everything goes well. This
relationship between both Zero and Stanley is
crucial to look at when coming to a conclusion on
the value of the whole play. This play was designed
to have a theme where although you may think
the worst at times there's always going to be
someone to pick you up when you have fallen. In
the play they display this by adding in past events
in order to incorporate many of the main aspect of
friendships. In the scene where Sam the onion
man help Kathryn Barlow a displays a friendship
and a love relationship towards the end. I feel like
the way that this play is formated is to make us
realize that even though this play has references
made from the past our future doesn't differ as
much as people would think. The perception of
how society functions now towards others will
differ throughout the year but at the same time i
feel like there wouldn't be as much change due to
the effects that friendships between two people.
The tone of the play was very mellow at times but
were emphasized when needed to when an
important scene was rising. The purpose of this
who play was to show how one friendship can
overcome any problem in a sense where that in
the end who ever stands by you will be the one
who will help you in the future. The author
 incorporated workmanship throughout the whole
play by including a job like setting for stanley giving
him bunk mates and including a prison like setting
for him to be in. The workman's ship focuses on
discipline and throughout the play discipline was a
main aspect of the theme other than friendship.
Learning right from wrong these groups of kids
were given tasks to complete in order to make
sure the message on not commiting crimes were
to never cross their minds. In conclusion the way
that this was all produced was to give the audience
a feeling of identity because in the end of it all who
stanley was, was something important realizing
that he was in fact his own person.
Remember: This assignment is due at the beginning of the period in which we will discuss a text —not mid-way through. These
responses will serve as the basis for our class discussion.