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Iriana
Andrew Iriana

Dr. Wargo

EDU 415

December 4, 2023

Strategy Collection
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Comedy/Tragedy

Resource: Shakespeare, W. (2019). The complete works of William Shakespeare. Chartwell

Books.

The catalogue of plays and poems by William Shakespeare have not only shaped the

canon of modern English literature but have become archetypes of storytelling in their own

rights. Some standards in the PA Common Core explicitly call for the study of Shakespeare for

this reason. In a study of the conventions of both comedy and tragedy, not many writers can

claim to have such a mastery of both types like Shakespeare, and the enduring nature of his plays

make them engaging to student readers as well. The study of Shakespeare can reveal the inner

workings of the conventions of both comedy and tragedy.

Strategy: Word Knowledge Rating Chart

A word knowledge rating chart is a document that allows students to assess their own

knowledge of vocabulary words, helping define unfamiliar vocabulary of clarify confusing

terms. Students will receive a document with relevant vocabulary words for what is about to be

read, along with boxes for students to mark how familiar they are with the words, what they

think they mean, what definition they in groups make of the words, and finally what the actual

definition is, which the teacher will give at the end of the exercise.

This strategy can be especially helpful for introducing Shakespeare because of how old

his plays are. Shakespeare wrote his plays hundreds of years ago during the transition from

Middle English to early Modern English, so much of the vocabulary he uses is archaic and

obscure to modern readers. By having students tackle and define the more difficult or antiquated

language first, it will allow them to engage more easily with the text as a whole.
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The following WKR chart is made to prepare students for the archaic language within A

Midsummer Night’s Dream, which would be read and taught during the comedy portion of the

unit. This sheet specifically deals with language from Act 1, as each act will be introduced with

its own WKR chart. As described earlier, students will fill this out in groups before reading the

act, first filling in what they know or don’t know and what they think it means before coming up

with a group definition and finally filling in the definition given by the teacher.
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Blank Example
Vocab I have I’ve I think I I know My definition My group’s Teacher’s Definition
no clue heard/ know what definition
seen it what it this
before means, means
but still and I
not sure can
define it

Nuptial

Apace

Mirth

Filch

Livery
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Filled Example
Vocab I have I’ve I think I I know My definition My group’s Teacher’s Definition
no clue heard/ know what definition
seen it what it this
before means, means
but still and I
not sure can
define it
Something with A phase of the Of or relating to a

Nuptial X the moon moon wedding

Keeping pace Going ahead of Rapidly; in a speedy

Apace X with something something or manner

someone

Mirth X Happy Happiness, Great merriment

Glee

Filch X Garbage Something from To make off with the

a gutter belongings of others

To taste like liver The quality of A uniform

Livery X tasting like

liver
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Satire

Resource: Orwell, G. (1945). Animal Farm. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Corp.

An allegory for the rise and corruption of the Soviet Union, Animal Farm tells the story

of farm animals overthrowing their farmer and running the farm for themselves. The pigs,

however, slowly mislead the other animals into acting against their own interests, and eventually

become indistinguishable from the farmers they resist. What Animal Farm can teach in a unit on

satire is how satirists draw direct parallels to real-world history to better support their claims. By

rooting the story firmly in historical reality, George Orwell’s claims about the corruption of the

Soviet Union are better bolstered, as well as offering readers a new perspective on historical

events through the lens of fiction.

Strategy: Graffiti Wall

A graffiti wall works by having the teacher propose a question or prompt on a specific

content area and having students write or draw their responses and connections on the board.

This gauges and recalls prior knowledge, letting the teacher know what the students know about

a specific subject as well as giving them plenty of prompts to spur discussion and/or lecture.

Where this strategy can be useful in teaching Animal Farm is to first gauge student

knowledge about the Soviet Union. If students don’t know much about the USSR, then they will

miss much or all of the satirical material of Animal Farm. Alternatively, students who know quite

a bit can be cued into paying attention to certain historical parallels in the novel. By the end of

the strategy exercise, the class’s collective knowledge of the history of the USSR should either

give the teacher an effective launch point to engage with Animal Farm or tell them how much

history they’re going to need to teach before they can effectively discuss the novel.
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Because this strategy is done on a board, there is no handout to make an example of.

Instead, I have made a reconstruction of what the graffiti wall may look like by the end given the

prompt of “What made up the Soviet Union?”.

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What made up the Soviet Union?

