This lesson highlights the changing relationship between the city center and the suburb in the postwar decades, especially in the 1950s. Students will look at the legislation leading up to and including the Federal Highway Act of 1956. They will also examine documents about the history of Levittown, the most famous and most important of the postwar suburban planned developments.
In The Red Badge of Courage, Stephen Crane presents war through the eyes—and thoughts—of one soldier. The narrative’s altered point of view and stylistic innovations enable a heightened sense of realism while setting the work apart from war stories written essentially as tributes or propaganda.
Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, una muy importante figura literaria a nivel mundial y la primer gran poeta de la América Latina, es un producto del Siglo de Oro Español.
John Steinbeck recognized that one of the most criticized elements of The Grapes of Wrath was his alternating use of inner chapters or “generals” that interrupt the narrative of the Joads. In this lesson, students will first determine the function of Steinbeck’s opening chapter which acts as the first “inner chapter.” Then, they will explore the relationship between inner chapters and the Joad narrative chapters throughout the novel.
Students learn the linguistic strategies Achebe uses to convey the Igbo and British missionary cultures presented in the novel and how the text combines European linguistic and literary forms with African oral traditions.
Nigerian born Chinua Achebe is one of the world's most well-known and influential contemporary writers. His first novel, Things Fall Apart (1958), is an early narrative about the European colonization of Africa told from the point of view of the colonized people.
Heavily influenced by social and scientific theories, including those of Darwin, writers of naturalism described—usually from a detached or journalistic perspective—the influence of society and surroundings on the development of the individual. In the following lesson plan, students will learn the key characteristics that comprise American literary naturalism as they explore London's "To Build a Fire" and Crane's "The Open Boat."
Through close readings of Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God, students will analyze how Hurston creates a unique literary voice by combining folklore, folk language, and traditional literary techniques. Students will examine the role that folk groups play in both their own lives and in the novel.
This lesson provides a Common Core application for high school students for Chinua Achebe’s novel Things Fall Apart. Students will undertake close reading of passages in Things Fall Apart to evaluate the impact of Achebe’s literary techniques, the cultural significance of the work, and how this international text serves as a lens to discover the experiences of others.
