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Learning Life’s Lessons through Literature - ELA High School Unit – Macomb ISDUnit 9.1 – Short Story - Appendix

1. Prompt [Day 1] 2. Revision Checklist [Day 2]3. Rubric [Day 2]4. Peer Editing Questions [Day 2]5. Themes and Essential Questions [Days 3, 16, 17 and 18]6. The Importance of Story [Day 3]7. Quick Write Procedure [Days 3, 5, 7, 9, 10, 12, 13, 14]8a-b. Genre: Newspaper – Editorial and student Bookmark [Day 3] 9a-c. “Pirates of the Mediterranean” [Days 3, 4] 9d. Venn Diagram [Day 3]10a-b. “Folly’s Antidote” [Day 3, 4] 11a-b. “For 2008: An American Themistocles” [Days 3, 4] 12. Getting the Most from Discussions and Presentations [Days 3, 4]13. Think-(Write)-Pair-Share Procedure [Day 4]14. Think Aloud Procedure [Days 4, 6, 15]15 1-16. “The Most Dangerous Game” [Day 5]15a. Text Analysis Rubric [Day 5, 8, 14, 15]16a-b. Genre: Short Story and Student Bookmark [Days 6, 10] 17a. Reader’s Guide to Understanding Plot Development [Days 6, 9]17b. Plot Development Chart [Days 6, 9, 13, 17 and 18] 18. Focus Question Directions [Day 6]19a. Focus Question #1 [Day 6]19b. Focus Question Scoring Rubric [Day 6]20a-b. Profundity for “The Most Dangerous Game” [Day 7]21. Figurative Language and Literary Devices for “The Most Dangerous Game” [Day 8]22. Vocabulary in Context Strategy [Days 8, 12, 15]23. What does it mean? [Days 8, 9]24. Assignment Rubric [Days 7, 10, 11, 12]25. Comparing and Contrasting [Day 9]26 1-4. “The Gift of the Magi” [Day 10] 27. Profundity Scale for “The Gift of the Magi” [Day 10]28. “The Gift of the Magi” Persuasive Prompt (ACT) [Day 11]29a-c. Persuasive Writing and MME and ACT Persuasive Rubrics [Day 11]30a. Figurative Language for “The Gift of the Magi” [Day 12]30b-c. Literary Analysis: “The Gift of the Magi” [Day 12] 31a. “How Do I Love Thee” [Day 13]31b. Elizabeth Barrett Browning: Biographical Background [Day 13] 32a-b. 6-Word Short Stories [Day 13]33 1-7. “The Necklace” [Day 14]34. Profundity for “The Necklace” [Day 14]35. Plot Development for “The Necklace” [Day 15]36a. Character Development: Eight Ways an Author Reveals Character [Day 15]36b. Literary Analysis: “The Necklace” [Day 15]37. Pulling the Unit Together [Day 16]38a-b. “Pip and the Judge: An Unlikely Friendship” [Days 17 and 18]39a-b. “’Until the Building Falls Down:’ A Fight to Vote [Days 17 and 18]40a-b. Intergenerational Interview [Days 17 and 18]41. Culminating Activity Assignment [Days 19+]42. Genre: Satire – Irony [Days 19+]

1ELA High School Unit9.1- Short Story – Appendix ©Macomb Intermediate School District 2007

DirectionsIt has been said that stories can change our lives. These stories – fiction or nonfiction – could be ones you have read in a book, a newspaper, on-line, or stories that have been told to you. Think of a story that has had an important impact on your life or on the life of someone you know.

Write about the theme: An Important Story

Do one of the following:

Retell the story briefly and then describe the impact it has had on your life or on the life of someone you know.

OR Tell about an important lesson that could be learned from a story. Briefly retell the story. OR Persuade your readers that one’s success in life could depend on learning lessons from an

important story. OR

Write about the theme in your own way.

Use examples from real life, from what you have read or watched, or from your imagination. Your writing will be read by interested adults.

Use the paper provided for notes, freewriting, outlining, clustering, or writing your rough draft. If you need to make a correction, cross out the error and write the correction above or next to it.

You should give careful thought to revision (rethinking ideas) and proofreading (correcting spelling, capitalization, and punctuation). Use the checklist and rubric to help improve your writing.

Appendix #1


Review of Writing: Publishing Final Copy

DIRECTIONS

Now you will be doing three things: revising your paper (which means to rethink your ideas); polishing your paper (which means to edit and proofread); and recopying your paper as neatly as possible.

Use the following checklist as you revise and edit the writing that you have done. When you are finished revising, you must make a final copy of your paper. Then, proofread your final copy to make sure that all of your revisions have been made.

CHECKLIST FOR REVISION

1. Do I have a clear central idea that connects to the topic?

2. Do I stay focused on my central idea?

3. Do I support my central idea with important and relevant details/examples?

4. Do I need to take out details/examples that DO NOT support my central idea?

5. Is my writing organized and complete, with a clear beginning, middle, and end?

6. Do I use a variety of interesting words, phrases, and/or sentences?

CHECKLIST FOR EDITING

7. Have I checked and corrected my spelling to help readers understand my writing?

8. Have I checked and corrected my punctuation and capitalization to help readers

understand my writing?

CHECKLIST FOR PROOFREADING

9. Is everything in my final copy just the way I want it?

Reread your writing. You should cross out or erase any errors you make. You will have as much time as you need. Appendix #2


RubricWriting from Knowledge and Experience

Characteristics 6 5 4 3 2 1

Content and Ideas The writing is exceptionally clear and focused. Ideas and content are thoroughly developed with relevant details and examples where appropriate.

The writing is clear and focused. Ideas and content are well developed with relevant details and examples where appropriate.

The writing is generally clear and focused. Ideas and content are developed with relevant details and examples where appropriate, although there may be some unevenness.

The writing is somewhat clear and focused. Ideas and content are developed with limited or partially successful use of examples and details.

The writing is only occasionally clear and focused. Ideas and content are underdeveloped.

The writing is generally unclear and unfocused. Ideas and content are not developed or connected.

Organization The writer’s control over organization and the connections between ideas move the reader smoothly and naturally through the text.

The writer’s control over organization and the connections between ideas effectively move the reader through the text.

The response is generally coherent, and its organization is functional.

There may be evidence of an organizational structure, but it may be artificial or ineffective.

There may be little evidence of organizational structure.

There may be no noticeable organizational structure.

Style and Voice The writer shows a mature command of language including precise word choice that results in a compelling piece of writing.

The writer shows a command of language including precise word choice.

The writer’s command of language, including word choice, supports meaning.

Vocabulary may be basic.

Vocabulary may be limited.

Conventions Tight control over language use and mastery of writing conventions contribute to the effect of the response.

The language is well controlled, and occasional lapses in writing conventions are hardly noticeable.

Lapses in writing conventions are not distracting.

Incomplete mastery of over writing conventions and language use may interfere with meaning some of the time.

Limited control over writing conventions may make the writing difficult to understand.

Lack of control over writing conventions may make the writing difficult to understand.

Not ratable if: a) off topic b) illegible c) written in language other than English d) blank/refused to respond

Appendix #3


Peer Editing Questions

Is the central idea or point of the writing clear?

Is the central idea or point supported by important and relevant details, examples, and/or anecdotes?

Does the writing begin with an interesting and engaging lead, continue with a middle that supports and develops the point, and conclude with an ending that summarizes the point?

Is the writing interesting with engaging words and different sentence lengths and types?

What do I as the listener, think is good about the writing?

Do I have questions and/or suggestions for the writer?

Appendix #4


Themes and Essential Questions

Disposition: Inter-Relationships and Self-Reliance

Themes Story is the basic principle of mind. One story helps make sense of another.

Story can help us to come to a deeper understanding of ourselves and the world around us.

History is a story that we can learn from so we do not repeat the mistakes of history.

Essential Questions

Who am I? How can I find my identity and discover where I fit in the world?

How do I relate to my family, my community, and my country?

How do my relationships, skills and talents help to define me?

What can I learn from story about myself, my relationships and my world?

What lesson(s) can I derive from stories? How can I apply these lessons to my life?

What lessons can I learn from the stories of history to help me succeed in the present?

Appendix #5


The Importance of Story

“The story-from Rumplestiltskin to War and Peace-is one of the basic tools invented by the human mind for the purpose of understanding. There have been great societies that did not use the wheel, but there have been no societies that did not tell stories.” Ursula K. Le Guin

o What is Ursula K. Le Guin trying to tell us about story?

“We are our stories. We compress years of experience, thought, and emotion into a few compact narratives that we convey to others and tell to ourselves. That has always been true. But personal narrative has become more prevalent, and perhaps more urgent, in a time of abundance, when many of us are free to seek a deeper understanding of ourselves and our purpose. …We must listen to each other’s stories and… we are each author’s of our own lives.” Daniel Pink from A Whole New Mind

o What does Daniel Pink mean by this?

Story…o gives order to human experience.o explores cultural values.o demands an emotional response from the reader.o can show the reader things s/he has never seen before.

Adapted from www.learner.org/exhibits/literature o In a Quick Write respond to some or all of the above by telling what each point

means to you.


http://www.learner.org/exhibits/literature

Appendix #6Quick Write Procedure

What is it?Quick writes are most often used to develop fluency. In quick writes, students write rapidly and without stopping in response to literature and for other types of impromptu writing. Quick writes, provide students with a means of quickly representing their thinking. Rather than being concerned with correct spelling, punctuation, and word usage, the student is more interested in simply responding to the prompt in a personal way. Students reflect on what they know about a topic, ramble on paper, generate words and ideas, and make connections among the ideas. Young children often do quick writes in which they draw pictures and add labels. Some students do a mixture of writing and drawing.

Students do quick writes for a variety of purposes: Learning logs:

Immediately following a particular lesson, engaging activity, or discussion, pause and allow students to reflect in their learning logs or journals. Share responses.

Constructed response to literature:--to activate prior knowledge--to reflect on a theme of a story and how it relates to them personally--to describe a favorite character

Reflections on new learning:--students write an explanation of what something means --to define or explain a word on the word wall

How to do a quick write1. The teacher selects a purpose for the students. This prompt should be tied to a content

area and elicit a personal response from the student.

2. After listening to the prompt, the student is instructed to write a response by jotting down whatever comes to mind. The time limit should be no longer than 5-10 minutes in length. When students are first doing quick writes, start with 2 minutes of writing and increase the time gradually. Students write until instructed to stop. They are allowed to only finish their thought when “time” is called.

3. Quick writes may be used several times in a day. They may provide a “nugget” for a more extended piece of writing.

4. When it is time to share, students read their writing to a small group of four or five students. Volunteers could also share with the whole group.


Appendix #7Genre: Newspaper Editorial

An editorial gives the opinion of the owner (newspaper, magazine, radio or TV station).

Editorial

Definition: A statement in a newspaper, magazine or on radio or TV that gives the opinion of

the owner or someone designated by the owner A short persuasive essay that expresses opinion or reaction to a news or topical

event

Purpose To persuade the reader to have the same opinion as the editorial writer To force public officials to reconsider decisions or priorities To bring current issues to the readers’ attention To share opinions and influence readers To suggest alternatives To entertain

Form and Features Editorials express opinions, often with obvious bias. Editorials may be controversial and require critical reading. They sometimes anticipate counter arguments. They may cause readers to have an emotional response. They appear in the same place (in the paper or magazine or at a designated time on

radio or TV) The length of editorials is consistent with other editorials in the same publication.

Adapted from Margaret Mooney, Text, Forms and Features, 2001, Richard C. Owen.

Appendix #8a


Newspaper Editorial Bookmark Newspaper Editorial Bookmark Newspaper Editorial BookmarkAn editorial tries to persuade the reader of the opinion

of the owner (newspaper, magazine, radio or TV)An editorial tries to persuade the reader of the opinion

of the owner (newspaper, magazine, radio or TV)An editorial tries to persuade the reader of the opinion

of the owner (newspaper, magazine, radio or TV)Name: Name: Name:

Title: Title: Title:

Answer questions and write a brief reminder of the genre characteristics you find as you read.



What persuasive point is the writer trying to make? What persuasive point is the writer trying to make? What persuasive point is the writer trying to make?

Cite examples of the following: Cite examples of the following: Cite examples of the following:

Obvious bias: Obvious bias: Obvious bias:

Arguments designed to anticipate counter arguments: Arguments designed to anticipate counter arguments: Arguments designed to anticipate counter arguments:

Calls for emotional response or action: Calls for emotional response or action: Calls for emotional response or action:

Consistent length and placement of editorial: Consistent length and placement of editorial: Consistent length and placement of editorial:

Copyright 2005, MacombISD All Rights Reserved. Copyright 2005, MacombISD All Rights Reserved. Copyright 2005, MacombISD All Rights Reserved.

Appendix #8b


September 30, 2006OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR

Pirates of the Mediterranean By ROBERT HARRIS

Kintbury, England

IN the autumn of 68 B.C. the world’s only military superpower was dealt a profound psychological blow by a daring terrorist attack on its very heart. Rome’s port at Ostia was set on fire, the consular war fleet destroyed, and two prominent senators, together with their bodyguards and staff, kidnapped.

The incident, dramatic though it was, has not attracted much attention from modern historians. But history is mutable. An event that was merely a footnote five years ago has now, in our post-9/11 world, assumed a fresh and ominous significance. For in the panicky aftermath of the attack, the Roman people made decisions that set them on the path to the destruction of their Constitution, their democracy and their liberty. One cannot help wondering if history is repeating itself.

Consider the parallels. The perpetrators of this spectacular assault were not in the pay of any foreign power: no nation would have dared to attack Rome so provocatively. They were, rather, the disaffected of the earth: “The ruined men of all nations,” in the words of the great 19th-century German historian Theodor Mommsen, “a piratical state with a peculiar esprit de corps.”

Like Al Qaeda, these pirates were loosely organized, but able to spread a disproportionate amount of fear among citizens who had believed themselves immune from attack. To quote Mommsen again: “The Latin husbandman, the traveler on the Appian highway, the genteel bathing visitor at the terrestrial paradise of Baiae were no longer secure of their property or their life for a single moment.”

What was to be done? Over the preceding centuries, the Constitution of ancient Rome had developed an intricate series of checks and balances intended to prevent the concentration of power in the hands of a single individual. The consulship, elected annually, was jointly held by two men. Military commands were of limited duration and subject to regular renewal. Ordinary citizens were accustomed to a remarkable degree of liberty: the cry of “Civis Romanus sum” — “I am a Roman citizen” — was a guarantee of safety throughout the world.

But such was the panic that ensued after Ostia that the people were willing to compromise these rights. The greatest soldier in Rome, the 38-year-old Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus (better known to posterity as

Pompey the Great) arranged for a lieutenant of his, the tribune Aulus Gabinius, to rise in the Roman Forum and propose an astonishing new law.

Appendix #9a


“Pompey was to be given not only the supreme naval command but what amounted in fact to an absolute authority and uncontrolled power over everyone,” the Greek historian Plutarch wrote. “There were not many places in the Roman world that were not included within these limits.”

Pompey eventually received almost the entire contents of the Roman Treasury — 144 million sesterces — to pay for his “war on terror,” which included building a fleet of 500 ships and raising an army of 120,000 infantry and 5,000 cavalry. Such an accumulation of power was unprecedented, and there was literally a riot in the Senate when the bill was debated.

Nevertheless, at a tumultuous mass meeting in the center of Rome, Pompey’s opponents were cowed into submission, the Lex Gabinia passed (illegally), and he was given his power. In the end, once he put to sea, it took less than three months to sweep the pirates from the entire Mediterranean. Even allowing for Pompey’s genius as a military strategist, the suspicion arises that if the pirates could be defeated so swiftly, they could hardly have been such a grievous threat in the first place.

But it was too late to raise such questions. By the oldest trick in the political book — the whipping up of a panic, in which any dissenting voice could be dismissed as “soft” or even “traitorous” — powers had been ceded by the people that would never be returned. Pompey stayed in the Middle East for six years, establishing puppet regimes throughout the region, and turning himself into the richest man in the empire.

Those of us who are not Americans can only look on in wonder at the similar ease with which the ancient rights and liberties of the individual are being surrendered in the United States in the wake of 9/11. The vote by the Senate on Thursday to suspend the right of habeas corpus for terrorism detainees, denying them their right to challenge their detention in court; the careful wording about torture, which forbids only the inducement of “serious” physical and mental suffering to obtain information; the admissibility of evidence obtained in the United States without a search warrant; the licensing of the president to declare a legal resident of the United States an enemy combatant — all this represents an historic shift in the balance of power between the citizen and the executive.

An intelligent, skeptical American would no doubt scoff at the thought that what has happened since 9/11 could presage the destruction of a centuries-old constitution; but then, I suppose, an intelligent, skeptical Roman in 68 B.C. might well have done the same.

In truth, however, the Lex Gabinia was the beginning of the end of the Roman republic. It set a precedent. Less than a decade later, Julius Caesar — the only man, according to Plutarch, who spoke out in favor of Pompey’s special command during the Senate debate — was awarded similar, extended

Appendix #9b


military sovereignty in Gaul. Previously, the state, through the Senate, largely had direction of its armed forces; now the armed forces began to assume direction of the state.

It also brought a flood of money into an electoral system that had been designed for a simpler, non-imperial era. Caesar, like Pompey, with all the resources of Gaul at his disposal, became immensely wealthy, and used his treasure to fund his own political faction. Henceforth, the result of elections was determined largely by which candidate had the most money to bribe the electorate. In 49 B.C., the system collapsed completely, Caesar crossed the Rubicon — and the rest, as they say, is ancient history.

