Lesson Plan

Lesson 2: Scrooge as He is Revealed during the Ghostly Experiences

Photo caption

Scrooge and the Ghost of Marley by Arthur Rackham (1915).

As students read the entirety of A Christmas Carol, they will undoubtedly note that the novel is organized around the visits of the ghosts promised by Marley. The apparitions all focus on what Scrooge himself lacks—family, love, companionship, good will, happiness regardless of wealth; his responses illuminate much about his character. While Dickens through the narrator makes many direct statements about the protagonist, the text also enables readers to infer insights that make it clear that Scrooge is not a flat caricature of a miser but a character of some complexity.

In stave 2, the Ghost of Christmas Past takes Scrooge on a journey through the past, including an unhappy childhood and a failed romance. In stave 3, the Ghost of Christmas Present leads Scrooge on a journey through various scenes of the present, most notably and lengthily, celebrations at the homes of the Cratchits and of the nephew and his wife. Stave 4 features the Ghost of Christmas Future and presents a dire possibility for Scrooge. Clips from movies scenes of the ghostly visitations can be very useful as a preliminary activity to help students to visualize events in the story.

Guiding Questions

What does A Christmas Carol teach us about life and humanity?

How does Dickens use symbolism throughout A Christmas Carol?

Learning Objectives

Analyze Scrooge’s experiences during his encounters with the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future.

Evaluate how Dickens used both direct and indirect characterization to illuminate Ebenezer Scrooge.

Lesson Plan Details

Content Standards

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.CCRA.R.1. Read closely to determine what the text says explicitly and to make logical inferences from it; cite specific textual evidence when writing or speaking to support conclusions drawn from the text.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.CCRA.R.2. Determine central ideas or themes of a text and analyze their development; summarize the key supporting details and ideas.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.CCRA.R.3. Analyze how and why individuals, events, or ideas develop and interact over the course of a text.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.CCRA.R.4. Interpret words and phrases as they are used in a text, including determining technical, connotative, and figurative meanings, and analyze how specific word choices shape meaning or tone.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.CCRA.R.5. Analyze the structure of texts, including how specific sentences, paragraphs, and larger portions of the text (e.g., a section, chapter, scene, or stanza) relate to each other and the whole.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.CCRA.R.6. Assess how point of view or purpose shapes the content and style of a text.

Preparation

Staves 2, 3, and 4 of A Christmas Carol

Worksheet 2. Understanding Scrooge

Worksheet 2. Understanding Scrooge (teachers version)

Lesson Activities

Activity 1. Scrooge as He is Revealed during the Ghostly Experiences

Point out that Scrooge’s ghostly visitations all occur during the night. Why? Does Scrooge really see ghosts, or is he dreaming? Ask students to describe Scrooge’s responses to anticipating and experiencing the ghosts and the things they show him.

Explain that authors use both direct characterization (direct statements about characters’ personalities and intentions) and indirect characterization (details that enable readers to infer what is not directly stated). If necessary, provide an example from students’ previous reading experiences or from a movie they have seen.

Then have the class use Worksheet 2 to investigate in detail the experiences engineered by the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future. You may want to assign staves to groups and then have the class pool information. Follow with discussion, using the teachers version of Worksheet 2.

Activity 2. Follow-up discussion questions

What do the three ghostly experiences have in common? Why did Dickens choose this similarity?
If there were a fourth ghost, what might it look like? What might it represent?
It is easy at first to think of Scrooge as nothing more than a mean old miser. How do the vision scenes demonstrate that he is actually quite complex?

Assessment

Assign students to write narrative pieces describing an additional experience Scrooge might have had with one of the three ghosts including Scrooge’s responses to it. Direct students to use dialogue and to incorporate both direct and indirect characterization.