I. Unite title: What does The Fault in Our Stars really say?

II. Theme: Explaining a novel through poetry

In this unit for tenth grade students they will be exposed to the following texts; The
Fault in Our Stars, Williams The Red Wheelbarrow, Christina Rossettis I loved
you first; but afterwards your love, Walt Whitmans A Glimpse, Sarah Mangusos
Love Letter(clouds), and we will also look at an interview with John Green. This
unit should last from a week and a half to two weeks.
III. DEMOGRAPHICS
This unit will be taught in Van Buren High School in Van Buren, Arkansas. The
economic background of the students is middle class but is mostly diverse.
40% Caucasian
30% Hispanic
15% Asian
10% African American
5% Native American
My classroom would have four white walls with two large windows opposite of the
door. There will be 28 desks but only 24 are occupied. My desk will sit to the right of
the door facing the windows. This way I can see all of the students. My classroom is
on the second floor. The classroom is near a library. My tenth grade classroom will
have 2 ELL students in it and 3 students with 504 disabilities. To accommodate for
every student in my classroom we will often work diverse ability grouping. I will
have groups pre-maid every month so that people get to be around new students
with new learning styles. If the students work it groups they will more likely feel
more comfortable around each other to share their thoughts. I will make sure to
have a very engaging attention getter to every class that way my 504 students are
immediately engaged. To follow up with that I will always have a visual of the lesson
on the board or printed out that way my ELL students can get a hands on approach
to their learning.
IV. UNIT GOALS/CCSS Standards/SL Objectives
In this unit students will be able to find figurative words in a text and figurative
phrases that will help identify the meaning of sections of the text and meaning of
the overall text. Students will also be able to use that figurative language to analyze
and create a vivid description of a portion of the text using multi-literacies like
poetry

V. RATIONALE

Teaching poetry and figurative language can be a harder subject for students to
understand. I am teaching this unit because tenth grade is when students start to
grasp the figurative language in a text and can be able to define them and give
examples of their own examples within a text. It is very important for all students
but especially ELL and 504/IEPs to have full understanding of figurative language
and poetry because when they progress to the next grade they will use those skills
to analyze literature. These learned skills are the backbone to their reading and
analyzing. A theory I have adopted while creating this unit is the Discovery theory.
Jerome Bruner is the father of the Discovery theory. The Discovery theory is an
active process of learning it is a type of learning called inquiry-based learning where
the students will learn a deep understand of the topic at hand and they will
remember that and just build off of prior knowledge and new knowledge. The
difference in Discovery theory is that the students discover the learned material and
learn it on their own. I will just be a guide or an aid to them when they stray too far
off or get confused. I want the students to be able to learn the information for them.
This is important because they are just adding to their own knowledge instead of
regurgitating what the teacher taught for the test. There are five reasons as to why
students will benefit from Discovery learning; one, is that this type of learning is
used with problem-based learning and hands-on approach where the students get
to figure the stuff out and then work with it too; two, is that discovery learning
makes the process of learning more important than the final outcome; three, the
situation of failure will not be an issue because as a teacher I will always encourage
them to find more solutions and examples; four, is that feedback and collaboration
is a very important part of the discovery learning process; and finally, it encourages
and satisfies human curiosity and helps pull the students interest up front into their
learning(Learn NC). I feel like I am using this in the classroom because I am having
the students find their own examples of figurative language in the text and they
have to explain to me why. I have engaging activities that will peak their curiosity so
that they will be ready to learn and ready to work with figurative language and
poetry. They will be able to research poetry that will justify their claims on what a
section of their choice is meaning in The Fault in Our Stars
VI. UNIT CONTENT AND SKILLS
Concepts central to unit them: This unit deals with the identity of the characters and
how to read it based upon the figurative language in text novel. This unit also deals
with the social construction of a characters identity; how the social aspect of life
affects Hazel and Gus in positive or negative ways. A very important concept
covered is identity crisis because of Hazel acting as if she is ruining everyone life
because she is sick and how she feels she cannot do anything because of her
cancer. Figurative language, poetry, analyzing, planning, applying the students
knowledge by teaching his/her classmates about their poem and section of the
novel and how they relate, will be used in this unit. Items of importance are key
vocabulary dealing with poetry and figurative language. There will be specific
terminology when studying The Fault in Our Stars. We will start the entire unit off by
reading an interview of John Green the writer.

Unit skills: Analyzing a large text, analyzing a poem, identifying figurative language
in a novel/poem, give evidence of the figurative devices found, applying evidence to
the novel/poem, compare/contrast the novel/poem based on learned material, and
justify a section of the novel with a poem that can be related to it.
VII. UNIT OVERVIEW
In the Figurative Language unit students start by getting engaged with a video that
will show fun examples of figurative language in popular movies. They will then
review their previous pre-assessment on finding their own examples in the public
and infer what the words meant. Once we cover those in class we will break into
groups and each group will get a specific word that they will make a presentation
board out of butcher paper to show to the class. The second lesson will be examples
of the figurative language throughout The Fault in Our Stars. They will be given
examples that they must explore within the text and use context clues to determine
what type of figurative language the expert is using. The third lesson is to show the
students how to analyze a poem with the TP-FASST method. Using this method the
students are finding the vivid words and emotional meaning tied to the figurative
language. They will work in groups with individual poems to analyze them together
and discuss what they learned from their pre-assessment when taking the poems
home over night and making notes about their thoughts. In the fourth lesson the
students will be given a handout that explain that they

VIII. INSTRUCTIONAL PLANS

See Lesson Plans
IX. UNIT EVALUATION/ASSESSMENTS
A. I have made a unit assessment rubric for the students. It is attached to their
assessment form. The different parts of the assessment are broken down into
categories that all add up to equal 100 total points. This rubric explains what the
students must have and it explains what parts of the assessment will receive a
given amount of points. It will be apparent to the students as to what they need to
do to achieve the full credit. B. During the unit each day will have an ending
assessment where the students will either turn in what they have been working on.
Lesson one assessment is the students butcher paper where they present their
figurative language word. Lesson two assessments are where the students will pick
their own examples of figurative language and justify their reasons. Lesson three
consists of an assessment of turning in their poetry graphic organizer so that I can
see how they have progressed in their analysis. Lesson fours assessment is where
the students pick their poem to compare to the novel and complete a diagram that
they will turn into to me. The final assessment is having their project planning
completed and turning the skeleton of their projects in.

X. TEACHER CANDIDATE and STUDENT REFERENCES AND BIBLIOGRAPHIES

A. Resources: - www.youtube.com - www.readwritethink.org www.teacherspayteachers.com
-The Fault in Our Stars
by John Green -http://www.learnnc.org/lp/pages/5352 http://johngreenbooks.com/questions-about-the-fault-in-our-stars-spoilers/ www.poetryfoundation.org