It may be that the Roman republic was doomed in any case. But the disproportionate reaction to the raid on Ostia unquestionably hastened the process, weakening the restraints on military adventurism and corrupting the political process. It was to be more than 1,800 years before anything remotely comparable to Rome’s democracy — imperfect though it was — rose again.

The Lex Gabinia was a classic illustration of the law of unintended consequences: it fatally subverted the institution it was supposed to protect. Let us hope that vote in the United States Senate does not have the same result.

Robert Harris is the author, most recently, of “Imperium: A Novel of Ancient Rome.”

Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

Appendix #9c


http://www.nytco.com/

http://www.nytimes.com/ref/membercenter/help/copyright.html


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Appendix #9d

January 1, 2007OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR

Folly’s Antidote By ARTHUR M. SCHLESINGER Jr.

MANY signs point to a growing historical consciousness among the American people. I trust that this is so. It is useful to remember that history is to the nation as memory is to the individual. As persons deprived of memory become disoriented and lost, not knowing where they have been and where they are going, so a nation denied a conception of the past will be disabled in dealing with its present and its future. “The longer you look back,” said Winston Churchill, “the farther you can look forward.”

But all historians are prisoners of their own experience. We bring to history the preconceptions of our personalities and of our age. We cannot seize on ultimate and absolute truths. So the historian is committed to a doomed enterprise — the quest for an unattainable objectivity.

Conceptions of the past are far from stable. They are perennially revised by the urgencies of the present. When new urgencies arise in our own times and lives, the historian’s spotlight shifts, probing at last into the darkness, throwing into sharp relief things that were always there but that earlier historians had carelessly excised from the collective memory. New voices ring out of the historical dark and demand to be heard.

One has only to note how in the last half-century the movements for women’s rights and civil rights have reformulated and renewed American history. Thus the present incessantly reinvents the past. In this sense, all history, as Benedetto Croce said, is contemporary history. It is these permutations of consciousness that make history so endlessly fascinating an intellectual adventure. “The one duty we owe to history,” said Oscar Wilde, “is to rewrite it.”

We are the world’s dominant military power, and I believe a consciousness of history is a moral necessity for a nation possessed of overweening power. History verifies John F. Kennedy’s proposition, stated in the first year of his thousand days: “We must face the fact that the United States is neither omnipotent or omniscient — that we are only 6 percent of the world’s population; that we cannot impose our will upon the other 94 percent of mankind; that we cannot right every wrong or reverse each adversity; and therefore there cannot be an American solution to every world problem.”

History is the best antidote to delusions of omnipotence and omniscience. Self-knowledge is the indispensable prelude to self-control, for the nation as well as for the individual, and history should forever remind us of the limits of our passing perspectives. It should strengthen us to resist the pressure to


Appendix #10a

convert momentary impulses into moral absolutes. It should lead us to acknowledge our profound and chastening frailty as human beings — to a recognition of the fact, so often and so sadly displayed, that the future outwits all our certitudes and that the possibilities of the future are more various than the human intellect is designed to conceive.

Sometimes, when I am particularly depressed, I ascribe our behavior to stupidity — the stupidity of our leadership, the stupidity of our culture. Three decades ago, we suffered defeat in an unwinnable war against tribalism, the most fanatic of political emotions, fighting against a country about which we knew nothing and in which we had no vital interests. Vietnam was hopeless enough, but to repeat the same arrogant folly 30 years later in Iraq is unforgivable. The Swedish statesman Axel Oxenstierna famously said, “Behold, my son, with how little wisdom the world is governed.”

A nation informed by a vivid understanding of the ironies of history is, I believe, best equipped to manage the tragic temptations of military power. Let us not bully our way through life, but let a growing sensitivity to history temper and civilize our use of power. In the meantime, let a thousand historical flowers bloom. History is never a closed book or a final verdict. It is forever in the making. Let historians never forsake the quest for knowledge in the interests of an ideology, a religion, a race, a nation.

The great strength of history in a free society is its capacity for self-correction. This is the endless excitement of historical writing — the search to reconstruct what went before, a quest illuminated by those ever-changing prisms that continually place old questions in a new light.

History is a doomed enterprise that we happily pursue because of the thrill of the hunt, because exploring the past is such fun, because of the intellectual challenges involved, because a nation needs to know its own history. Or so we historians insist. Because in the end, a nation’s history must be both the guide and the domain not so much of its historians as its citizens.

Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr., who has won Pulitzer Prizes for history and biography, is the author, most recently, of “War and the American Presidency.”





Appendix #10b

March 25, 2007

For 2008: An American Themistocles By DAVID BROOKS

Leonidas led the Spartans at Thermopylae, and as anybody who’s seen “300” can tell you, he had all the qualities of a perfect movie hero. He was brave, straightforward and self-sacrificing.

But it’s worth pointing out that Leonidas didn’t win the Persian Wars. Themistocles did, and Themistocles had an altogether different set of qualities. He was not straightforward; in fact, he could be deceptive and manipulative. He was not self-sacrificing; there was an air of corruption and fierce ambition about him. He was not charming or cultured; historians from Herodotus on down have had trouble warming to him.

But he was cunning and effective. After the defeat at Thermopylae he manipulated the demoralized Greek city-states into making a stand against the Persians at Salamis. He understood Persian impatience, and maneuvered the empire into a battle on waters most favorable to the heavier and slower Greek warships. He apparently lied to the Persian king, Xerxes, by promising to commit treason, and so tricked the Persians into a hasty attack.

The Athenians valued Themistocles, but they never really loved him. He was pushed from power mere months after his epic victory. As Plutarch later reported, the Athenians “treated him like a plane-tree; when it was stormy, they ran under his branches for shelter, but as soon as it was fine, they plucked his leaves and lopped his branches.”

When we Americans pick a leader, we usually look for the Leonidas type: direct, faithful and upright. We usually pick someone we hope is uplifting. Especially since Watergate, Americans have sought presidents uncorrupted by capital intrigue.

From Carter to Reagan to Clinton to Bush, we’ve favored Washington outsiders, people who seemed to offer freshness or authenticity, whose claim to leadership flowed from some inner light, rather than rugged expertise in the tough and nasty business of national politics.

But I wonder if this will be the election in which voters seek out a Themistocles, an election in which they put aside dreams of finding somebody pure and good, and select somebody they think will be wily and effective.


http://topics.nytimes.com/top/opinion/editorialsandoped/oped/columnists/davidbrooks/index.html?inline=nyt-per

Appendix # 11a

For over the past few years, America’s enemies have been more cunning than we have. Whether it was Mohamed Atta with the box cutters, bin Laden escaping at Tora Bora, the Baathists with their insurgency, Zarqawi inciting an Iraqi civil war, or Ahmadinejad maneuvering his way toward a nuclear bomb, America’s enemies seem to have been rendered clever by their relative weakness while we’ve been rendered stupid by our might.

And the tasks ahead require cleverness more than Gary Cooper simplicity and virtue. The next leader will have to build a coalition of autocrats against the extremists, not grow apoplectically rigid in the face of their barbarism. The next leader will have to manipulate the self-interest of other countries and factions, not bully them with ultimatums. The next leader will have to have an intimate knowledge of the apparatus of government and the limits and capacities of what it can do.

In other words, what the country seems to need is somebody who understands power, and the subtlety of its use, and who has had direct experience with friends and foes, foreign and domestic.

And this person must have all these world-weary qualities with a thick stripe of American idealism too. Or as Reinhold Niebuhr put it a few decades ago: “The preservation of a democratic civilization requires the wisdom of the serpent and the harmlessness of the dove. The children of light must be armed with the wisdom of the children of darkness but remain free from their malice. They must know the power of self-interest in human society without giving it moral justification. They must have this wisdom in order that they may beguile, deflect, harness and restrain self-interest, individual and collective, for the sake of the community.”

This is a unique set of qualities — more Themistocles than Leonidas, more Bismarck and Sharon than Gandhi, Havel and Mandela. People who have this mixture of idealism and wiliness are usually experienced and tainted by scandal.

But I suspect the voters will go to the polling places with a colder eye this time. In any case, before we get too lost in the tactics and personalities of the campaign, it might be a good idea to actually figure out what kind of leader we are seeking to hire, what qualities the times require. Is it those of Themistocles or those of Leonidas, or someone else?





Appendix #11b Getting the Most From Discussions and Presentations

Group Discussion Guidelines Be attentive and civil.

Gain the floor politely.

Pose appropriate questions.

Tolerate lack of consensus.

How to get the most out of listening…

Monitor message for clarity and understanding.

Ask relevant questions.

Provide verbal and nonverbal feedback.

Notice cues such as change of pace and emphasis that indicate a new point is about to be made.

Take notes to organize essential information.

How to be a good team member… Fulfill roles and

responsibilities.

Pose relevant questions.

Give and follow instructions.

Acknowledge and build on ideas of others.

Offer dissent courteously.

What to do in discussions… Pose questions.

Listen to others.

Contribute ideas.

Reflect on and revise initial responses.


Appendix #12


Think-(Write)-Pair-Share

A Think-Pair-Share (TPS) is a quick 2-5 minute verbal interaction between two or three students that allows them to quickly process the academic language and content being learned. TPS is not just a background knowledge activity, so also keep it in mind for building other habits and for the during and post reading stages. TPS can be very effective during teacher presentations for creating “breaks” that push student to organize thoughts well enough to communicate them. TPS also allows a student to hear how another person is processing the learning, which further builds background knowledge.

You can use TPS in many different areas of instruction, such as vocabulary, content concepts, opinions, compare-and-contrast activities, sharing parts of homework, summaries of text or visuals, connecting to background knowledge or other classes, making predictions or inferences, and solving problems.

Procedure:

1. Create a question or prompt that will encourage students to use their background knowledge and experience in answering it.

2. Have students think in silence for 30-60 seconds to mentally prepare what they will say. Variation: They write notes and/or an answer prior to turning to partners to share. This makes the procedure, Think-Write-Pair-Share.

3. Put students into pairs. During the pair work, students should do the following:a. Face their partner, show interest, and listen actively. They can even take notesb. Stay on the topic.c. Remember what their partner says in order to share it with the class later.d. Give reasons for any opinions, such as evidence from the book, class

discussions, or one’s own life.e. Use the vocabulary and academic language that you have modeled.f. Ask their partner questions that call for clarification and evidence. Do you mean

that?…. Why do you think that?… Where does it say that?…(caution students to be respectful and polite in their questioning of one another.)

4. After pair time, ask students to share with the class what their partner said. This forces them to listen and also publicly validates what partners have said.

Appendix #13


Think Aloud

The Literacy Dictionary (Harris and Hodges, 10995, IRA) defines a think aloud as “1. oral verbalization, 2. in literacy instruction “ a metacognitive technique or strategy in which the teacher verbalizes aloud while reading a selection orally, thus modeling the process of comprehension” (Davey, 1983).

Put another way, a think aloud is making thinking public. A teacher models what an expert would be thinking as s/he were reading, visualizing, listening; or preparing to write, speak or visually represent. The goal of thinking aloud is to graphically show students what they might do to understand what they are reading, viewing or listening to, as well as, plan for writing or speaking.

Following is an example of a think aloud for figuring out the meaning of an unfamiliar word in context:

“It’s important while we read to be able to figure out the meaning of an unfamiliar word. When I come to a word I don’t know the meaning of, I read the words and sentences around that word to try to figure out what the word might mean.

The other day I was reading this great mystery, The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin. I read the following paragraph with lots of challenging words:

“Sam Westing was not murdered, but one of his heirs was guilty – guilty of some offense against a relentless man. And that heir was in danger. From his grave Westing would stalk his enemy and through his heirs he would wreak his revenge.”

It was a paragraph about Sam Westing who had just died and left a challenge behind to find his killer(s). I knew most of the words. I knew “relentless” meant that Sam Westing never gave up until he got what he wanted. I knew that “stalk his enemy” meant that even after death, Sam Westing would somehow go after and find his enemy. But I wasn’t sure what “wreak his revenge” meant. I knew that revenge meant Sam Westing would get even with his enemy, so I figured that “wreak” must be a stronger way to say, “get his revenge.”

I’ve heard the word “wreak” before, and now I’ll keep it in my mind and may be able to use it in writing sometime. I will know it when I see it in print”.

Appendix #14


The Most Dangerous Game by RICHARD CONNELL

"OFF THERE to the right--somewhere--is a large island," said Whitney." It's rather a mystery--"

"What island is it?" Rainsford asked.

"The old charts call it `Ship-Trap Island,"' Whitney replied." A suggestive name, isn't it? Sailors have a curious dread of the place. I don't know why. Some superstition--"

"Can't see it," remarked Rainsford, trying to peer through the dank tropical night that was palpable as it pressed its thick warm blackness in upon the yacht.

"You've good eyes," said Whitney, with a laugh," and I've seen you pick off a moose moving in the brown fall bush at four hundred yards, but even you can't see four miles or so through a moonless Caribbean night."

"Nor four yards," admitted Rainsford. "Ugh! It's like moist black velvet."

"It will be light enough in Rio," promised Whitney. "We should make it in a few days. I hope the jaguar guns have come from Purdey's. We should have some good hunting up the Amazon. Great sport, hunting."

"The best sport in the world," agreed Rainsford.

"For the hunter," amended Whitney. "Not for the jaguar."

"Don't talk rot, Whitney," said Rainsford. "You're a big-game hunter, not a philosopher. Who cares how a jaguar feels?"

"Perhaps the jaguar does," observed Whitney.

"Bah! They've no understanding."

"Even so, I rather think they understand one thing--fear. The fear of pain and the fear of death."

"Nonsense," laughed Rainsford. "This hot weather is making you soft, Whitney. Be a realist. The world is made up of two classes--the hunters and the huntees. Luckily, you and I are hunters. Do you think we've passed that island yet?"

"I can't tell in the dark. I hope so."

"Why? " asked Rainsford.

"The place has a reputation--a bad one."

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http://www.classicshorts.com/bios/bioconnl.html

http://www.classicshorts.com/bib.html#danggame

"Cannibals?" suggested Rainsford.

"Hardly. Even cannibals wouldn't live in such a God-forsaken place. But it's gotten into sailor lore, somehow. Didn't you notice that the crew's nerves seemed a bit jumpy today?"

"They were a bit strange, now you mention it. Even Captain Nielsen--"

"Yes, even that tough-minded old Swede, who'd go up to the devil himself and ask him for a light. Those fishy blue eyes held a look I never saw there before. All I could get out of him was `This place has an evil name among seafaring men, sir.' Then he said to me, very gravely, `Don't you feel anything?'--as if the air about us was actually poisonous. Now, you mustn't laugh when I tell you this--I did feel something like a sudden chill.

"There was no breeze. The sea was as flat as a plate-glass window. We were drawing near the island then. What I felt was a--a mental chill; a sort of sudden dread."

"Pure imagination," said Rainsford.

"One superstitious sailor can taint the whole ship's company with his fear."

"Maybe. But sometimes I think sailors have an extra sense that tells them when they are in danger. Sometimes I think evil is a tangible thing--with wave lengths, just as sound and light have. An evil place can, so to speak, broadcast vibrations of evil. Anyhow, I'm glad we're getting out of this zone. Well, I think I'll turn in now, Rainsford."

"I'm not sleepy," said Rainsford. "I'm going to smoke another pipe up on the afterdeck."

"Good night, then, Rainsford. See you at breakfast."

"Right. Good night, Whitney."

There was no sound in the night as Rainsford sat there but the muffled throb of the engine that drove the yacht swiftly through the darkness, and the swish and ripple of the wash of the propeller.

Rainsford, reclining in a steamer chair, indolently puffed on his favorite brier. The sensuous drowsiness of the night was on him." It's so dark," he thought, "that I could sleep without closing my eyes; the night would be my eyelids--"

An abrupt sound startled him. Off to the right he heard it, and his ears, expert in such matters, could not be mistaken. Again he heard the sound, and again. Somewhere, off in the blackness, someone had fired a gun three times.

Rainsford sprang up and moved quickly to the rail, mystified. He strained his eyes in the direction from which the reports had come, but it was like trying to see through a blanket. He leaped upon the rail and balanced himself there, to get greater elevation; his pipe, striking a rope, was knocked from his mouth. He lunged for it; a short, hoarse cry came from his lips as he realized he had reached too far and had lost his

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ELA High School Unit9.1- Short Story – Appendix ©Macomb Intermediate School District 2007

balance. The cry was pinched off short as the blood-warm waters of the Caribbean Sea dosed over his head.

He struggled up to the surface and tried to cry out, but the wash from the speeding yacht slapped him in the face and the salt water in his open mouth made him gag and strangle. Desperately he struck out with strong strokes after the receding lights of the yacht, but he stopped before he had swum fifty feet. A certain coolheadedness had come to him; it was not the first time he had been in a tight place. There was a chance that his cries could be heard by someone aboard the yacht, but that chance was slender and grew more slender as the yacht raced on. He wrestled himself out of his clothes and shouted with all his power. The lights of the yacht became faint and ever-vanishing fireflies; then they were blotted out entirely by the night.

Rainsford remembered the shots. They had come from the right, and doggedly he swam in that direction, swimming with slow, deliberate strokes, conserving his strength. For a seemingly endless time he fought the sea. He began to count his strokes; he could do possibly a hundred more and then--

Rainsford heard a sound. It came out of the darkness, a high screaming sound, the sound of an animal in an extremity of anguish and terror.

