Secondary English Language Arts: Revised ed:TPA Lesson Plan Template

Name: Jett Levin

Lesson Title: Orphan Train on Social Media
Grade Level: 10
Lesson Goals
Central Focus: Describe the central focus (of the unit) and explain how this lesson reflects the central focus.
Central Focus: to explore what we carry with us, synthesizing narrative strategies from mentor texts and creating personal narratives
with thematic elements that reflect individual growth experiences.
This lesson reflects the central focus by prompting students to draw connections between two different kinds of storytelling media:
novel and online social media. It also requires students to use critical thinking skills and empathy to act as the characters from the
book and respond to their classmates in a new format.
List the title, author, and write a short description of the text(s) used in this lesson.
Orphan Train by Christina Baker Kline. Orphan Train is a novel about the intersection of two womens stories: Vivian Daly and Molly
Ayer. In and out of foster homes, Molly steals a book and is threatened with juvenile prison and being kicked out of her uncomfortable
home if she does not find a way to do community service hours elsewhere. Vivian, an elderly woman whose childhood as an Irish
immigrant on the orphan train determined the progression of her life homes lives nearby, and needs help working through the
memories and objects from those years that have been lying abandoned in her attic. When Mollys boyfriend tells her of an
opportunity to get hours helping Vivian clear out her attic, a unique friendship is born.

Conceptual/Theoretical Framework (draw from research and readings in CI and English coursework:
The conceptual/theoretical framework for this lesson comes from Heather Lattimers Real-World Literacies Disciplinary
Teaching in the High School Classroom. Lattimer argues that literacy education needs to be authentic, realistic, and a
disciplinerather than a subject in school. Writing for school has predominately been about the product. This framework
instead focuses on the process of writing inside and outside of the classroom. Lattimer encourages the use of instructional
strategies that support realistic learning and follow realistic, natural (rather than purely task-based) processes.
Writing that is real (and not just created by a teacher for the sake of having a task to do) is discipline based: engage[s]
students in writing that reflects the norms of the discipline, authentic in its purpose and audience responds to a real
problem or seeks to answer an authentic question, involves collaboration and communication, allows students to
demonstrate writing as thinking with flexible structures and the use of mentor texts with students so they can recognize
the structures and strategies authors used and then adapt them to their own writing (Lattimer 60). It also involves

metacognition and a great deal of practice.

Standard(s) Addressed (use examples from both the Common Core State Standards and the Illinois Professional Teaching
Standards):
Standard 1 - Teaching Diverse Students The competent teacher understands the diverse characteristics and abilities of each student and how
individuals develop and learn within the context of their social, economic, cultural, linguistic, and academic experiences. The teacher uses these
experiences to create instructional opportunities that maximize student learning.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.9-10.6
Use technology, including the Internet, to produce, publish, and update individual or shared writing products, taking advantage of
technology's capacity to link to other information and to display information flexibly and dynamically.
Recall your central focus and explain how the standards (above) and learning objectives (below), that you have identified, support
students learning:
The central focus of this unit is to explore what we carry with us, synthesizing narrative strategies from mentor texts and creating
personal narratives with thematic elements that reflect individual growth experiences. The standards and objectives in this lesson
create an opportunity for students to engage with writing for different characters and creating shared writing projects in the same
formats as Facebook and Twitter. With knowledge of students abilities and interests, namely aptitude in social media genres, this
lesson draws from their prior knowledge of these genres and asks them to think critically about the characters in Orphan Train and
how they might engage with new communicative media.
Materials/ Instructional Resources:
Copies of Orphan Train
Notebooks
Computer paper
Writing utensils
Colored Pencils
*Learning Objectives (Add additional objective boxes as
needed):

*Assessment (both formal and informal)- Evidence of Student

Understanding:

Objective 1: Students will demonstrate character and plot

knowledge of Orphan Train to create twitter conversations
between the characters about events in the novel thus far.

Related Assessment:
The related assessment will be their written conversations in twitter
format.

Explain the Assessments Alignment with the Objective:

The assessment allows students to demonstrate genre
knowledge and understanding of characterization
and the plot of the novel by giving them opportunities to write
as a given character and respond to one another in character.
Describe the form of Student feedback that accompanies
the assessment:
Written partnered or groups of 3 twitter conversations.
Objective 2:
Students will reflect upon the experience of writing as someone
else and in familiar but nonacademic genres.

Related Assessment:

Formative: reflection
Explain the Assessments Alignment with the Objective:
The reflection will give students an opportunity to think critically
about what they did during the previous assessment activity.
Describe the form of Student feedback that accompanies
the assessment:
Brief written reflection

Lesson Considerations

Pre-Assessment:
Summary of Orphan Train thus far will be given at the beginning of the class. Students can use the butcher paper posters on
characterization they made yesterday that are around the room to refresh their memories about the main characters.
Prior Academic Learning and Prerequisite Skills: (Cite evidence that describes what students know, what they can

do, and what they are still learning to do.)

