Pre-Reading Lesson Plan
Subject: English Grade level: 10th grade
Unit: Julius Caesar Day/periods: 4/04/12, 45 minutes
Topic: Who was Julius Caesar?
Content Standards:
Reading Standard for Informational Text:
2. Determine a central idea of a text and analyze its development over the course of the text, including how it emerges and is shaped and refined by specific details; provide an objective summary of the text.
Writing Standard:
2. Write informative/explanatory texts to examine and convey complex ideas, concepts, and information clearly and accurately through the effective selection, organization, and analysis of content.
Speaking and Listening Standard:
1. Initiate and participate effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grades 9–10 topics, texts, and issues, building on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly and persuasively.
Learning Experience Outcomes
Students will:
Analyze the life of Julius Caesar to gain historical background on the text.
Work collaboratively in groups.
Learning Experience Assessments
Completion and quality of group’s before and after Julius Caesar biographies.
Teacher will observe participation in small groups and keep track of amount of input by students.
Differentiation
Approaching Students will be working with each other to help understand the text. Also, students will be given a handout of teacher prepared notes that will help the student follow along during the direct instruction.
On-level Students will have other students to ask questions in the group if needed, but if not, they will be able to make their own inferences.
Beyond Students can help others who may not understand the text. They will have the choice to take their own notes or use the teacher prepared ones. They will be the ones writing the biographies and prompted by the teacher to make deeper connections.
Curriculum Integration: Social studies, literacy
Procedures/Strategies: Students will complete the do now on an index card, teacher will provide background on Rome during the time period, students will be broken into groups and will create a bio-impression, groups will read the life story of Julius Caesar, students will recreate their biographies, they will share these with the class, teacher will give students her notes on Julius Caesar, class discussion will be held relating this information to the play and then the homework of reading Act 1 will be assigned.
Materials/Resources
Julius Caesar text handout
http://www.socialstudiesforkids.com/articles/worldhistory/juliuscaesar1.htm
Whiteboard
Marker
Series of words
Day 1
Sponge Activity (activity that will be done as students enter the room to get them into the mindset of the concept to be learned) Students will have a do now that they will complete on the front of an index card. The do now will be: Write any words or phrases that come to your mind when you think of Julius Caesar.
Anticipatory Set (focus question/s that will be used to get students thinking about the day’s lesson) How will having background information on Julius Caesar help us to understand and analyze the larger text?
Activating Prior Knowledge (what information will be shared with/among students to connect to prior knowledge/experience) Completing the do now will call upon student’s prior knowledge of Julius Caesar. This will help the teacher get a sense of how much the students already know about him.
Direct Instruction (input, modeling, check for understanding)
1. The teacher will go over briefly what life was like in Rome during Julius Caesar’s time period.
2. There will be written on the board “Julius Caesar” and then a series of words that relate to him/his life.
3. The teacher will explain to the students how to complete a bio-impression.
4. Using the series of words (listed below) about Julius Caesar, students will create what they think his life was like, only using those words.
5. After completing this supposed biography, students will read their hand-outs.
6. Upon completing the reading, students will re-write their biographies using their new knowledge.
7. After the students complete the guided practice of the bio-impression, the teacher will provide the students with her notes on the board of Julius Caesar’s life.
Guided Practice (how students will demonstrate their grasp of new learning)
1. Students will be broken up into groups of four.
2. On the board will be written “Julius Caesar” and a series of words that relate to him/his life:
· Wealth and power
· Cornelia
· Hiding
· Public Speaker
· Lawyer
· Consul
· Murdered
· Brutus
· Coins
· Dictator?
3. As a group and just from looking at these words, students will create what they believe to be Julius Caesar’s life story. There will be one person from each group writing down the thoughts of the group.
4. After completing this, students will be given a hand-out (http://www.socialstudiesforkids.com/articles/worldhistory/juliuscaesar1.htm) of Julius Caesar’s actual life story. The words that were used previously to create the bio-impression will be found also in the text. They will read this text as a group, taking turns to read different sections out loud to one another.
5. Groups will then recreate their bios of Julius Caesar with their newly learned knowledge of him. There will be one per group, but the student rewriting the bio must be different from the previous student to make sure the work is being split up evenly.
6. As a class, each group will share both of their biographies to show the different between the before and after.
Closure (action/statement by teacher designed to bring lesson presentation to an appropriate close) There will be a class discussion using the focus question of how this information about Julius Caesar’s life will help the students read the larger play of Julius Caesar.
Independent Practice (what students will do to reinforce learning of the lesson) Students will take the knowledge they got from the lesson and apply it while the read the first act of Julius Caesar.