He did not recognize the animal that made the sound; he did not try to; with fresh vitality he swam toward the sound. He heard it again; then it was cut short by another noise, crisp, staccato.

"Pistol shot," muttered Rainsford, swimming on.

Ten minutes of determined effort brought another sound to his ears--the most welcome he had ever heard--the muttering and growling of the sea breaking on a rocky shore. He was almost on the rocks before he saw them; on a night less calm he would have been shattered against them. With his remaining strength he dragged himself from the swirling waters. Jagged crags appeared to jut up into the opaqueness; he forced himself upward, hand over hand. Gasping, his hands raw, he reached a flat place at the top. Dense jungle came down to the very edge of the cliffs. What perils that tangle of trees and underbrush might hold for him did not concern Rainsford just then. All he knew was that he was safe from his enemy, the sea, and that utter weariness was on him. He flung himself down at the jungle edge and tumbled headlong into the deepest sleep of his life.

When he opened his eyes he knew from the position of the sun that it was late in the afternoon. Sleep had given him new vigor; a sharp hunger was picking at him. He looked about him, almost cheerfully.

"Where there are pistol shots, there are men. Where there are men, there is food," he thought. But what kind of men, he wondered, in so forbidding a place? An unbroken front of snarled and ragged jungle fringed the shore.

He saw no sign of a trail through the closely knit web of weeds and trees; it was easier to go along the shore, and Rainsford floundered along by the water. Not far from where he landed, he stopped.

Some wounded thing--by the evidence, a large animal--had thrashed about in the underbrush; the jungle

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weeds were crushed down and the moss was lacerated; one patch of weeds was stained crimson. A small, glittering object not far away caught Rainsford's eye and he picked it up. It was an empty cartridge.

"A twenty-two," he remarked. "That's odd. It must have been a fairly large animal too. The hunter had his nerve with him to tackle it with a light gun. It's clear that the brute put up a fight. I suppose the first three shots I heard was when the hunter flushed his quarry and wounded it. The last shot was when he trailed it here and finished it."

He examined the ground closely and found what he had hoped to find--the print of hunting boots. They pointed along the cliff in the direction he had been going. Eagerly he hurried along, now slipping on a rotten log or a loose stone, but making headway; night was beginning to settle down on the island.

Bleak darkness was blacking out the sea and jungle when Rainsford sighted the lights. He came upon them as he turned a crook in the coast line; and his first thought was that be had come upon a village, for there were many lights. But as he forged along he saw to his great astonishment that all the lights were in one enormous building--a lofty structure with pointed towers plunging upward into the gloom. His eyes made out the shadowy outlines of a palatial chateau; it was set on a high bluff, and on three sides of it cliffs dived down to where the sea licked greedy lips in the shadows.

"Mirage," thought Rainsford. But it was no mirage, he found, when he opened the tall spiked iron gate. The stone steps were real enough; the massive door with a leering gargoyle for a knocker was real enough; yet above it all hung an air of unreality.

He lifted the knocker, and it creaked up stiffly, as if it had never before been used. He let it fall, and it startled him with its booming loudness. He thought he heard steps within; the door remained closed. Again Rainsford lifted the heavy knocker, and let it fall. The door opened then--opened as suddenly as if it were on a spring--and Rainsford stood blinking in the river of glaring gold light that poured out. The first thing Rainsford's eyes discerned was the largest man Rainsford had ever seen--a gigantic creature, solidly made and black bearded to the waist. In his hand the man held a long-barreled revolver, and he was pointing it straight at Rainsford's heart.

Out of the snarl of beard two small eyes regarded Rainsford.

"Don't be alarmed," said Rainsford, with a smile which he hoped was disarming. "I'm no robber. I fell off a yacht. My name is Sanger Rainsford of New York City."

The menacing look in the eyes did not change. The revolver pointing as rigidly as if the giant were a statue. He gave no sign that he understood Rainsford's words, or that he had even heard them. He was dressed in uniform--a black uniform trimmed with gray astrakhan.

"I'm Sanger Rainsford of New York," Rainsford began again. "I fell off a yacht. I am hungry."

The man's only answer was to raise with his thumb the hammer of his revolver. Then Rainsford saw the man's free hand go to his forehead in a military salute, and he saw him click his heels together and stand at attention. Another man was coming down the broad marble steps, an erect, slender man in evening clothes. He advanced to Rainsford and held out his hand.

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In a cultivated voice marked by a slight accent that gave it added precision and deliberateness, he said, "It is a very great pleasure and honor to welcome Mr. Sanger Rainsford, the celebrated hunter, to my home."

Automatically Rainsford shook the man's hand.

"I've read your book about hunting snow leopards in Tibet, you see," explained the man. "I am General Zaroff."

Rainsford's first impression was that the man was singularly handsome; his second was that there was an original, almost bizarre quality about the general's face. He was a tall man past middle age, for his hair was a vivid white; but his thick eyebrows and pointed military mustache were as black as the night from which Rainsford had come. His eyes, too, were black and very bright. He had high cheekbones, a sharpcut nose, a spare, dark face--the face of a man used to giving orders, the face of an aristocrat. Turning to the giant in uniform, the general made a sign. The giant put away his pistol, saluted, withdrew.

"Ivan is an incredibly strong fellow," remarked the general, "but he has the misfortune to be deaf and dumb. A simple fellow, but, I'm afraid, like all his race, a bit of a savage."

"Is he Russian?"

"He is a Cossack," said the general, and his smile showed red lips and pointed teeth. "So am I."

"Come," he said, "we shouldn't be chatting here. We can talk later. Now you want clothes, food, rest. You shall have them. This is a most-restful spot."

Ivan had reappeared, and the general spoke to him with lips that moved but gave forth no sound.

"Follow Ivan, if you please, Mr. Rainsford," said the general. "I was about to have my dinner when you came. I'll wait for you. You'll find that my clothes will fit you, I think."

It was to a huge, beam-ceilinged bedroom with a canopied bed big enough for six men that Rainsford followed the silent giant. Ivan laid out an evening suit, and Rainsford, as he put it on, noticed that it came from a London tailor who ordinarily cut and sewed for none below the rank of duke.

The dining room to which Ivan conducted him was in many ways remarkable. There was a medieval magnificence about it; it suggested a baronial hall of feudal times with its oaken panels, its high ceiling, its vast refectory tables where twoscore men could sit down to eat. About the hall were mounted heads of many animals--lions, tigers, elephants, moose, bears; larger or more perfect specimens Rainsford had never seen. At the great table the general was sitting, alone.

"You'll have a cocktail, Mr. Rainsford," he suggested. The cocktail was surpassingly good; and, Rainsford noted, the table apointments were of the finest--the linen, the crystal, the silver, the china.

They were eating borsch, the rich, red soup with whipped cream so dear to Russian palates. Half apologetically General Zaroff said, "We do our best to preserve the amenities of civilization here. Please

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forgive any lapses. We are well off the beaten track, you know. Do you think the champagne has suffered from its long ocean trip?"

"Not in the least," declared Rainsford. He was finding the general a most thoughtful and affable host, a true cosmopolite. But there was one small trait of .the general's that made Rainsford uncomfortable. Whenever he looked up from his plate he found the general studying him, appraising him narrowly.

"Perhaps," said General Zaroff, "you were surprised that I recognized your name. You see, I read all books on hunting published in English, French, and Russian. I have but one passion in my life, Mr. Rains. ford, and it is the hunt."

"You have some wonderful heads here," said Rainsford as he ate a particularly well-cooked filet mignon. " That Cape buffalo is the largest I ever saw."

"Oh, that fellow. Yes, he was a monster."

"Did he charge you?"

"Hurled me against a tree," said the general. "Fractured my skull. But I got the brute."

"I've always thought," said Rains{ord, "that the Cape buffalo is the most dangerous of all big game."

For a moment the general did not reply; he was smiling his curious red-lipped smile. Then he said slowly, "No. You are wrong, sir. The Cape buffalo is not the most dangerous big game." He sipped his wine. "Here in my preserve on this island," he said in the same slow tone, "I hunt more dangerous game."

Rainsford expressed his surprise. "Is there big game on this island?"

The general nodded. "The biggest."

"Really?"

"Oh, it isn't here naturally, of course. I have to stock the island."

"What have you imported, general?" Rainsford asked. "Tigers?"

The general smiled. "No," he said. "Hunting tigers ceased to interest me some years ago. I exhausted their possibilities, you see. No thrill left in tigers, no real danger. I live for danger, Mr. Rainsford."

The general took from his pocket a gold cigarette case and offered his guest a long black cigarette with a silver tip; it was perfumed and gave off a smell like incense.

"We will have some capital hunting, you and I," said the general. "I shall be most glad to have your society."

But what game--" began Rainsford.

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"I'll tell you," said the general. "You will be amused, I know. I think I may say, in all modesty, that I have done a rare thing. I have invented a new sensation. May I pour you another glass of port?"

"Thank you, general."

The general filled both glasses, and said, "God makes some men poets. Some He makes kings, some beggars. Me He made a hunter. My hand was made for the trigger, my father said. He was a very rich man with a quarter of a million acres in the Crimea, and he was an ardent sportsman. When I was only five years old he gave me a little gun, specially made in Moscow for me, to shoot sparrows with. When I shot some of his prize turkeys with it, he did not punish me; he complimented me on my marksmanship. I killed my first bear in the Caucasus when I was ten. My whole life has been one prolonged hunt. I went into the army--it was expected of noblemen's sons--and for a time commanded a division of Cossack cavalry, but my real interest was always the hunt. I have hunted every kind of game in every land. It would be impossible for me to tell you how many animals I have killed."

The general puffed at his cigarette.

"After the debacle in Russia I left the country, for it was imprudent for an officer of the Czar to stay there. Many noble Russians lost everything. I, luckily, had invested heavily in American securities, so I shall never have to open a tearoom in Monte Carlo or drive a taxi in Paris. Naturally, I continued to hunt--grizzliest in your Rockies, crocodiles in the Ganges, rhinoceroses in East Africa. It was in Africa that the Cape buffalo hit me and laid me up for six months. As soon as I recovered I started for the Amazon to hunt jaguars, for I had heard they were unusually cunning. They weren't." The Cossack sighed. "They were no match at all for a hunter with his wits about him, and a high-powered rifle. I was bitterly disappointed. I was lying in my tent with a splitting headache one night when a terrible thought pushed its way into my mind. Hunting was beginning to bore me! And hunting, remember, had been my life. I have heard that in America businessmen often go to pieces when they give up the business that has been their life."

"Yes, that's so," said Rainsford.

The general smiled. "I had no wish to go to pieces," he said. "I must do something. Now, mine is an analytical mind, Mr. Rainsford. Doubtless that is why I enjoy the problems of the chase."

"No doubt, General Zaroff."

"So," continued the general, "I asked myself why the hunt no longer fascinated me. You are much younger than I am, Mr. Rainsford, and have not hunted as much, but you perhaps can guess the answer."

"What was it?"

"Simply this: hunting had ceased to be what you call `a sporting proposition.' It had become too easy. I always got my quarry. Always. There is no greater bore than perfection."

The general lit a fresh cigarette.

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"No animal had a chance with me any more. That is no boast; it is a mathematical certainty. The animal had nothing but his legs and his instinct. Instinct is no match for reason. When I thought of this it was a tragic moment for me, I can tell you."

Rainsford leaned across the table, absorbed in what his host was saying.

"It came to me as an inspiration what I must do," the general went on.

"And that was?"

The general smiled the quiet smile of one who has faced an obstacle and surmounted it with success. "I had to invent a new animal to hunt," he said.

"A new animal? You're joking." "Not at all," said the general. "I never joke about hunting. I needed a new animal. I found one. So I bought this island built this house, and here I do my hunting. The island is perfect for my purposes--there are jungles with a maze of traits in them, hills, swamps--"

"But the animal, General Zaroff?"

"Oh," said the general, "it supplies me with the most exciting hunting in the world. No other hunting compares with it for an instant. Every day I hunt, and I never grow bored now, for I have a quarry with which I can match my wits."

Rainsford's bewilderment showed in his face.

"I wanted the ideal animal to hunt," explained the general. "So I said, `What are the attributes of an ideal quarry?' And the answer was, of course, `It must have courage, cunning, and, above all, it must be able to reason."'

"But no animal can reason," objected Rainsford.

"My dear fellow," said the general, "there is one that can."

"But you can't mean--" gasped Rainsford.

"And why not?"

"I can't believe you are serious, General Zaroff. This is a grisly joke."

"Why should I not be serious? I am speaking of hunting."

"Hunting? Great Guns, General Zaroff, what you speak of is murder."

The general laughed with entire good nature. He regarded Rainsford quizzically. "I refuse to believe that so modern and civilized a young man as you seem to be harbors romantic ideas about the value of human life. Surely your experiences in the war--"

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"Did not make me condone cold-blooded murder," finished Rainsford stiffly.

Laughter shook the general. "How extraordinarily droll you are!" he said. "One does not expect nowadays to find a young man of the educated class, even in America, with such a naive, and, if I may say so, mid-Victorian point of view. It's like finding a snuffbox in a limousine. Ah, well, doubtless you had Puritan ancestors. So many Americans appear to have had. I'll wager you'll forget your notions when you go hunting with me. You've a genuine new thrill in store for you, Mr. Rainsford."

"Thank you, I'm a hunter, not a murderer."

"Dear me," said the general, quite unruffled, "again that unpleasant word. But I think I can show you that your scruples are quite ill founded."

"Yes?"

"Life is for the strong, to be lived by the strong, and, if needs be, taken by the strong. The weak of the world were put here to give the strong pleasure. I am strong. Why should I not use my gift? If I wish to hunt, why should I not? I hunt the scum of the earth: sailors from tramp ships--lassars, blacks, Chinese, whites, mongrels--a thoroughbred horse or hound is worth more than a score of them."

"But they are men," said Rainsford hotly.

"Precisely," said the general. "That is why I use them. It gives me pleasure. They can reason, after a fashion. So they are dangerous."

"But where do you get them?"

The general's left eyelid fluttered down in a wink. "This island is called Ship Trap," he answered. "Sometimes an angry god of the high seas sends them to me. Sometimes, when Providence is not so kind, I help Providence a bit. Come to the window with me."

Rainsford went to the window and looked out toward the sea.

"Watch! Out there!" exclaimed the general, pointing into the night. Rainsford's eyes saw only blackness, and then, as the general pressed a button, far out to sea Rainsford saw the flash of lights.

The general chuckled. "They indicate a channel," he said, "where there's none; giant rocks with razor edges crouch like a sea monster with wide-open jaws. They can crush a ship as easily as I crush this nut." He dropped a walnut on the hardwood floor and brought his heel grinding down on it. "Oh, yes," he said, casually, as if in answer to a question, "I have electricity. We try to be civilized here."

"Civilized? And you shoot down men?"

A trace of anger was in the general's black eyes, but it was there for but a second; and he said, in his most pleasant manner, "Dear me, what a righteous young man you are! I assure you I do not do the thing you suggest. That would be barbarous. I treat these visitors with every consideration. They get plenty of good

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food and exercise. They get into splendid physical condition. You shall see for yourself tomorrow."

"What do you mean?"

"We'll visit my training school," smiled the general. "It's in the cellar. I have about a dozen pupils down there now. They're from the Spanish bark San Lucar that had the bad luck to go on the rocks out there. A very inferior lot, I regret to say. Poor specimens and more accustomed to the deck than to the jungle." He raised his hand, and Ivan, who served as waiter, brought thick Turkish coffee. Rainsford, with an effort, held his tongue in check.

"It's a game, you see," pursued the general blandly. "I suggest to one of them that we go hunting. I give him a supply of food and an excellent hunting knife. I give him three hours' start. I am to follow, armed only with a pistol of the smallest caliber and range. If my quarry eludes me for three whole days, he wins the game. If I find him "--the general smiled--" he loses."

"Suppose he refuses to be hunted?"

"Oh," said the general, "I give him his option, of course. He need not play that game if he doesn't wish to. If he does not wish to hunt, I turn him over to Ivan. Ivan once had the honor of serving as official knouter to the Great White Czar, and he has his own ideas of sport. Invariably, Mr. Rainsford, invariably they choose the hunt."

"And if they win?"

The smile on the general's face widened. "To date I have not lost," he said. Then he added, hastily: "I don't wish you to think me a braggart, Mr. Rainsford. Many of them afford only the most elementary sort of problem. Occasionally I strike a tartar. One almost did win. I eventually had to use the dogs."

"The dogs?"

"This way, please. I'll show you."

The general steered Rainsford to a window. The lights from the windows sent a flickering illumination that made grotesque patterns on the courtyard below, and Rainsford could see moving about there a dozen or so huge black shapes; as they turned toward him, their eyes glittered greenly.

"A rather good lot, I think," observed the general. "They are let out at seven every night. If anyone should try to get into my house--or out of it--something extremely regrettable would occur to him." He hummed a snatch of song from the Folies Bergere.

"And now," said the general, "I want to show you my new collection of heads. Will you come with me to the library?"

"I hope," said Rainsford, "that you will excuse me tonight, General Zaroff. I'm really not feeling well."

"Ah, indeed?" the general inquired solicitously. "Well, I suppose that's only natural, after your long swim.

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You need a good, restful night's sleep. Tomorrow you'll feel like a new man, I'll wager. Then we'll hunt, eh? I've one rather promising prospect--" Rainsford was hurrying from the room.