Students know what characterization is and where to find evidence of it in a text. They can describe and analyze characters and their
choices. They are learning to take on new perspectives in their writing and adapt authorial voice to different tasks.

Personal, cultural, and community assets related to the central focusExplain what you know about your students
everyday experiences, cultural and language backgrounds and practices, and interests.
My students have internet access and computers at home and are voracious readers of texts like Facebook and Twitter.
They are familiar with these genres having grown up as millennial kids. They have great deal of prior knowledge about
writing for social media and may even do so in multiple languages (ie. French, Korean, English). They use social media to
connect to topics and activities that interest them including funny videos, current events, social justice movements, buzz
feed quizzes, Instagram etc. Many are interested in photography in this vein.
Misconceptions:
Students may have misconceptions about the assignment: what does it mean to tweet as someone else?
Though this is unlikely, some students may not be familiar with Twitter or Facebook, in which case an expert peer can give a succinct
explanation and guide them through the format they will need to recreate.

Language Objectives and Demands

Identify a Language Function:

Tweet/Write
Language Function. Using information about your students language assets and needs, identify one language function essential
for students within your central focus. Listed below are some sample language functions. You may choose one of these or another
more appropriate language function for this lesson.
Analyze

Argue

Describe

Evaluate

Explain

Interpret

Justify

Synthesize

Vocabulary:

Student selected vocabulary from the reading.

Learning and Linguistic Accommodations: Describe the instructional accommodations that you must make, as the classroom
teacher, in order to address the learning needs of students with special needs and students who are not English proficient or
students who use varieties of English.
Accommodations for students with Special Needs:

For the student on the autism spectrum, I will refer to the IEP and consult with the special education teacher on how to
best meet their goals and needs with this lesson. If needed, modifications can be made to differentiate goals/objectives
and student output for the day.
Accommodations for students who are not proficient uses of Standard English:

Students who are not proficient users of Standard English do not need to write their tweets in standard English, it is not a
necessary norm for social media literacies.

Explain your instructional decision-making and the way you plan to support student learning when using whole class,
small groups, and individualized assignments. In addition, explain accommodations for students who have
special needs and students who are not proficient users of Standard English as part of whole class and small
group arrangements
Students will be reading individually at their own pace. Then, in pairs or groups of 3, they will be working on a conversation together
as two different characters, OR they can choose to make two Facebook profiles together for those characters. Students can choose
who writes/draws, and generate ideas together. The student with special needs will be placed with supportive peers. The student who
is French dominant will also be placed with someone they are friends with so they can explain and help with writing if need be.

Time

*Lesson Plan Details

Lesson Introduction

20
Summary of where we left off as a class
Reading and annotating Orphan Train independently
Learning Activities 25
Group project: Tweeting as and creating Facebook profile pages for characters in Orphan Train.
Students will work together to have ongoing conversations and be actively writing or reading/seeking evidence throughout
this portion of the class period. The instructor will be circulating in case anyone needs help and to keep everyone on task.
Describe how your planned formal and informal assessments, including a written product, will provide direct evidence of
students abilities to construct meaning from, interpret, OR respond to a complex text throughout the learning segment.
Students will use the reading they did in previous classes and earlier that day to interpret characters feelings and thoughts
and respond to each other within the literate practice norms of Twitter and Facebook as those identities. They will respond to
issues in the book that the characters face, and whatever the students see fit to add that is typical of social media (daily
activities, pictures, status updates etc.)

Closure
Reflection: what was it like to pretend to be a character on twitter or Facebook? Did you learn anything about the characters
or about the media format by completing this assignment?
Extension
Option 1: annotation and vocabulary worksheet time
Option 2: expand upon your reflection
Option 3: Read ahead for Monday

Resources and References (use APA or MLA listing the information from the conceptual framework above as
well as from any other categories where cited a source):
Illinois Professional Teaching Standards (2013). Illinois State Board of Education. ISBE, 2013. Web. 2 November 2015.
Lattimer, Heather. Real-world Literacies: Disciplinary Teaching in the High School Classroom. Urbana: NCTE, 2014. Print.
National Governors Association Center for Best Practices, Council of Chief State School Officers. Common Core State
Standards English Language Arts. National Governors Association Center for Best Practices, Council of Chief State School
Officers, Washington D.C., 2010. Web. 2 November 2015.

Attachments: handouts, assessments, etc.

Instructions today will be verbal, unless the IEP asks for them to be typed out.