Russia Lenin The October Revolution

Stalin Sputnik USSR Cold War

Ukraine Chernobyl
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Persuasive Writing

Resource: Barton, B. (2019). I’m trying to love spiders: (it isn’t easy.). Puffin Books.

I’m trying to love spiders is a children’s book about arguing for the value of spiders. It is

filled to the brim with interesting facts about spiders, logical appeals for their lack of danger

towards humans, and emotional appeals for their worth as creatures. Being a kids’ book, its

argumentative techniques are more transparent and easily noticeable to students, making it a

good introduction to persuasive writing.

Strategy: Four Corners Debate

Four corners debate is a strategy that sees the teaching posing a stance on a subject – “I

support a higher minimum wage”, “The government has no place in religion”, etc. – and

assigning different responses to the four corners of their room, offering differing levels of

response. The students then choose which corner to stand in depending on their stance –

“Strongly Agree” stands in this corner, “Moderately Disagree” stands there, etc. Students will

then discuss with the others in their corner the issue and come up with a consolidated argument

for their stance. This practice helps spur inquiry, introduce issues of debate, and encourage

developing and practicing argumentation.

Incorporating this strategy into a lesson built around I’m trying to love spiders would act

as an introduction to persuasive writing and argumentation, and could involve posing the

statement like “I usually squash spiders (or get someone else to do it) whenever I see one in my

house” to the class and have them get into corners representing the stances of “Strongly Agree”,

“Moderately Agree”, “Moderately Disagree”, and “Strongly Agree”. Students would then be

asked to explain and argue for their choices. The teacher would then point out several of the

possible argumentation techniques the students used in their responses before starting into a read-
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aloud of the book. Once finished, the teacher would ask the students what they saw the author

use to defend their claim, and then task students with grouping back into their corners (or new

one if their perspective has changed) and coming up with an updated response in light of the

book and incorporating some of the techniques seen in it.

Much like the graffiti wall, this strategy doesn’t involve handouts, so I have included two

examples of what the four corners debate might look like in practice. I have included a pre-

reading example as well as what it might look like post-reading.

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Pre-Reading Example

“I usually squash spiders (or get someone else to do it)

whenever I see one in my house”
Strongly Agree Moderately Agree
Spiders are venomous Some are venomous and I don’t want to find out the hard
way which ones are or aren’t
They shouldn’t be in my house
My sister is arachnophobic
I don’t like them

I don’t like most of them

Moderately Disagree Strongly Disagree

I don’t like killing things Killing animals indiscriminately is morally wrong

Spiders can kill other bugs in your house Spiders are cute

Some spider deaths are okay, though Most spiders are not dangerous to people
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Post-Reading Example

“I usually squash spiders (or get someone else to do it)

whenever I see one in my house”
Strongly Agree Moderately Agree
Enough spiders are venomous to constitute proper caution Assuming they’re harmless is only going to lower your
in killing them on sight guard against the dangerous ones

What if you actually like the bugs they kill? My sister is still arachnophobic and we won’t have peace
in the house if spiders are allowed to live
I still just don’t like them

Moderately Disagree Strongly Disagree

Spiders are valuable members of the local ecosystem
Spiders can kill other bugs in your house
Venomous spiders are okay to kill, however
Spiders are interesting and complex creatures that pose
little to no harm to the majority of people.
Most spiders don’t want anything to do with people,
anyway

Most spiders are not dangerous to people

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Dystopia

Resource: https://ed.ted.com/lessons/how-to-recognize-a-dystopia-alex-gendler

This TEDed video does a good job summarizing the literary principles, history, and

significance of dystopian fiction. “How to Recognize a Dystopia” would make for a good

starting point for the unit, as it connects dystopian literature to real life history and lists many

examples of dystopian stories that may garner interest in the subject as well as activate prior

knowledge of the genre.

Strategy: Patterned Paragraph

The patterned paragraph is a writing-to-learn strategy designed to help students see how

detail-rich paragraphs are formed and how to summarize information succinctly and thoroughly

into writing. It involves having students read or watch a text or video and then relaying the

information from the source into a paragraph, with students filling out a template “pattern” to

define the main claim of the source, cite evidence to support that claim, and offer support for that

evidence. (See the blank example below for specifics.)

This can be used in tandem with “How to Recognize a Dystopia” to help students

develop working definitions of dystopia as well as prepare them to think about how dystopian

literature spawns from real life dystopias. Students will summarize the information of the video

and organize its claims into a condense paragraph in order to show an understanding of the genre

as well as simply exercising writing skills and summarization.