"Sorry you can't go with me tonight," called the general. "I expect rather fair sport--a big, strong, black. He looks resourceful--Well, good night, Mr. Rainsford; I hope you have a good night's rest."

The bed was good, and the pajamas of the softest silk, and he was tired in every fiber of his being, but nevertheless Rainsford could not quiet his brain with the opiate of sleep. He lay, eyes wide open. Once he thought he heard stealthy steps in the corridor outside his room. He sought to throw open the door; it would not open. He went to the window and looked out. His room was high up in one of the towers. The lights of the chateau were out now, and it was dark and silent; but there was a fragment of sallow moon, and by its wan light he could see, dimly, the courtyard. There, weaving in and out in the pattern of shadow, were black, noiseless forms; the hounds heard him at the window and looked up, expectantly, with their green eyes. Rainsford went back to the bed and lay down. By many methods he tried to put himself to sleep. He had achieved a doze when, just as morning began to come, he heard, far off in the jungle, the faint report of a pistol.

General Zaroff did not appear until luncheon. He was dressed faultlessly in the tweeds of a country squire. He was solicitous about the state of Rainsford's health.

"As for me," sighed the general, "I do not feel so well. I am worried, Mr. Rainsford. Last night I detected traces of my old complaint."

To Rainsford's questioning glance the general said, "Ennui. Boredom."

Then, taking a second helping of crêpes Suzette, the general explained: "The hunting was not good last night. The fellow lost his head. He made a straight trail that offered no problems at all. That's the trouble with these sailors; they have dull brains to begin with, and they do not know how to get about in the woods. They do excessively stupid and obvious things. It's most annoying. Will you have another glass of Chablis, Mr. Rainsford?"

"General," said Rainsford firmly, "I wish to leave this island at once."

The general raised his thickets of eyebrows; he seemed hurt. "But, my dear fellow," the general protested, "you've only just come. You've had no hunting--"

"I wish to go today," said Rainsford. He saw the dead black eyes of the general on him, studying him. General Zaroff's face suddenly brightened.

He filled Rainsford's glass with venerable Chablis from a dusty bottle.

"Tonight," said the general, "we will hunt--you and I."

Rainsford shook his head. "No, general," he said. "I will not hunt."

The general shrugged his shoulders and delicately ate a hothouse grape. "As you wish, my friend," he

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said. "The choice rests entirely with you. But may I not venture to suggest that you will find my idea of sport more diverting than Ivan's?"

He nodded toward the corner to where the giant stood, scowling, his thick arms crossed on his hogshead of chest.

"You don't mean--" cried Rainsford.

"My dear fellow," said the general, "have I not told you I always mean what I say about hunting? This is really an inspiration. I drink to a foeman worthy of my steel--at last." The general raised his glass, but Rainsford sat staring at him.

"You'll find this game worth playing," the general said enthusiastically." Your brain against mine. Your woodcraft against mine. Your strength and stamina against mine. Outdoor chess! And the stake is not without value, eh?"

"And if I win--" began Rainsford huskily.

"I'll cheerfully acknowledge myself defeat if I do not find you by midnight of the third day," said General Zaroff. "My sloop will place you on the mainland near a town." The general read what Rainsford was thinking.

"Oh, you can trust me," said the Cossack. "I will give you my word as a gentleman and a sportsman. Of course you, in turn, must agree to say nothing of your visit here."

"I'll agree to nothing of the kind," said Rainsford.

"Oh," said the general, "in that case--But why discuss that now? Three days hence we can discuss it over a bottle of Veuve Cliquot, unless--"

The general sipped his wine.

Then a businesslike air animated him. "Ivan," he said to Rainsford, "will supply you with hunting clothes, food, a knife. I suggest you wear moccasins; they leave a poorer trail. I suggest, too, that you avoid the big swamp in the southeast corner of the island. We call it Death Swamp. There's quicksand there. One foolish fellow tried it. The deplorable part of it was that Lazarus followed him. You can imagine my feelings, Mr. Rainsford. I loved Lazarus; he was the finest hound in my pack. Well, I must beg you to excuse me now. I always' take a siesta after lunch. You'll hardly have time for a nap, I fear. You'll want to start, no doubt. I shall not follow till dusk. Hunting at night is so much more exciting than by day, don't you think? Au revoir, Mr. Rainsford, au revoir." General Zaroff, with a deep, courtly bow, strolled from the room.

From another door came Ivan. Under one arm he carried khaki hunting clothes, a haversack of food, a leather sheath containing a long-bladed hunting knife; his right hand rested on a cocked revolver thrust in the crimson sash about his waist.

1234


Rainsford had fought his way through the bush for two hours. "I must keep my nerve. I must keep my nerve," he said through tight teeth.

He had not been entirely clearheaded when the chateau gates snapped shut behind him. His whole idea at first was to put distance between himself and General Zaroff; and, to this end, he had plunged along, spurred on by the sharp rowers of something very like panic. Now he had got a grip on himself, had stopped, and was taking stock of himself and the situation. He saw that straight flight was futile; inevitably it would bring him face to face with the sea. He was in a picture with a frame of water, and his operations, clearly, must take place within that frame.

"I'll give him a trail to follow," muttered Rainsford, and he struck off from the rude path he had been following into the trackless wilderness. He executed a series of intricate loops; he doubled on his trail again and again, recalling all the lore of the fox hunt, and all the dodges of the fox. Night found him leg-weary, with hands and face lashed by the branches, on a thickly wooded ridge. He knew it would be insane to blunder on through the dark, even if he had the strength. His need for rest was imperative and he thought, "I have played the fox, now I must play the cat of the fable." A big tree with a thick trunk and outspread branches was near by, and, taking care to leave not the slightest mark, he climbed up into the crotch, and, stretching out on one of the broad limbs, after a fashion, rested. Rest brought him new confidence and almost a feeling of security. Even so zealous a hunter as General Zaroff could not trace him there, he told himself; only the devil himself could follow that complicated trail through the jungle after dark. But perhaps the general was a devil--

An apprehensive night crawled slowly by like a wounded snake and sleep did not visit Rainsford, although the silence of a dead world was on the jungle. Toward morning when a dingy gray was varnishing the sky, the cry of some startled bird focused Rainsford's attention in that direction. Something was coming through the bush, coming slowly, carefully, coming by the same winding way Rainsford had come. He flattened himself down on the limb and, through a screen of leaves almost as thick as tapestry, he watched. . . . That which was approaching was a man.

It was General Zaroff. He made his way along with his eyes fixed in utmost concentration on the ground before him. He paused, almost beneath the tree, dropped to his knees and studied the ground. Rainsford's impulse was to hurl himself down like a panther, but he saw that the general's right hand held something metallic--a small automatic pistol.

The hunter shook his head several times, as if he were puzzled. Then he straightened up and took from his case one of his black cigarettes; its pungent incenselike smoke floated up to Rainsford's nostrils.

Rainsford held his breath. The general's eyes had left the ground and were traveling inch by inch up the tree. Rainsford froze there, every muscle tensed for a spring. But the sharp eyes of the hunter stopped before they reached the limb where Rainsford lay; a smile spread over his brown face. Very deliberately he blew a smoke ring into the air; then he turned his back on the tree and walked carelessly away, back along the trail he had come. The swish of the underbrush against his hunting boots grew fainter and fainter.

The pent-up air burst hotly from Rainsford's lungs. His first thought made him feel sick and numb. The general could follow a trail through the woods at night; he could follow an extremely difficult trail; he

13


must have uncanny powers; only by the merest chance had the Cossack failed to see his quarry.

Rainsford's second thought was even more terrible. It sent a shudder of cold horror through his whole being. Why had the general smiled? Why had he turned back?

Rainsford did not want to believe what his reason told him was true, but the truth was as evident as the sun that had by now pushed through the morning mists. The general was playing with him! The general was saving him for another day's sport! The Cossack was the cat; he was the mouse. Then it was that Rainsford knew the full meaning of terror.

"I will not lose my nerve. I will not."

He slid down from the tree, and struck off again into the woods. His face was set and he forced the machinery of his mind to function. Three hundred yards from his hiding place he stopped where a huge dead tree leaned precariously on a smaller, living one. Throwing off his sack of food, Rainsford took his knife from its sheath and began to work with all his energy.

The job was finished at last, and he threw himself down behind a fallen log a hundred feet away. He did not have to wait long. The cat was coming again to play with the mouse.

Following the trail with the sureness of a bloodhound came General Zaroff. Nothing escaped those searching black eyes, no crushed blade of grass, no bent twig, no mark, no matter how faint, in the moss. So intent was the Cossack on his stalking that he was upon the thing Rainsford had made before he saw it. His foot touched the protruding bough that was the trigger. Even as he touched it, the general sensed his danger and leaped back with the agility of an ape. But he was not quite quick enough; the dead tree, delicately adjusted to rest on the cut living one, crashed down and struck the general a glancing blow on the shoulder as it fell; but for his alertness, he must have been smashed beneath it. He staggered, but he did not fall; nor did he drop his revolver. He stood there, rubbing his injured shoulder, and Rainsford, with fear again gripping his heart, heard the general's mocking laugh ring through the jungle.

"Rainsford," called the general, "if you are within sound of my voice, as I suppose you are, let me congratulate you. Not many men know how to make a Malay mancatcher. Luckily for me I, too, have hunted in Malacca. You are proving interesting, Mr. Rainsford. I am going now to have my wound dressed; it's only a slight one. But I shall be back. I shall be back."

When the general, nursing his bruised shoulder, had gone, Rainsford took up his flight again. It was flight now, a desperate, hopeless flight, that carried him on for some hours. Dusk came, then darkness, and still he pressed on. The ground grew softer under his moccasins; the vegetation grew ranker, denser; insects bit him savagely.

Then, as he stepped forward, his foot sank into the ooze. He tried to wrench it back, but the muck sucked viciously at his foot as if it were a giant leech. With a violent effort, he tore his feet loose. He knew where he was now. Death Swamp and its quicksand.

His hands were tight closed as if his nerve were something tangible that someone in the darkness was

1436


trying to tear from his grip. The softness of the earth had given him an idea. He stepped back from the quicksand a dozen feet or so and, like some huge prehistoric beaver, he began to dig.

Rainsford had dug himself in in France when a second's delay meant death. That had been a placid pastime compared to his digging now. The pit grew deeper; when it was above his shoulders, he climbed out and from some hard saplings cut stakes and sharpened them to a fine point. These stakes he planted in the bottom of the pit with the points sticking up. With flying fingers he wove a rough carpet of weeds and branches and with it he covered the mouth of the pit. Then, wet with sweat and aching with tiredness, he crouched behind the stump of a lightning-charred tree.

He knew his pursuer was coming; he heard the padding sound of feet on the soft earth, and the night breeze brought him the perfume of the general's cigarette. It seemed to Rainsford that the general was coming with unusual swiftness; he was not feeling his way along, foot by foot. Rainsford, crouching there, could not see the general, nor could he see the pit. He lived a year in a minute. Then he felt an impulse to cry aloud with joy, for he heard the sharp crackle of the breaking branches as the cover of the pit gave way; he heard the sharp scream of pain as the pointed stakes found their mark. He leaped up from his place of concealment. Then he cowered back. Three feet from the pit a man was standing, with an electric torch in his hand.

"You've done well, Rainsford," the voice of the general called. "Your Burmese tiger pit has claimed one of my best dogs. Again you score. I think, Mr. Rainsford, Ill see what you can do against my whole pack. I'm going home for a rest now. Thank you for a most amusing evening."

At daybreak Rainsford, lying near the swamp, was awakened by a sound that made him know that he had new things to learn about fear. It was a distant sound, faint and wavering, but he knew it. It was the baying of a pack of hounds.

Rainsford knew he could do one of two things. He could stay where he was and wait. That was suicide. He could flee. That was postponing the inevitable. For a moment he stood there, thinking. An idea that held a wild chance came to him, and, tightening his belt, he headed away from the swamp.

The baying of the hounds drew nearer, then still nearer, nearer, ever nearer. On a ridge Rainsford climbed a tree. Down a watercourse, not a quarter of a mile away, he could see the bush moving. Straining his eyes, he saw the lean figure of General Zaroff; just ahead of him Rainsford made out another figure whose wide shoulders surged through the tall jungle weeds; it was the giant Ivan, and he seemed pulled forward by some unseen force; Rainsford knew that Ivan must be holding the pack in leash.

They would be on him any minute now. His mind worked frantically. He thought of a native trick he had learned in Uganda. He slid down the tree. He caught hold of a springy young sapling and to it he fastened his hunting knife, with the blade pointing down the trail; with a bit of wild grapevine he tied back the sapling. Then he ran for his life. The hounds raised their voices as they hit the fresh scent. Rainsford knew now how an animal at bay feels.

He had to stop to get his breath. The baying of the hounds stopped abruptly, and Rainsford's heart stopped too. They must have reached the knife.

1537


He shinned excitedly up a tree and looked back. His pursuers had stopped. But the hope that was in Rainsford's brain when he climbed died, for he saw in the shallow valley that General Zaroff was still on his feet. But Ivan was not. The knife, driven by the recoil of the springing tree, had not wholly failed.

Rainsford had hardly tumbled to the ground when the pack took up the cry again.

"Nerve, nerve, nerve!" he panted, as he dashed along. A blue gap showed between the trees dead ahead. Ever nearer drew the hounds. Rainsford forced himself on toward that gap. He reached it. It was the shore of the sea. Across a cove he could see the gloomy gray stone of the chateau. Twenty feet below him the sea rumbled and hissed. Rainsford hesitated. He heard the hounds. Then he leaped far out into the sea. . . .

When the general and his pack reached the place by the sea, the Cossack stopped. For some minutes he stood regarding the blue-green expanse of water. He shrugged his shoulders. Then be sat down, took a drink of brandy from a silver flask, lit a cigarette, and hummed a bit from Madame Butterfly.

General Zaroff had an exceedingly good dinner in his great paneled dining hall that evening. With it he had a bottle of Pol Roger and half a bottle of Chambertin. Two slight annoyances kept him from perfect enjoyment. One was the thought that it would be difficult to replace Ivan; the other was that his quarry had escaped him; of course, the American hadn't played the game--so thought the general as he tasted his after-dinner liqueur. In his library he read, to soothe himself, from the works of Marcus Aurelius. At ten he went up to his bedroom. He was deliciously tired, he said to himself, as he locked himself in. There was a little moonlight, so, before turning on his light, he went to the window and looked down at the courtyard. He could see the great hounds, and he called, "Better luck another time," to them. Then he switched on the light.

A man, who had been hiding in the curtains of the bed, was standing there.

"Rainsford!" screamed the general. "How in God's name did you get here?"

"Swam," said Rainsford. "I found it quicker than walking through the jungle."

The general sucked in his breath and smiled. "I congratulate you," he said. "You have won the game."

Rainsford did not smile. "I am still a beast at bay," he said, in a low, hoarse voice. "Get ready, General Zaroff."

The general made one of his deepest bows. "I see," he said. "Splendid! One of us is to furnish a repast for the hounds. The other will sleep in this very excellent bed. On guard, Rainsford." . . .

He had never slept in a better bed, Rainsford decided.

http://www.classicshorts.com/stories/danger.html

16


http://www.classicshorts.com/stories/danger.html

Text Analysis RubricCharacteristic Still Developing

Understanding-1Has Mastered

Concept - 2Could Teach Concept -

3Understands difficult plot concepts.

Misses clues in text that lead to understanding author’s intent.

Understands main clues and pieces them together to state author’s intent.

Catches subtleties that less cautious readers miss—reads “into” text.

Uses text to support ideas.

May not use text references or may use inappropriate text references.

Draws on appropriate text references during discussion.

Smoothly and skillfully blends quotations and other text references into discussion.

Appendix #15a


Genre: Short StoryA brief fictional prose narrative

Definitions of Short Story “a brief fictional prose narrative designed to create a unified impression quickly and forcefully”

(from Harris, et al. The Literacy Dictionary, IRA, 1995) A well-written short story provides, “…rich characters, fascinating conflicts, thoughtful and thought-

provoking themes. However, because they are short, they are often more focused on a single main character and a single conflict….” (Heather Lattimer. Thinking through Genre, Stenhouse, 2003)

Purpose: To engage and entertain To involve the reader in a single situation or conflict in a character’s life

Form and Features: Short stories have a definite plot structure with character(s) (the who) in a setting, (the where and

when) and conflict, problem or goal (the why of the story). Plot Elements :

o Exposition is the information needed to understand the story and is usually given at the beginning (e.g. character and setting background)

o Complication is the catalyst that begins the major conflict and is often the problem or goal of the main character. Rising action follows complication. Conflict can come in four forms:

Person – against – self Person – against – person Person – against – nature Person – against – society

o Climax is the turning point of the story that occurs when characters try to resolve the complication/conflict (problem or goal). Climax is the most intense moment – either mentally or in the action and falling action follows from the climax.

o Resolution is the set of events that bring the story to a close, tying together all of the threads. The characters resolve the conflict/problem, reach the goal or come to terms with the situation.

Character can be developed or revealed in a number of ways:o Characters’ actionso Dialogueo Reactionso Thoughtso Character’s habits/idiosyncrasieso Character’s possessions o Physical descriptionso Background information

Theme of a short story is its view about life and how people behave – often a universal truth. The theme of a short story is not meant to teach or preach and is not usually presented directly. The reader must extract the theme from the characters, action, and setting of the story. To uncover the theme, the reader might refer to the title, notice repeating patterns and symbols, attend to allusions made throughout the story, and/or try to determine the greater meaning of the details and particulars of the story.

Adapted from http://www.readwritethink.org/lesson_images/lesson401/ReadersGuidetoPlot.pdf http://www.ket.org/education/guides/pd/teachingtheshortstory.pdf http://www.learner.org/exhibits/literature/ Appendix #16a


http://www.learner.org/exhibits/literature/

http://www.ket.org/education/guides/pd/teachingtheshortstory.pdf

http://www.readwritethink.org/lesson_images/lesson401/ReadersGuidetoPlot.pdf

Short Story Bookmark Short Story Bookmark Short Story BookmarkA brief fictional prose narrative A brief fictional prose narrative A brief fictional prose narrative

Name: Name: Name:

Title: Title: Title:




Identify short story elements: Identify short story elements: Identify short story elements:

Exposition: Information about character(s) and setting Exposition: Information about character(s) and setting Exposition: Information about character(s) and setting

Complication/Conflict: person-against-self, person-against-person, person-against-nature, person-against-society



Climax/Turning Point: Climax/Turning Point: Climax/Turning Point:

Resolution: Resolution: Resolution:

Theme: Theme: Theme:

How does the author reveal character? (actions, dialogue, thoughts, reactions, background information)



Copyright 2007, MacombISD All Rights Reserved. Copyright 2007, MacombISD All Rights Reserved. Copyright 2007, MacombISD All Rights Reserved.

Appendix 16b41


Reader’s Guide to Understanding Plot Development

1. What is the conflict in this story? How does the author present the problem between the protagonist (central character – hero(ine)) and the antagonist (character who opposes central character – villain)?

2. What do you learn about the characters, setting, and situation in the exposition or introduction to the story?

3. What events are included in the rising action of the story?

4. What is the climax of the story?

5. What events are included in the falling action of the story?

6. How is the conflict resolved?

7. How does the writer use suspense in developing the plot of this story?

8. What is the theme?

Adapted from http://www.readwritethink.org/lesson_images/lesson401/ReadersGuidetoPlot.pdfAppendix #17a


http://www.readwritethink.org/lesson_images/lesson401/ReadersGuidetoPlot.pdf

Complication/Trigger Event (Inciting Moment) Event that causes the conflict or sets the conflict in motion.

Rising Action Complications and events that occur as the character(s) tries to solve the problem

Climax (Turning Point) The point of highest interest, suspense, or greatest emotional tension.

Falling Action Events that occur as the character works toward the resolution of the conflict/

Resolution (Denouement)A satisfactory conclusion that is either positive or negative for the character.

Plot Development


Exposition (Beginning of the Story)The start of a story that introduces characters and setting.

Appendix #17b

Focus Question DirectionsStudents need to be explicitly taught to answer response to literature (open-ended,

constructed response) questions. Explicit teaching involves modeling (To: showing),

practice (With: guiding), and independence (By: independence). The following are

suggestions for moving students from guided practice to independence:

Teacher uses Answer Plan and Possible Answer to model answering Focus

Questions. (for 1 or 2 Focus Questions on the basis of student understanding)

Students work with partners using the Answer Plan, write a shared answer then

consult the Possible Answer and revise answer to Focus Question. (for 4+ Focus

Questions)

Students work with partners building an Answer Plan, write a shared answer,

consult the Possible Answer and revise. (for 2+ Focus Questions)

Students work individually to build Answer Plan and answer question. (Option:

Students could consult the Answer Plan and the Possible Answer to score their

own or other’s papers.)

Have students answer Focus Questions in discussion form. After students have

had a brief discussion, have them individually answer Focus Questions using the

Answer Plan.

Appendix #18


Focus Question #1How does Richard Connell craft his adventure story so that the reader does not want to put it down?

Answer Plan1. Restate the question to introduce the answer.2. Support with examples from the text showing the creation of interesting

characters and setting, the building of suspense, etc. Use quotations to support your answer, if possible

3. Conclude by giving your opinion about why the author ended the story as he did.

Possible Answer[1] Richard Connell has crafted “The Most Dangerous Game” so that readers must read to the end to find out what happens. [2] The author has chosen and described a very mysterious setting, Ship-Trap Island, “A suggestive name, isn't it? Sailors have a curious dread of the place. I don't know why. Some superstition--" Connell also creates very interesting characters: Rainsford (the general calls him “the celebrated hunter”); Zaroff (Rainsford saw him as “singularly handsome” with an “almost bizarre quality” about his face); and Ivan (described as “…a gigantic creature, solidly made and black bearded to the waist”). Connell also does a superb job of building suspense through Zaroff’s conversations and through passages like,

“But perhaps the general was a devil—.” page 12, “The general was playing him!” page 13, “He knew his pursuer was coming….” page 14, “…he had new things to learn about fear.” page 14, short sentences – “That was suicide.” page 14, and repetition – “…nearer, then still nearer, nearer, ever nearer.” page 14.

[3] I think Richard Connell ended the story with the sentence, “He had never slept in a better bed, Rainsford decided.” because it leaves the reader to infer what happened and to imagine how it happened. Sometimes imagination is better than reading something like, “They fought and Rainsford killed Zaroff.”

Appendix #19a


Focus Question Rubric

3 (complete) 2 (partial) 1 (minimal)

Traits:Content

Answers question Uses relevant details from text to

support answer Stays on topic

Answer is relevant with many details and examples.

Answer is relevant but has few details to support or explain the answer.

Answers question with misinterpretation. Little or no relevance to text or question. Ideas and content are not developed or connected.

Organization Restatement (Beginning) Details in support (Middle) Conclusion (End)

Student restates the question in his/her own words. Details support point. Response is written in a logical sequence that makes connections.

Student restates the question in the answer. Events are retold in a somewhat disconnected structure.

Students answer either “yes,” “no,” or “I agree” without reference to the question. Writing lacks sequence.

Style/Voice Uses quotes to support, Concludes with prediction

characters feelings, opinions, etc…

Word choice is precise.Uses quotes effectively. Conclusion engages the reader.

Vocabulary is basic.May use quotations, but reference is unclear.Conclusion is partially successful.

Vocabulary is limited.Quotations are not used.The conclusion is ineffective or does not exist.

Conventions/Presentation Writing is neat. Uses proper conventions

Presentation makes the writing inviting. Writing shows control over conventions.

Writing is readable.Errors in conventions do not distract from meaning.

Writing may not be legible.Errors in conventions distract from meaning.

Appendix #19b


Narrative Profundity ChartTitle: Character: Student Name: Date:Physical:

What did the character do?

(Action)

Mental:

What was the character thinking or feeling when s/he did

it?(Intention)

Moral:

What was right and wrong with what the

character did?(Judgment)

Psychological:

What did the character get from

doing what s/he did?(Benefit/

Consequences)

Analogical:

What links are there to me, to what I have

read and to my world?(Comparison)

Philosophical:

What is the lesson or principle that I can

learn from this story?(Abstraction)

Transformational:

How can this lesson, insight, or wisdom

change my life?(Transformation)


Appendix #20a From Weber, Nelson and Beals, adapted 11/08/07

Narrative Profundity ChartTitle: “The Most Dangerous Game” Character: Rainsford Student Name: Date:Physical:


(Action)

Mental:

What was the character thinking or feeling when s/he did

it?(Intention)

Moral:

What was right and wrong with what the

character did?(Judgment)

Psychological:

What did the character get from

doing what s/he did?(Benefit/

Consequences)

Analogical:

What links are there to me, to what I have

read and to my world?(Comparison)

Philosophical:

What is the lesson or principle that I can

learn from this story?(Abstraction)

Transformational:



Rainsford swam to shore and sought help.

Rainsford was trying to survive.

Right: It’s a human instinct to try to survive.

Wrong: He could have waited to be rescued.

He got help – food, clothing and shelter.

I’ve always been uncomfortable about guns and hunting. Who could hurt a helpless animal (like Bambi’s mother) and why – for sport?

The will to survive can cause us to do things that we never would have thought we could do under other circumstances – positive: survive or negative: kill another human being.

Brains over brawn

It has caused me to ask the questions, “Would the skills and strategies learned in the ‘hunt’ help one to be more successful in life? Is the ‘hunt and kill’ mentality necessary if one wants to succeed in business?”Skills of the hunter: Analyze the

prey/competition Predict what the

prey/competition will do next and be ready – proactive

Use skills that would give one the advantage

Focus on the “kill” – bottom-line

Rainsford tried many strategies to outwit Zaroff, then leapt into the sea. (Climax)

Rainford took on the challenge of being hunted because he did not like the alternative – Ivan.

Right: There was no alternative.

Wrong: He could have refused.

At least being hunted, he had a chance because of his experience and intelligence.

Rainsford killed Zaroff.

Rainsford was thinking that he could not let Zaroff live because Zaroff would somehow kill him.

Right: He had to protect himself.

Wrong: It is wrong to kill another human being.

He survived.

Appendix #20b From Weber, Nelson and Beals, adapted 11/08/06


Figurative Language and Plot Devices –“The Most Dangerous Game”

Figurative Language: Any expression that stretches the meaning of words beyond their literal meaning.

Metaphor: a figure of speech in which a comparison is implies by analogy but is not stated; the comparison of two unlike things without the use of “like” or “as” (e. g. “the night would be my eyelids” – a comparison between night and eyelids, page 2)

Simile: a comparison of two unlike things using “like” or “as” (e. g. “…moonless Caribbean night… It’s like moist black velvet” – comparison of two un like things, night and moist black velvet with the use of “like,” page 1)

Personification: a metaphorical figure of speech in which animals, ideas, things, etc. are represented as having human qualities (e. g. “…a sharp hunger was picking at him” – hunger as something that could pick, page 3)

Allusion: an implicit reference to an historical, literary, or biblical character, event, or element (e. g. “I have played the fox, now I must play the cat of the fable.” – a reference to two of Aesop’s fables, page 12)

Irony: a contradiction or incongruity between appearance or expectation and reality; a figure of speech in which the literal meaning of the words is the opposite of their intended meaning; an incongruity or discrepancy between an anticipated and realized outcome (e. g. “We do our best to preserve the amenities of civilization here.” Zaroff when he is hunting men for sport – is this civilized? page 5)

Literary Devices Suspense: the sustained interest in a narrative created by delaying the resolution of

the conflict (e. g. the author begins building suspense with mysterious references to Ship-Trap Island that has the crew very nervous. Page 1)

Foreshadowing: any clue or hint of future events in a narrative (e. g. “the place [Ship-Trap Island] has a reputation—a bad one.” This will be the place where Rainsford’s life will be threatened. page 1)

Adapted from Harris, et al. The Literacy Dictionary, IRA, 1995 and Sparknotes 101, 2001, Spark Educational Publishing

Appendix #21


Vocabulary In Context Strategy

Learning vocabulary in context is much more powerful and effective. Students understand the words better, will remember them, and will more often recognize the word and its meaning when next encountered. This is a simple vocabulary strategy that only involves dictionary work as a last resort.

Procedures:

Assign or let students choose partners. Display the vocabulary words with page numbers. Tell students in partners to:

1. find each listed word,2. read the sentences (context) around the word, then try to figure out

what the word means,3. check their definitions with the dictionary (if necessary), and4. jot down their “working definition” in their own words, and5. also write down why this word is important to the selection.

Encourage students to begin to keep a personal dictionary of new words that they might use in conversation and in writing.

Appendix #22


What does it mean?

“The world is made up of two classes—the hunters and the huntees.” p. 1

“Instinct is no match for reason.” p. 7, middle

“I drink to a foeman worthy of my steel—at last.” p. 11

“He lives a year in a minute.” p. 14

“Splendid! One of us is to furnish a repast for the hounds.” p. 15

Appendix #23


Assignment Rubric

Traits 3 (complete) 2 (partial) 1 (minimal)Content

Answer question. Use relevant details

from text to support answer.

Stay on topic.

Organization State point or

restate question. (Beginning)

Give details in support of point. (Middle)

Conclude with summary point or restate strongest point. (End)

Style/Voice May use quotes or

statistics to support. Conclude with

strong point or “clincher.”

Conventions/Presentation Writing is neat. Use proper

conventions.

Appendix #24


Comparing and Contrasting“The Most Dangerous Game” by Richard Connell & “The Hunter” from Gilligan’s Island

“The Most Dangerous Game”

and“The Hunter”

How Are They Alike?1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

“The Most Dangerous Game”

vs. “The Hunter”How Are They Different?

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

Conclusions/Connections I Can Make:


Appendix #25

The Gift of the Magi by O. HENRY

ONE DOLLAR AND EIGHTY-SEVEN CENTS. THAT WAS ALL. AND SIXTY CENTS of it was in pennies. Pennies saved one and two at a time by bulldozing the grocer and the vegetable man and the butcher until one's cheeks burned with the silent imputation of parsimony that such close dealing implied. Three times Della counted it. One dollar and eighty-seven cents. And the next day would be Christmas.

There was clearly nothing left to do but flop down on the shabby little couch and howl. So Della did it. Which instigates the moral reflection that life is made up of sobs, sniffles, and smiles, with sniffles predominating.

While the mistress of the home is gradually subsiding from the first stage to the second, take a look at the home. A furnished flat at $8 per week. It did not exactly beggar description, but it certainly had that word on the look-out for the mendicancy squad.

In the vestibule below was a letter-box into which no letter would go, and an electric button from which no mortal finger could coax a ring. Also appertaining thereunto was a card bearing the name "Mr. James Dillingham Young."

The "Dillingham" had been flung to the breeze during a former period of prosperity when its possessor was being paid $30 per week. Now, when the income was shrunk to $20, the letters of "Dillingham" looked blurred, as though they were thinking seriously of contracting to a modest and unassuming D. But whenever Mr. James Dillingham Young came home and reached his flat above he was called "Jim" and greatly hugged by Mrs. James Dillingham Young, already introduced to you as Della. Which is all very good.

Della finished her cry and attended to her cheeks with the powder rag. She stood by the window and looked out dully at a grey cat walking a grey fence in a grey backyard. To-morrow would be Christmas Day, and she had only $1.87 with which to buy Jim a present. She had been saving every penny she could for months, with this result. Twenty dollars a week doesn't go far. Expenses had been greater than she had calculated. They always are. Only $1.87 to buy a present for Jim. Her Jim. Many a happy hour she had spent planning for something nice for him. Something fine and rare and sterling--something just a little bit near to being worthy of the honour of being owned by Jim.

There was a pier-glass between the windows of the room. Perhaps you have seen a pier-glass in an $8 flat. A very thin and very agile person may, by observing his reflection in a rapid sequence of longitudinal strips, obtain a fairly accurate conception of his looks. Della, being slender, had mastered the art.

Suddenly she whirled from the window and stood before the glass. Her eyes were shining brilliantly, but her face had lost its colour within twenty seconds. Rapidly she pulled down her hair and let it fall to its full length.

Now, there were two possessions of the James Dillingham Youngs in which they both took a mighty pride. One was Jim's gold watch that had been his father's and his grandfather's. The other was Della's hair. Had the Queen of Sheba lived in the flat across the airshaft, Della would have let her hair hang out of the window some day to dry just to depreciate Her Majesty's jewels and gifts. Had King Solomon been the janitor, with all his treasures piled up in the basement, Jim would have pulled out his watch every time he passed, just to


http://www.classicshorts.com/bios/biohenry.html

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see him pluck at his beard from envy. 1So now Della's beautiful hair fell about her, rippling and shining like a cascade of brown waters. It reached below her knee and made itself almost a garment for her. And then she did it up again nervously and quickly. Once she faltered for a minute and stood still while a tear or two splashed on the worn red carpet.

On went her old brown jacket; on went her old brown hat. With a whirl of skirts and with the brilliant sparkle still in her eyes, she cluttered out of the door and down the stairs to the street.

Where she stopped the sign read: "Mme Sofronie. Hair Goods of All Kinds." One Eight up Della ran, and collected herself, panting. Madame, large, too white, chilly, hardly looked the "Sofronie."

"Will you buy my hair?" asked Della.

"I buy hair," said Madame. "Take yer hat off and let's have a sight at the looks of it."

Down rippled the brown cascade.

"Twenty dollars," said Madame, lifting the mass with a practised hand.

"Give it to me quick" said Della.

Oh, and the next two hours tripped by on rosy wings. Forget the hashed metaphor. She was ransacking the stores for Jim's present.

She found it at last. It surely had been made for Jim and no one else. There was no other like it in any of the stores, and she had turned all of them inside out. It was a platinum fob chain simple and chaste in design, properly proclaiming its value by substance alone and not by meretricious ornamentation--as all good things should do. It was even worthy of The Watch. As soon as she saw it she knew that it must be Jim's. It was like him. Quietness and value--the description applied to both. Twenty-one dollars they took from her for it, and she hurried home with the 78 cents. With that chain on his watch Jim might be properly anxious about the time in any company. Grand as the watch was, he sometimes looked at it on the sly on account of the old leather strap that he used in place of a chain.

When Della reached home her intoxication gave way a little to prudence and reason. She got out her curling irons and lighted the gas and went to work repairing the ravages made by generosity added to love. Which is always a tremendous task dear friends--a mammoth task.

Within forty minutes her head was covered with tiny, close-lying curls that made her look wonderfully like a truant schoolboy. She looked at her reflection in the mirror long, carefully, and critically.

"If Jim doesn't kill me," she said to herself, "before he takes a second look at me, he'll say I look like a Coney Island chorus girl. But what could I do--oh! what could I do with a dollar and eighty-seven cents?"