I have included below a fill-in template as well as a more fleshed out example that

students might make.

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Template Example
Your topic sentence (the overarching idea that you are writing about).
Transition word, the first claim.
The evidence to support your first claim AND a citation.
The explanation (not a retelling) of why the evidence supports your first claim.
This may be more than one sentence.
Transition word, the second claim.
The evidence to support your second claim AND a citation.
The explanation (not a retelling) of why the evidence supports your second claim.
This may be more than one sentence.
Transition word, the third claim.
The evidence to support your third claim AND a citation.
The explanation (not a retelling) of why the evidence supports your third claim.
This may be more than one sentence.
Your conclusive sentence (which wraps up your ideas and summarizes the topic

sentence in a new way).

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Filled Example
“How to Recognize a Dystopia” tells the story of the dystopia genre and the real-
world history behind it. To do this, the author claims that dystopian literature has
roots in the ancient world. He first explores the works of Plato, who claimed…
This helps show how dystopia as a genre has deep historical roots. However,
dystopia as a genre really came into fruition during the modern era. We can see
this in the proliferation of modern dystopian novels throughout the 20th and 21st
centuries such as… This shows how dystopia has been shaped by modern
historical events as well as modern technological and social progress. Lastly, the
video delves into how both historical and literary dystopias are shaped by the
pursuit to mold human nature. We can see this as much in the Third Reich as you
can in fictional dystopias like Animal Farm… We can see from these actions how
dystopias try to bend people’s actions and behaviors around their conceptions of
human nature. In conclusion “How to Recognize a Dystopia” shows how dystopian
literature has grown and has been shaped by ancient and modern history, telling an
endless tale of human authority trying to prescribe human nature to create perfect
societies that only wind up making everyone miserable.
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Poetry

Resource: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FjwJQ0NVyYc&ab_channel=WritingwithAndrew

This video, found on YouTube, provides a great perspective on poetry, seeing it not as

something to be deciphered but something to wash over the reader. I think a lot of students are

rightfully put off by poetry after having been taught to read poetry the deciphering way, so

perhaps by kicking off the poetry unit with “How to Read (and Even Enjoy) Poetry”, it might

help some students back on the right track to getting something out of poetry.

Strategy: Anticipation Guide

To activate prior knowledge and interest, an anticipation guide can help students assess

themselves as well as have them stretch their thinking by answering questions without

necessarily knowing the answer. Anticipation guides pose a series of questions that push students

to think about what they do and don’t know about a subject, asking “agree/disagree” and

“likely/unlikely” questions. Students will answer the questions before a reading or viewing of a

video or presentation, then they will do it again after being exposed to the text in question. This

will help students begin thinking about a subject before delving into it as well as showing

students what they have learned, building self-efficacy by showing personal growth and the

capacity to learn.

This strategy is useful in conjunction with “How to Read (and Even Enjoy) Poetry” as an

introduction to the unit because, as stated in the video, many students are turned off to poetry in

school for a variety of reasons. An anticipation guide could help challenge some of the

presumptions they may be bringing into class with them, as well as assessing listening skills by

asking questions with answers specifically found in the video. By having students confront their

(possible) misconceptions about poetry, they may be better enabled to embrace poetry for a unit.
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Blank Example

Before After

Agree Disagree Statement Agree Disagree

Poems are like riddles

I am familiar with how

poetry works

I am familiar with who

William Carlos Williams is

Poetry is primarily about

sharing experiences.

I enjoy/think I would enjoy

writing my own poetry

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Filled Example

Before After

Agree Disagree Statement Agree Disagree

X Poems are like riddles X

I am familiar with how

X poetry works X

I am familiar with who

X William Carlos Williams is X

Poetry is primarily about

X sharing experiences. X

I enjoy/think I would enjoy

X writing my own poetry X

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Works Cited

Barton, B. (2019). I’m trying to love spiders: (it isn’t easy.). Puffin Books.

“How to Read (and Even Enjoy) Poetry.” YouTube, YouTube, 11 Apr. 2022,

www.youtube.com/watch?v=FjwJQ0NVyYc&ab_channel=WritingwithAndrew.

“How to Recognize a Dystopia - Alex Gendler.” TED, TED-Ed, ed.ted.com/lessons/how-to-

recognize-a-dystopia-alex-gendler. Accessed 4 Dec. 2023.

Orwell, G. (1945). Animal Farm. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Corp.

Shakespeare, W. (2019). The complete works of William Shakespeare. Chartwell Books.