At 7 o'clock the coffee was made and the frying-pan was on the back of the stove hot and ready to cook the chops.Jim was never late. Della doubled the fob chain in her hand and sat on the corner of the table near the door that he always entered. Then she heard his step on the stair away down on the first flight, and she turned white for just a moment. She had a habit of saying little silent prayers about the simplest everyday things,


2

and now she whispered: "Please, God, make him think I am still pretty."

The door opened and Jim stepped in and closed it. He looked thin and very serious. Poor fellow, he was only twenty-two--and to be burdened with a family! He needed a new overcoat and he was with out gloves.

Jim stepped inside the door, as immovable as a setter at the scent of quail. His eyes were fixed upon Della, and there was an expression in them that she could not read, and it terrified her. It was not anger, nor surprise, nor disapproval, nor horror, nor any of the sentiments that she had been prepared for. He simply stared at her fixedly with that peculiar expression on his face.

Della wriggled off the table and went for him.

"Jim, darling," she cried, "don't look at me that way. I had my hair cut off and sold it because I couldn't have lived through Christmas without giving you a present. It'll grow out again--you won't mind, will you? I just had to do it. My hair grows awfully fast. Say 'Merry Christmas!' Jim, and let's be happy. You don't know what a nice-what a beautiful, nice gift I've got for you."

"You've cut off your hair?" asked Jim, laboriously, as if he had not arrived at that patent fact yet, even after the hardest mental labour.

"Cut it off and sold it," said Della. "Don't you like me just as well, anyhow? I'm me without my hair, ain't I?"

Jim looked about the room curiously.

"You say your hair is gone?" he said, with an air almost of idiocy.

"You needn't look for it," said Della. "It's sold, I tell you--sold and gone, too. It's Christmas Eve, boy. Be good to me, for it went for you. Maybe the hairs of my head were numbered," she went on with a sudden serious sweetness, "but nobody could ever count my love for you. Shall I put the chops on, Jim?"

Out of his trance Jim seemed quickly to wake. He enfolded his Della. For ten seconds let us regard with discreet scrutiny some inconsequential object in the other direction. Eight dollars a week or a million a year--what is the difference? A mathematician or a wit would give you the wrong answer. The magi brought valuable gifts, but that was not among them. I his dark assertion will be illuminated later on.

Jim drew a package from his overcoat pocket and threw it upon the table.

"Don't make any mistake, Dell," he said, "about me. I don't think there's anything in the way of a haircut or a shave or a shampoo that could make me like my girl any less. But if you'll unwrap that package you may see why you had me going a while at first."

White fingers and nimble tore at the string and paper. And then an ecstatic scream of joy; and then, alas! a quick feminine change to hysterical tears and wails, necessitating the immediate employment of all the comforting powers of the lord of the flat.

For there lay The Combs--the set of combs, side and back, that Della had worshipped for long in a Broadway window. Beautiful combs, pure tortoise-shell, with jewelled rims--just the shade to wear in the beautiful vanished hair. They were expensive combs, she knew, and her heart had simply craved and yearned over


3

them without the least hope of possession. And now, they were hers, but the tresses that should have adorned the coveted adornments were gone.

But she hugged them to her bosom, and at length she was able to look up with dim eyes and a smile and say: "My hair grows so fast, Jim!"

And then Della leaped up like a little singed cat and cried, "Oh, oh!"

Jim had not yet seen his beautiful present. She held it out to him eagerly upon her open palm. The dull precious metal seemed to flash with a reflection of her bright and ardent spirit.

"Isn't it a dandy, Jim? I hunted all over town to find it. You'll have to look at the time a hundred times a day now. Give me your watch. I want to see how it looks on it."

Instead of obeying, Jim tumbled down on the couch and put his hands under the back of his head and smiled.

"Dell," said he, "let's put our Christmas presents away and keep 'em a while. They're too nice to use just at present. I sold the watch to get the money to buy Your combs. And now suppose you put the chops on."

The magi, as you know, were wise men--wonderfully wise men-who brought gifts to the Babe in the manger. They invented the art of giving Christmas presents. Being wise, their gifts were no doubt wise ones, possibly bearing the privilege of exchange in case of duplication. And here I have lamely related to you the uneventful chronicle of two foolish children in a flat who most unwisely sacrificed for each other the greatest treasures of their house. But in a last word to the wise of these days let it be said that of all who give gifts these two were the wisest. Of all who give and receive gifts, such as they are wisest. Everywhere they are wisest. They are the magi.

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http://www.classicshorts.com/stories/magi.html

Narrative Profundity Chart – “The Gift of the Magi”Title: “The Gift of the Magi” Character: Della Student Name: Date:

Physical:


(Action)

Mental:

What was the character thinking or feeling when

s/he did it?(Intention)

Moral:

What was right and wrong with

what the character did?(Judgment)

Psychological:

What did the character get

from doing what s/he did?(Benefit/

Consequences)

Analogical:

What links are there to me, to

what I have read and to my world?

(Comparison)

Philosophical:

What is the lesson or

principle that I can learn from

this story?(Abstraction)

Transformational:



Della cut off her hair and sold it.

She wanted to get a wonderful present for Jim.

Right – It was Christmas and she loved him.Wrong – Her hair was her most valued possession.

She got the satisfaction of getting Jim an appropriate present.

When I got my job teaching, I didn’t have much money, but I wanted to buy something very special for my dad who had done so much for me. I bought him the first of a collection of very expensive glasses that I knew he would like.

I have heard of people donating organs to others.

Sacrificing for someone you love is a good thing to do.

Gifts of sacrifice are good gifts.

Unselfishness

Sacrificing for someone you love shows how much you love that person. I feel I should do this.

Della used the money to buy a watch fob.

She wanted Jim to have a very special gift to go with his most prized possession, his watch.

Right – Jim worked hard and deserved it.Wrong – They should have saved the money.

She was pleased that she had found the perfect present for Jim.

Della reacted to Jim’s gift with joy then tears.

She had wanted the combs so much, but now she did not have her long hair.

Right – It was right to appreciate them.Wrong – They could not afford them.

She showed Jim how she felt – happy and sad.

Appendix # 27 From Weber, Nelson and Beals, adapted 11/08/06


ACT Writing Prompt

It has been said that the relationship between Della and Jim in “The Gift of the Magi” by O. Henry is a truly unselfish love relationship. Many people aspire to that kind or relationship for themselves. Others say that people as poor as Della and Jim have no business spending money on such frivolous and unnecessary things like a watch fob and hair combs. They would say that the couple should be saving for a home or a “rainy day.”

In your essay, take a position on this relationship. You may write about either one of the two points of view given, or you may present a different point of view on the question. Use specific reasons and examples to support your position.

Appendix 28


Persuasive WritingDefinition:In persuasive writing, a writer takes a position FOR or AGAINST an issue and writes to convince the reader to agree or do something. It comes in a variety of forms: essays, speeches, letters and advertisements. The purpose of the writing is to convince your reader to agree with your opinion. Persuasive essays usually follow a pattern. You state your opinion, support it, discuss opposing viewpoints and in the closing, restate your opinion.(Adapted from: Listen to This: Developing an Ear for Expository. Marcia S. Freeman, 2003.)Purpose:

To convince the reader to agree with your opinion or to do somethingOrganization:

Characterized by a series of arguments that support opinion or position Logical Order-Arranged by importance or strength of the arguments Three parts:

1. Opening statement of position or opinion2. Series of arguments (with supporting details)3. Final argument or conclusion (clincher)

Beginnings: Need to hook the reader Contain the thesis statement

Endings: Short Contains clincher May reiterate opinion, draw conclusions or refer back to opening hook

Additional Persuasive Techniques: Dramatize the facts Use striking statistics Use opposites for impact Say things repetitively but in a variety of ways Use language that appeals to reader’s emotions

Types of support for arguments: Scientific or numerical facts Concrete examples Narrative vignettes Authoritative quotes Statistics Definitions Tables Charts Diagrams

Arguments should appeal to: Shared values Common goals Common sense Benefits to audience Emotion Vanity

Appendix #29a


MME Persuasive Writing Scoring GuideTask II: Taking a Stand

Characteristics Position Complexity Organization Language

6

The essay takes a position on the issue in the prompt, shows clear understanding of that issue, and maintains focus across the response. The position is supported thoroughly and consistently with specific, logical reasons and/or examples.

The response may demonstrate insight and complexity by evaluating various implications of the position and/or by responding to arguments that differ from the writer’s position.

Organization is well controlled, with a logical sequence of reasons and strong transitions and relationships among reasons.

The essay shows a good command of varied, precise language that supports meaning. Few, if any, errors distract the reader.

5

The essay takes a position on the issue in the prompt, shows clear understanding of that issue, and maintains focus through most of the response. The position is supported with specific logical reasons.

The essay may show recognition of complexity by partially evaluating implications of the issue, or by responding to arguments that differ from the author’s position.

Organization is generally controlled, with occasional lapses in sequencing and/or relationships among reasons.

Language is competent and supports meaning. Errors are rarely distracting.

4The essay takes a position on the issue in the prompt, shows an understanding of that issue, and is generally focused. The position is supported adequately, and may be an uneven mixture of general and specific reasons.

The essay may show some recognition of complexity by responding to some arguments that differ from the writer’s position.

Some organization is evident in the sequencing and relationships of reasons.

Language is adequate. Errors may distract, but do not interfere with meaning.

3The essay takes a position on the issue in the prompt, shows some understanding of the issue in the prompt, but may not remain focused. The position is supported with reasons that may be limited and/or repetitious.

The essay may also mention an argument that opposes the writer’s position.

Organization may be uneven, but there are clusters of sequenced and related reasons.

Language may be limited. Errors may occasionally interfere with meaning.

2The essay takes a position, but shows little understanding of the issue in the prompt, or takes an unclear position. Support may be so minimal or unclear that organization may not be apparent.

Organization may not be apparent.

Language may be simple. Errors may interfere with meaning.

1The essay takes no position, or takes a position with no support, showing little or no understanding of the issue in the prompt.

There is little or no evidence of an organizational structure, or of sequencing and connecting reasons.

Language may be limited and contain errors that detract from meaning.

0 The essay (A) is off topic, (B) was written in a language other than English or illegible, or (C) was not found in your answer folder.

Appendix #29b


ACT Writing Prompt RubricPapers at each level exhibit all or most of the characteristics described at each score point.Score = 6 Essays within this score range demonstrate effective skill in responding to the task.

The essay shows a clear understanding of the task. The essay takes a position on the issue and may offer a critical context for discussion. The essay addresses complexity by examining different perspectives on the issue, or by evaluating the implications and/or complications of the issue, or by fully responding to counterarguments to the writer’s position. Development of ideas is ample, specific, and logical. Most ideas are fully elaborated. A clear focus on the specific issue in the prompt is maintained. The organization of the essay is clear: the organization may be somewhat predictable or it may grow from the writer’s purpose. Ideas are logically sequenced. Most transitions reflect the writer’s logic and are usually integrated into the essay. The introduction and conclusion are effective, clear, and well developed. The essay shows a good command of language. Sentences are varied and word choice is varied and precise. There are few, if any, errors to distract the reader.

Score = 3 Essays within this score range demonstrate some developing skill in responding to the task.

The essay shows some understanding of the task. The essay takes a position on the issue but does not offer a context for discussion. The essay may acknowledge a counterargument to the writer’s position, but its development is brief or unclear. Development of ideas is limited and may be repetitious, with little, if any, movement between general statements and specific reasons, examples, and details. Focus on the general topic ismaintained, but focus on the specific issue in the prompt may not be maintained. The organization of the essay is simple. Ideas are logically grouped within parts of the essay, but there is little or no evidence of logicalsequencing of ideas. Transitions, if used, are simple and obvious. An introduction and conclusion are clearly discernible but underdeveloped. Language shows a basic control. Sentences show a little variety and word choice is appropriate. Errors may be distracting and may occasionally impede understanding.

Score = 5 Essays within this score range demonstrate competent skill in responding to the task.

The essay shows a clear understanding of the task. The essay takes a position on the issue and may offer a broad context for discussion. The essay shows recognition of complexity by partially evaluating the implications and/or complications of the issue, or by responding tocounterarguments to the writer’s position. Development of ideas is specific and logical. Most ideas are elaborated, with clear movement between general statements and specific reasons, examples, and details. Focus on thespecific issue in the prompt is maintained. The organization of the essay is clear, although it may be predictable. Ideas are logically sequenced, although simple and obvious transitions may be used. The introduction and conclusion are clear and generally well developed. Language is competent. Sentences are somewhat varied and word choice is sometimes variedand precise. There may be a few errors, but they are rarely distracting.

Score = 2 Essays within this score range demonstrate inconsistent or weak skill in responding to the task.

The essay shows a weak understanding of the task. The essay may not take a position on the issue, or the essay may take a position but fail to convey reasons to support that position, or the essay may take a position but fail tomaintain a stance. There is little or no recognition of a counterargument to the writer’s position. The essay is thinly developed. If examples are given, they are general and may not be clearly relevant. The essay may includeextensive repetition of the writer’s ideas or of ideas in the prompt. Focus on the general topic is maintained, but focus on the specific issue in the prompt may not be maintained. There is some indication of an organizationalstructure, and some logical grouping of ideas within parts of the essay is apparent. Transitions, if used, are simple and obvious, and they may be inappropriate or misleading. An introduction and conclusion are discerniblebut minimal. Sentence structure and word choice are usually simple. Errors may be frequently distracting and may sometimes impede understanding.

Score = 4 Essays within this score range demonstrate adequate skill in responding to the task.

The essay shows an understanding of the task. The essay takes a position on the issue and may offer some context for discussion. The essay may show some recognition of complexity by providing some response tocounterarguments to the writer’s position. Development of ideas is adequate, with some movement between general statements and specific reasons, examples, and details. Focus on the specific issue in the prompt is maintained throughout most of the essay. The organization of the essay is apparent but predictable. Some evidence of logical sequencing of ideas is apparent, although most transitions are simple and obvious. The introduction and conclusion are clear and somewhat developed. Languageis adequate, with some sentence variety and appropriate word choice. There may be some distracting errors, but they do not impede understanding.

Score = 1 Essays within this score range show little or no skill in responding to the task.

The essay shows little or no understanding of the task. If the essay takes a position, it fails to convey reasons to support that position. The essay is minimally developed. The essay may include excessive repetition of the writer’s ideas or of ideas in the prompt. Focus on the general topic is usually maintained, but focus on the specific issue in the prompt may not be maintained. There is little or no evidence of an organizational structure or of the logical grouping of ideas. Transitions are rarely used. If present, an introduction and conclusion are minimal. Sentence structure and word choice are simple. Errors may be frequently distracting and may significantly impede understanding.

Score = 0 Blank, Off-Topic, or IllegibleAppendix #29c


Figurative Language and Plot Devices – “The Gift of the Magi”

Figurative Language: Any expression that stretches the meaning of words beyond their literal meaning.

Simile: a comparison of two unlike things using “like” or “as” (e. g. “So now Della’s hair fell about her, rippling and shining like a cascade of brown waters.” page 2)

Personification: a metaphorical figure of speech in which animals, ideas, things, etc. are represented as having human qualities (e. g. “…the letters of “Dillingham” looked blurred, as though they were thinking seriously of contracting to the modest and unassuming D.”, page 1

Allusion: an implicit reference to an historical, literary, or biblical character, event, or element (e. g. “The Gift of the Magi” – a reference to the wise men from the Bible, page 1)

Irony: a contradiction or incongruity between appearance or expectation and reality; a figure of speech in which the literal meaning of the words is the opposite of their intended meaning; an incongruity or discrepancy between an anticipated and realized outcome (e. g. the irony of O. Henry’s calling this poor couple “mistress” and “lord of the flat,” pages 1 and 3)

Literary Devices

Foreshadowing: any clue or hint of future events in a narrative (e. g. “the author makes a big deal about their prized possessions. page 1)

Adapted from Harris, et al. The Literacy Dictionary, IRA, 1995 and Sparknotes 101, 2001, Spark Educational Publishing

Appendix #30a


Short Critical Excerpts about "The Gift of the Magi"

#1____________________________________________________________________

"It is not surprising that 'The Gift of the Magi' still enjoys such widespread fame, for in this trite little tale of mutual self-sacrifice between husband and wife, O. Henry crystallized dramatically what the world in all its stored-up wisdom knows to be of fundamental value in ordinary family life. Unselfish love shared, regardless of the attendant difficulties or distractions--this is the idea repeatedly implied as a criterion in his fictional treatment of domestic affairs. If such love is present, life can be a great adventure transcending all drabness; if it is absent, nothing else can take its place....O. Henry wrote few stories of ordinary family life that approach in tenderness and universal appeal the qualities found in 'The Gift of the Magi' (Current-Garcia 116)."

Current-Garcia, Eugene. O. Henry (William Sydney Porter) . Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1965.

[At the time he wrote this, Dr. Current-Garcia was the Hargis Professor of English and American Literature at Auburn University, Auburn, Alabama, U.S.A.]

#2____________________________________________________________________

"In 'Gift of the Magi' the surprise ending comes when Jim reveals that he has sold his watch to buy Della her present; then O. Henry goes on to add that of all who give gifts, these are the wisest. (This added moral is a favorite device of his.) ( Peel 11)

One outstanding characteristic of O. Henry's work of which critics have taken little note is his use of the technique of 'after the thunder, the still, small voice.' This is the adding of a moral after the punch line or surprise ending...O. Henry's stories are often didactic in this fashion"(Peel 17).

Peel, Donald F. "A Critical Study of the Short Stories of O. Henry." Northwest Missouri State College Studies 25:4 (1961): 11-17.

Appendix #30b


#3____________________________________________________________________

The following quote contains both a synopsis of the story's content and a suggestion of its theme:

"Most of his [O. Henry's] many stories of New York City...make the point that the humble little insignificant people of New York are just as admirable and their lives as worthy of attention and interest [and, as he implies, respect] as the members of the Four Hundred. Typical is 'The Gift of the Magi,' O. Henry's famous story of the young married couple, each of whom sells a treasured possession to obtain money to buy a Christmas present for the other. Della sells her beautiful long hair to buy the platinum chain for Jim's watch, only to discover that he has sold it to buy the jeweled tortoise-shell combs for her hair. O. Henry builds up to his surprise twist very artfully, and with deft touches he elicits the reader's admiration and sympathy for his young couple whose love for each other more than compensates [for their lack of money and material possessions].. ..Artfully, too, O. Henry does not end on the note of irony and surprise but gives to what he calls his 'uneventful chronicle of two foolish children' the appearance of a little parable with a significant meaning. The magi, he reminds the reader, were wise men who brought gifts to the Christ child, and thus invented the giving of Chrismas presents. As for Jim and Della, 'in a last word to the wise of these days let it be said that of all who give gifts these two were the wisest....They are the magi'" (Voss 123-24).

MLA Format for the above quotation:

Voss, Arthur. The American Short Story: A Critical Survey. Norman: Oklahoma UP, 1973: 123-24.From: http://mclibrary.nhmccd.edu/lit/crit5.html

Assignment: Other than “trite little tale,” the comments are essentially positive in nature. Would today’s critic be more judgmental? Make a judgment as to the effectiveness or appropriateness of the criticism for today’s reader.

Appendix #30c


http://mclibrary.nhmccd.edu/lit/crit5.html

How Do I Love Thee? (Sonnet 43) by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.

I love thee to the depth and breadth and height

My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight

For the ends of being and ideal grace.

I love thee to the level of every day's

Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.

I love thee freely, as men strive for right.

I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.

I love thee with the passion put to use

In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.

I love thee with a love I seemed to lose

With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,

Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,

I shall but love thee better after death.

From: http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/152

Appendix #31a


http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/152


Elizabeth Barrett BrowningElizabeth Barrett, an English poet of the Romantic Movement, was born in 1806 at Coxhoe Hall, Durham, England. The oldest of twelve children, Elizabeth was the first in her family born in England in over two hundred years. For centuries, the Barrett family, who were part Creole, had lived in Jamaica, where they owned sugar plantations and relied on slave labor. Elizabeth's father, Edward Barrett Moulton Barrett, chose to raise his family in England, while his fortune grew in Jamaica. Educated at home, Elizabeth apparently had read passages from Paradise Lost and a number of Shakespearean plays, among other great works, before the age of ten. By her twelfth year she had written her first "epic" poem, which consisted of four books of rhyming couplets. Two years later, Elizabeth developed a lung ailment that plagued her for the rest of her life. Doctors began treating her with morphine, which she would take until her death. While saddling a pony when she was fifteen, Elizabeth also suffered a spinal injury. Despite her ailments, her education continued to flourish. Throughout her teenage years, Elizabeth taught herself Hebrew so that she could read the Old Testament; her interests later turned to Greek studies. Accompanying her appetite for the classics was a passionate enthusiasm for her Christian faith. She became active in the Bible and Missionary Societies of her church.

In 1826 Elizabeth anonymously published her collection An Essay on Mind and Other Poems. Two years later, her mother passed away. The slow abolition of slavery in England and mismanagement of the plantations depleted the Barrett's income, and in 1832, Elizabeth's father sold his rural estate at a public auction. He moved his family to a coastal town and rented cottages for the next three years, before settling permanently in London. While living on the sea coast, Elizabeth published her translation of Prometheus Bound (1833), by the Greek dramatist Aeschylus.

Gaining notoriety for her work in the 1830's, Elizabeth continued to live in her father's London house under his tyrannical rule. He began sending Elizabeth's younger siblings to Jamaica to help with the family's estates. Elizabeth bitterly opposed slavery and did not want her siblings sent away. During this time, she wrote The Seraphim and Other Poems (1838), expressing Christian sentiments in the form of classical Greek tragedy. Due to her weakening disposition she was forced to spend a year at the sea of Torquay accompanied by her brother Edward, whom she referred to as "Bro." He drowned later that year while sailing at Torquay and Elizabeth returned home emotionally broken, becoming an invalid and a recluse. She spent the next five years in her bedroom at her father's home. She continued writing, however, and in 1844 produced a collection entitled simply Poems. This volume gained the attention of poet Robert Browning, whose work Elizabeth had praised in one of her poems, and he wrote her a letter.

Elizabeth and Robert, who was six years her junior, exchanged 574 letters over the next twenty months. Immortalized in 1930 in the play The Barretts of Wimpole Street, by Rudolf Besier (1878-1942), their romance was bitterly opposed by her father, who did not want any of his children to marry. In 1846, the couple eloped and settled in Florence, Italy, where Elizabeth's health improved and she bore a son, Robert Wideman Browning. Her father never spoke to her again. Elizabeth's Sonnets from the Portuguese, dedicated to her husband and written in secret before her marriage, was published in 1850. Critics generally consider the Sonnets—one of the most widely known collections of love lyrics in English—to be her best work. Admirers have compared her imagery to Shakespeare and her use of the Italian form to Petrarch.

Political and social themes embody Elizabeth's later work. She expressed her intense sympathy for the struggle for the unification of Italy in Casa Guidi Windows (1848-51) and Poems Before Congress (1860). In 1857 Browning published her verse novel Aurora Leigh, which portrays male domination of a woman. In her poetry she also addressed the oppression of the Italians by the Austrians, the child labor mines and mills of England, and slavery, among other social injustices. Although this decreased her popularity, Elizabeth was heard and recognized around Europe.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning died in Florence on June 29, 1861.

From http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/152



http://www.poets.org/wshak

http://www.poets.org/rbrow

Appendix #31b

6-Word Short Stories(From Wired, Issue 14.11, November 2006, http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.11/sixwords_pr.html )

We kissed. She melted. Mop please!- James Patrick Kelly's latest short story, "The Leila Torn Show," was featured in the June issue of Asimov's.

Wasted day. Wasted life. Dessert, please.- Steven Meretzky is the designer behind text-based videogames like A Mind Forever Voyaging and Planetfall.

Failed SAT. Lost scholarship. Invented rocket.- William Shatner played Captain James T. Kirk on the original Star Trek TV series.

Gown removed carelessly. Head, less so.- Joss Whedon is the creator of three TV series: Angel, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Firefly.

Automobile warranty expires. So does engine.- Stan Lee is the cocreator of comic book icons Spider-Man, Daredevil, and the X-Men.

With bloody hands, I say good-bye.- Frank Miller's graphic novels include Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, 300, Ronin, and the Sin City series.

Epitaph: Foolish humans, never escaped Earth.- Vernor Vinge's earliest works, like 1981's True Names, helped trigger the cyberpunk explosion.

We went solar; sun went nova.- Ken MacLeod's most recent book, Learning the World, was nominated for a 2006 Hugo Award for Best Novel.

TIME MACHINE REACHES FUTURE!!! … nobody there …- Harry Harrison is author of Make Room! Make Room!, basis for film Soylent Green.

Easy. Just touch the match to- Ursula K. Le Guin created the fictional world of Earthsea; Voices, her latest novel, was just released.

Dinosaurs return. Want their oil back.- David Brin earned a doctorate in space physics from UC San Diego before becoming an award-winning sci-fi author.


http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.11/sixwords_pr.html

Appendix #32a

Bang postponed. Not Big enough. Reboot.- David Brin earned a doctorate in space physics from UC San Diego before becoming an award-winning sci-fi author.

Democracy postponed. Whence franchise? Ask Diebold...- David Brin earned a doctorate in space physics from UC San Diego before becoming an award-winning sci-fi author.

Corpse parts missing. Doctor buys yacht.- Margaret Atwood 's sixth collection of short fiction, The Tent, was published in January.

He read his obituary with confusion.- Steven Meretzky is the designer behind text-based videogames like A Mind Forever Voyaging and Planetfall.

I win lottery. Sun goes nova.- Steven Meretzky is the designer behind text-based videogames like A Mind Forever Voyaging and Planetfall.

Parallel universe. Bush, destitute, joins army.- Steven Meretzky is the designer behind text-based videogames like A Mind Forever Voyaging and Planetfall.

Epitaph: He shouldn't have fed it.- Brian Herbert

K.I.A. Baghdad, Aged 18 - Closed Casket- Richard K. Morgan

Three to Iraq. One came back.- Graeme Gibson

1. Choose your favorite 6-word short story and, in a Quick Write, tell what it means to you. How powerful is the story that these six words relate?

2. Now you write a 3-5 6-word short stories. Choose your favorite to share with the class.

Appendix #32b


The Necklace by GUY de MAUPASSANThttp://www.classicshorts.com/stories/necklace.html

SHE WAS ONE OF THOSE PRETTY AND CHARMING GIRLS BORN, as though fate had blundered over her, into a family of artisans. She had no marriage portion, no expectations, no means of getting known, understood, loved, and wedded by a man of wealth and distinction; and she let herself be married off to a little clerk in the Ministry of Education. Her tastes were simple because she had never been able to afford any other, but she was as unhappy as though she had married beneath her; for women have no caste or class, their beauty, grace, and charm serving them for birth or family. Their natural delicacy, their instinctive elegance, their nimbleness of wit, are their only mark of rank, and put the slum girl on a level with the highest lady in the land.

She suffered endlessly, feeling herself born for every delicacy and luxury. She suffered from the poorness of her house, from its mean walls, worn chairs, and ugly curtains. All these things, of which other women of her class would not even have been aware, tormented and insulted her. The sight of the little Breton girl who came to do the work in her little house aroused heart-broken regrets and hopeless dreams in her mind. She imagined silent antechambers, heavy with Oriental tapestries, lit by torches in lofty bronze sockets, with two tall footmen in knee-breeches sleeping in large arm-chairs, overcome by the heavy warmth of the stove. She imagined vast saloons hung with antique silks, exquisite pieces of furniture supporting priceless ornaments, and small, charming, perfumed rooms, created just for little parties of intimate friends, men who were famous and sought after, whose homage roused every other woman's envious longings.

When she sat down for dinner at the round table covered with a three-days-old cloth, opposite her husband, who took the cover off the soup-tureen, exclaiming delightedly: "Aha! Scotch broth! What could be better?" she imagined delicate meals, gleaming silver, tapestries peopling the walls with folk of a past age and strange birds in faery forests; she imagined delicate food served in marvellous dishes, murmured gallantries, listened to with an inscrutable smile as one trifled with the rosy flesh of trout or wings of asparagus chicken.

She had no clothes, no jewels, nothing. And these were the only things she loved; she felt that she was made for them. She had longed so eagerly to charm, to be desired, to be wildly attractive and sought after.

She had a rich friend, an old school friend whom she refused to visit, because she suffered so keenly when she returned home. She would weep whole days, with grief, regret, despair, and misery.

***

One evening her husband came home with an exultant air, holding a large envelope in his hand.

" Here's something for you," he said.

Swiftly she tore the paper and drew out a printed card on which were these words:

"The Minister of Education and Madame Ramponneau request the pleasure of the company of Monsieur and Madame Loisel at the Ministry on the evening of Monday, January the 18th."

Instead of being delighted, as her-husband hoped, she flung the invitation petulantly across the table, murmuring: 1


http://www.classicshorts.com/stories/necklace.html

http://www.classicshorts.com/bios/biomaup.html

http://www.classicshorts.com/bib.html#necklace

"What do you want me to do with this?"

"Why, darling, I thought you'd be pleased. You never go out, and this is a great occasion. I had tremendous trouble to get it. Every one wants one; it's very select, and very few go to the clerks. You'll see all the really big people there."

She looked at him out of furious eyes, and said impatiently: "And what do you suppose I am to wear at such an affair?"

He had not thought about it; he stammered:

"Why, the dress you go to the theatre in. It looks very nice, to me...."

He stopped, stupefied and utterly at a loss when he saw that his wife was beginning to cry. Two large tears ran slowly down from the corners of her eyes towards the corners of her mouth.

"What's the matter with you? What's the matter with you?" he faltered.

But with a violent effort she overcame her grief and replied in a calm voice, wiping her wet cheeks:

"Nothing. Only I haven't a dress and so I can't go to this party. Give your invitation to some friend of yours whose wife will be turned out better than I shall."

He was heart-broken.

"Look here, Mathilde," he persisted. “What would be the cost of a suitable dress, which you could use on other occasions as well, something very simple?"

She thought for several seconds, reckoning up prices and also wondering for how large a sum she could ask without bringing upon herself an immediate refusal and an exclamation of horror from the careful-minded clerk.

At last she replied with some hesitation:

"I don't know exactly, but I think I could do it on four hundred francs."

He grew slightly pale, for this was exactly the amount he had been saving for a gun, intending to get a little shooting next summer on the plain of Nanterre with some friends who went lark-shooting there on Sundays.

Nevertheless he said: "Very well. I'll give you four hundred francs. But try and get a really nice dress with the money."

The day of the party drew near, and Madame Loisel seemed sad, uneasy and anxious. Her dress was ready, however. One evening her husband said to her:

"What's the matter with you? You've been very odd for the last three days."

271


"I'm utterly miserable at not having any jewels, not a single stone, to wear," she replied. "I shall look absolutely no one. I would almost rather not go to the party."

"Wear flowers," he said. "They're very smart at this time of the year. For ten francs you could get two or three gorgeous roses."

She was not convinced.

"No . . . there's nothing so humiliating as looking poor in the middle of a lot of rich women."

"How stupid you are!" exclaimed her husband. "Go and see Madame Forestier and ask her to lend you some jewels. You know her quite well enough for that."

She uttered a cry of delight.

"That's true. I never thought of it."

Next day she went to see her friend and told her her trouble.

Madame Forestier went to her dressing-table, took up a large box, brought it to Madame Loisel, opened it, and said:

"Choose, my dear."

First she saw some bracelets, then a pearl necklace, then a Venetian cross in gold and gems, of exquisite workmanship. She tried the effect of the jewels before the mirror, hesitating, unable to make up her mind to leave them, to give them up. She kept on asking:

"Haven't you anything else?"

"Yes. Look for yourself. I don't know what you would like best."

Suddenly she discovered, in a black satin case, a superb diamond necklace; her heart began to beat covetousIy. Her hands trembled as she lifted it. She fastened it round her neck, upon her high dress, and remained in ecstasy at sight of herself.

Then, with hesitation, she asked in anguish:

"Could you lend me this, just this alone?"

"Yes, of course."

She flung herself on her friend's breast, embraced her frenziedly, and went away with her treasure. The day of the party arrived. Madame Loisel was a success. She was the prettiest woman present, elegant, graceful, smiling, and quite above herself with happiness. All the men stared at her, inquired her name, and asked to be introduced to her. All the Under-Secretaries of State were eager to waltz with her. The Minister noticed her. 3


She danced madly, ecstatically, drunk with pleasure, with no thought for anything, in the triumph of her beauty, in the pride of her success, in a cloud of happiness made up of this universal homage and admiration, of the desires she had aroused, of the completeness of a victory so dear to her feminine heart.

She left about four o'clock in the morning. Since midnight her husband had been dozing in a deserted little room, in company with three other men whose wives were having a good time. He threw over her shoulders the garments he had brought for them to go home in, modest everyday clothes, whose poverty clashed with the beauty of the ball-dress. She was conscious of this and was anxious to hurry away, so that she should not be noticed by the other women putting on their costly furs.

Loisel restrained her.

"Wait a little. You'll catch cold in the open. I'm going to fetch a cab."

But she did not listen to him and rapidly descended-the staircase. When they were out in the street they could not find a cab; they began to look for one, shouting at the drivers whom they saw passing in the distance.

They walked down towards the Seine, desperate and shivering. At last they found on the quay one of those old nightprowling carriages which are only to be seen in Paris after dark, as though they were ashamed of their shabbiness in the daylight.

It brought them to their door in the Rue des Martyrs, and sadly they walked up to their own apartment. It was the end, for her. As for him, he was thinking that he must be at the office at ten.

She took off the garments in which she had wrapped her shoulders, so as to see herself in all her glory before the mirror. But suddenly she uttered a cry. The necklace was no longer round her neck!

"What's the matter with you?" asked her husband, already half undressed.

She turned towards him in the utmost distress.

"I . . . I . . . I've no longer got Madame Forestier's necklace. . . ."

He started with astonishment.

"What! . . . Impossible!"

They searched in the folds of her dress, in the folds of the coat, in the pockets, everywhere. They could not find it.

"Are you sure that you still had it on when you came away from the ball?" he asked.

"Yes, I touched it in the hall at the Ministry."

"But if you had lost it in the street, we should have heard it fall."

"Yes. Probably we should. Did you take the number of the cab?" 4


"No. You didn't notice it, did you?"

"No."

They stared at one another, dumbfounded. At last Loisel put on his clothes again.

"I'll go over all the ground we walked," he said, "and see if I can't find it."

And he went out. She remained in her evening clothes, lacking strength to get into bed, huddled on a chair, without volition or power of thought.

Her husband returned about seven. He had found nothing.

He went to the police station, to the newspapers, to offer a reward, to the cab companies, everywhere that a ray of hope impelled him.

She waited all day long, in the same state of bewilderment at this fearful catastrophe.

Loisel came home at night, his face lined and pale; he had discovered nothing.

"You must write to your friend," he said, "and tell her that you've broken the clasp of her necklace and are getting it mended. That will give us time to look about us."

She wrote at his dictation.

***

By the end of a week they had lost all hope.

Loisel, who had aged five years, declared:

"We must see about replacing the diamonds."

Next day they took the box which had held the necklace and went to the jewellers whose name was inside. He consulted his books.

"It was not I who sold this necklace, Madame; I must have merely supplied the clasp."

Then they went from jeweller to jeweller, searching for another necklace like the first, consulting their memories, both ill with remorse and anguish of mind.

In a shop at the Palais-Royal they found a string of diamonds which seemed to them exactly like the one they were looking for. It was worth forty thousand francs. They were allowed to have it for thirty-six thousand.

They begged the jeweller not to sell it for three days. And they arranged matters on the understanding that it would be taken back for thirty-four thousand francs, if the first one were found before the end of February.

574


Loisel possessed eighteen thousand francs left to him by his father. He intended to borrow the rest.

He did borrow it, getting a thousand from one man, five hundred from another, five louis here, three louis there. He gave notes of hand, entered into ruinous agreements, did business with usurers and the whole tribe of money-lenders. He mortgaged the whole remaining years of his existence, risked his signature without even knowing it he could honour it, and, appalled at the agonising face of the future, at the black misery about to fall upon him, at the prospect of every possible physical privation and moral torture, he went to get the new necklace and put down upon the jeweller's counter thirty-six thousand francs.

When Madame Loisel took back the necklace to Madame Forestier, the latter said to her in a chilly voice:

"You ought to have brought it back sooner; I might have needed it."

She did not, as her friend had feared, open the case. If she had noticed the substitution, what would she have thought? What would she have said? Would she not have taken her for a thief?

***

Madame Loisel came to know the ghastly life of abject poverty. From the very first she played her part heroically. This fearful debt must be paid off. She would pay it. The servant was dismissed. They changed their flat; they took a garret under the roof.

She came to know the heavy work of the house, the hateful duties of the kitchen. She washed the plates, wearing out her pink nails on the coarse pottery and the bottoms of pans. She washed the dirty linen, the shirts and dish-cloths, and hung them out to dry on a string; every morning she took the dustbin down into the street and carried up the water, stopping on each landing to get her breath. And, clad like a poor woman, she went to the fruiterer, to the grocer, to the butcher, a basket on her arm, haggling, insulted, fighting for every wretched halfpenny of her money.

Every month notes had to be paid off, others renewed, time gained.

Her husband worked in the evenings at putting straight a merchant's accounts, and often at night he did copying at twopence-halfpenny a page.

And this life lasted ten years.

At the end of ten years everything was paid off, everything, the usurer's charges and the accumulation of superimposed interest.

Madame Loisel looked old now. She had become like all the other strong, hard, coarse women of poor households. Her hair was badly done, her skirts were awry, her hands were red. She spoke in a shrill voice, and the water slopped all over the floor when she scrubbed it. But sometimes, when her husband was at the office, she sat down by the window and thought of that evening long ago, of the ball at which she had been so beautiful and so much admired.

What would have happened if she had never lost those jewels. Who knows? Who knows? How strange life is, how fickle! How little is needed to ruin or to save! 6


One Sunday, as she had gone for a walk along the Champs-Elysees to freshen herself after the labours of the week, she caught sight suddenly of a woman who was taking a child out for a walk. It was Madame Forestier, still young, still beautiful, still attractive.

Madame Loisel was conscious of some emotion. Should she speak to her? Yes, certainly. And now that she had paid, she would tell her all. Why not?

She went up to her.

"Good morning, Jeanne."

The other did not recognise her, and was surprised at being thus familiarly addressed by a poor woman.

"But . . . Madame . . ." she stammered. "I don't know . . . you must be making a mistake."

"No . . . I am Mathilde Loisel."

Her friend uttered a cry.

"Oh! . . . my poor Mathilde, how you have changed! . . ."

"Yes, I've had some hard times since I saw you last; and many sorrows . . . and all on your account."

"On my account! . . . How was that?"

"You remember the diamond necklace you lent me for the ball at the Ministry?"

"Yes. Well?"

"Well, I lost it."

"How could you? Why, you brought it back."

"I brought you another one just like it. And for the last ten years we have been paying for it. You realise it wasn't easy for us; we had no money. . . . Well, it's paid for at last, and I'm glad indeed."

Madame Forestier had halted.

"You say you bought a diamond necklace to replace mine?"

"Yes. You hadn't noticed it? They were very much alike."

And she smiled in proud and innocent happiness.

Madame Forestier, deeply moved, took her two hands.

"Oh, my poor Mathilde! But mine was paste (imitation). It was worth at the very most five hundred francs! .”


7

Narrative Profundity ChartTitle: “The Necklace Character: Madame Loisel – Mathilde Student Name: Date:

Physical:


(Action)

Mental:

What was the character thinking

or feeling when s/he did it?

(Intention)

Moral:

What was right and wrong with

what the character did?

(Judgment)

Psychological:

What did the character get from doing what s/he

did?(Benefit/

Consequences)

Analogical:

What links are there to me, to what I

have read and to my world?

(Comparison)

Philosophical:

What is the lesson or principle that I

can learn from this story?

(Abstraction)

Transformational:



Mathilde Borrowed her friend’s necklace.

She felt she had to have to have jewelry to be like or better than the other women who would be at the dance.

Right: She should be able to look good.

Wrong: She should not have borrowed anything so valuable.

She was happy because, “…she was the prettiest woman present….”

Sometimes when something bad happens, I want to blame it on someone else when it is really my fault and responsibility.

Neither a borrower nor a lender be.

Live within your means; do not put on airs.

We should take responsibility for our own actions and thoughts. I should not think I am better than anyone else.Mathilde lost

the necklace.She was frantic and knew she would have to find it or replace it.

Right: It was her responsibility.

Wrong: She should have been paying more attention to the necklace.

The consequence was that she had to live a much harder life to repay the debt.

Mathilde told her friend that she was the cause of her, Mathilde’s, unhappiness.

She wanted to transfer the blame and anger to someone else.

Right: She had grown old too fast and wanted to blame someone.

It made her feel better to transfer blame and guilt.


Wrong: It was her fault.

Appendix #34 From Weber, Nelson and Beals, adapted 11/08/07


Complication/Trigger Event (Inciting Moment) Event that causes the conflict or sets the conflict in motion.

Rising Action Complications and events that occur as the character(s) tries to solve the problem

Climax (Turning Point) The point of highest interest, suspense, or greatest emotional tension.

Falling Action Events that occur as the character works toward the resolution of the conflict/

Resolution (Denouement)A satisfactory conclusion that is either positive or negative for the character.

Plot Development for “The Necklace”


Exposition (Beginning of the Story)The start of a story that introduces characters and setting.

Appendix #35

Character Development: Eight Ways an Author Reveals Charactero through characters’ actions

o through dialogue

o through reactions of characters to one-another

o through characters’ thoughts

o through character’s habits/idiosyncrasies

o through character’s possessions

o through physical descriptions of characters

o through background information

Appendix #36a adapted from http://www.ket.org/education/guides/pd/teachingtheshortstory.pdf80


http://www.ket.org/education/guides/pd/teachingtheshortstory.pdf

Literary Criticism: “The Necklace”

Guy de Maupassant's short story ‘‘The Necklace’’ (‘‘La parure’’) was first published in the Paris newspaper Le Gaulois on February 17, 1884, and was subsequently included in his 1885 collection of short stories Tales of Day and Night (Contes dejour et de la nuit). Like most of Maupassant's short fiction, it was an instant success, and it has become his most widely read and anthologized story. In addition to its well-rounded characters, tight plotting, wealth of detail, and keen social commentary, ''The Necklace'' is conspicuous for its use of the "whip-crack" or ‘‘O. Henry’’ ending, in which a plot twist at the end of the story completely changes the story's meaning. Although Maupassant rarely made use of the device, its presence in this work has tied him to it irrevocably. Although it is not known where Maupassant got the idea for his story, certain connections may be made between ‘‘The Necklace’’ and the novel Madame Bovary, written by Maupassant's mentor and friend, Gustave Flaubert. Both stories feature a young, beautiful woman in a social situation that she finds distasteful. Like Madame Bovary, Mathilde Loisel attempts to escape her social station in life, but her scheming actions ultimately doom her. From: http://www.enotes.com/necklace//print

Assignment: This is a piece of literary criticism about the story you have just read, “The Necklace.” In this piece the critic refers to the “O. Henry ending.” What does the critic mean by an “O. Henry ending”? Explain your answer by making references to both “The Necklace” and “The Gift of the Magi” by O. Henry.

Appendix #36b


http://www.enotes.com/necklace/print

Pulling the Unit Together through the Themes and Essential Questions

Themes: Story is the basic principle of mind. One story helps make sense of another. What did you learn from

one of the stories in the unit that helped you understand another story? Story can help us to come to a deeper understanding of ourselves and the world around us. How have

these three stories helped us to come to a deeper understanding of ourselves and the world around us?

History is a story that we can learn from so we do not repeat the mistakes of history. Have we learned about mistakes that we should not repeat in any of these stories?

Essential Questions: Who am I? How can I find my identity and discover where I fit in the world? How do the stories help me

to determine my place in the world?

How do I relate to my family, my community, and my country? How do the stories help me understand my relationships to family, community, and country?

How do my relationships, skills and talents help to define me? How do the stories help me to see my relationships, skills, and talents as helping to define me?

What can I learn from story about myself, my relationships and my world? What have I learned from these stories about myself, my relationships, and my world?

What lesson(s) can I derive from stories? How can I apply these lessons to my life? What lesson/s can I derive from these stories? How can I apply them to my life?

What lessons can I learn from the stories of history to help me succeed in the present? Have I learned anything about the stories of history in these stories?

Writing Assignment

Nominate one of the three stories for inclusion in a compilation entitled Greatest Stories of All Time. Editors of the proposed volume have announced that the main standard for inclusion in this volume is universality of appeal, based on how well the story does the following:

Demonstrate the power of story by showing how story can help people come to a deeper understanding of themselves and their world and the relationships that draw them together.

Use the essential questions as idea branches for the discussion. The writing should take the form of a nominating letter to the editors of the proposed volume. Include as a part of your letter a section of literary criticism introducing the story and commenting on its effectiveness. Be sure to refer specifically to literary elements the author has developed especially well.

Appendix #37


StoryCorps: Recording America

Pip and the Judge: An Unlikely Friendship

Retired judge and prosecutor Joe Pigott with his wife, Lorraine, in Jackson, Miss. StoryCorps

Morning Edition, March 16, 2007 · Judge Joe Pigott served nearly two decades on the bench in Jackson, Miss. But he says no defendant confounded him more than the man nicknamed "Pip" — otherwise known as the late Willie Earl Dow, whose exploits often landed him in Pigott's courtroom.

Recalling those days with his wife, Lorraine, Pigott said that Dow had two bad habits: drinking, and stealing in order to support his drinking.

"You didn't have to try him, he always pled guilty," Pigott said. "And he was a likable person."

Dow also sent the judge an occasional letter. In one, he wrote from prison to tell Pigott, "I feel like I've been up here long enough this time, and I would appreciate it if you'd write the parole board and see if they'll let me out."

Pigott did so — and Dow was released.

But six weeks later, Dow robbed one of his friends, taking a watch and the keys to his car. The friend called the sheriff, and soon Dow was back before Judge Pigott, pleading guilty yet again.

"I am so disappointed I don't know what to say," the judge said. "I just don't understand you," he told Dow as he prepared to announce his sentence.

"Well, judge," Dow answered, "I'm disappointed in you."

"Everything in the courtroom got deathly quiet," Pigott recalls.

"When I was here four years ago," Dow went on, "you were sitting in that same chair, wearing that same robe, making that same speech."

"I figured a man of your caliber ought to at least be on the Supreme Court by now."

"I told him, 'Mr. Dow, I was going to sentence you to five years,'" Pigott recalls. "'But since you are so perceptive, I think I'll just give you three years,' which I did."

Appendix #38a


http://www.npr.org/templates/rundowns/rundown.php?prgId=3

http://www.npr.org/

The next time Pigott saw Dow was at the time of his retirement, when a ceremony was held at the courtroom. And in strode Willie Earl "Pip" Dow.

"Mr. Dow," Pigott said then, "I am so glad to see you."

"Well," Pigott remembers him answering, "I heard they were going to hang Judge Pigott at the courtroom, and so, I didn't want to miss that."

Pigott then asked Dow how long it would be before he was back in trouble.

"He said, 'Judge, you're resigning; I'm resigning. I'm going to retire just like you.'"

That led Pigott to ask the new judge and the county sheriff to keep him informed about Dow, and to let him know if "Pip" was arrested for anything. And Dow kept his promise in the remaining decade or so of his life.

"Sometimes you make friends in strange ways," Pigott says.

Produced for 'Morning Edition' by Mike Garofalo. The senior producer for StoryCorps is Sarah Kramer.

Appendix #38b


StoryCorps: Recording America'Until the Building Falls Down': A Fight to Vote

Theresa Burroughs, with her daughter, Toni Love, at a StoryCorps booth in Tuscaloosa, Ala.

Morning Edition, January 12, 2007 · When Theresa Burroughs came of age in the late 1940s, she was ready to vote. But in her Alabama town, it took two years of effort just for her to register.

Accompanied by J.J. Simmons, a minister who would not let her back down, Burroughs went down to the Hale County Courthouse on the first and third Monday of each month.

"The white men," Burroughs says, "they would not let us register to vote."

The chairman of the board of registrars, remembered by Burroughs only as "Mr. Cox," posed questions meant to disqualify black voters, such as "How many black jelly beans in a jar? How many red ones in there?"

When Burroughs responded that Cox didn't know how many jelly beans were in the jar any more than she did, the answer was quick: "Shut your black mouth."

But Burroughs, with Simmons' support, kept on going, despite the embarrassment.

"We're going to go until the building falls down," Simmons said.

On the day that Cox finally relented, he asked Burroughs and Simmons a simpler question — to recite part of the preamble of the Constitution — and also gave her a final insult.

Appendix #39a


http://www.npr.org/templates/rundowns/rundown.php?prgId=3

"You're going to pass today. Because we are tired of looking at your black faces," Burroughs recalls him saying. Then he handed over the slip of paper that meant Burroughs was a registered voter.

Burroughs voted in the next election. And she hasn't stopped since.

"It shouldn't have been this hard," she says. "I knew it shouldn't have been this hard."

Produced for 'Morning Edition' by Katie Simon. The senior producer for StoryCorps is Sarah Kramer.

Appendix #39b


Intergenerational Interview WorksheetName of person being interviewed: Circle age group:

25-40 60+Relationship to you:

Question:

Be sure your question forces the person being interviewed to give you more than just a yes or no answer.

Answer:

Remember, you don’t have to write every single word down that the person says. Write down key ideas and concepts that they are saying.

Whom does this answer remind you of in the book?

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

Appendix #40aIntergenerational Interview Worksheet


Name of person being interviewed: Circle age group: 25-40 60+

Relationship to you:

Question:

Be sure your question forces the person being interviewed to give you more than just a yes or no answer.

Answer:

Remember, you don’t have to write every single word down that the person says. Write down key ideas and concepts that they are saying.

Whom does this answer remind you of in the book?

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

Appendix #40bShort Story Unit: Multi-media Presentation Assignment


Develop a multi-media presentation showing the power of story to reflect the inter-relationships of individuals with their families and communities (both local and global). Draw on the stories within this unit, but also look beyond your class work to discover other stories in your community, in books, or in other media.

Consider how stories draw people together in every aspect of their lives. How have stories helped you to learn, to understand, to remember, to empathize? Use the essential questions as springboards for ideas to use in developing your presentation:

Who am I? How can I find my identity and discover where I fit in the world? How do the stories of my life help me fit into the world?

How do I relate to my family, my community, and my country? How do stories tie all of us together?

How do my relationships, skills and talents help to define me? What stories help define me?

What can I learn from story about myself, my relationships and my world? How might these stories help others?

What lesson(s) can I derive from stories? How can I apply these lessons to my life? How might the lessons I have learned from stories be the same as lessons learned by others?

What lessons can I learn from the stories of history to help me succeed in the present? How vital are these stories—how long lasting? Why?

Decide on three or four main points to make in your presentation, and then expand each one with examples from the stories in this unit, from books, from media, from real life. In your research you will use a variety of resources such as stories from books, the media, and from real life. Make sure you use your teacher and librarian for research suggestions. Cite your sources.

Choose three forms of media in making your presentation. You can include: music, Power Point, video clips, overhead projector, audio clips, visual display (i.e. photo essay, collage, artistic display), cartoons, graphics, etc.Appendix #41

Genre: Satire89


Self

Family

Community

Satire uses ridicule or scorn in a humorous way to expose vices.

SatireDefinition:

“the use of ridicule or scorn, often in a humorous way, to expose vices and follies” (from Harris, et al. The Literacy Dictionary, IRA, 1995)

Satire “….uses irony, wit and sometimes sarcasm to expose humanities vices and foibles, giving impetus to change or reform through ridicule.” (Murfin and Ray, The Bedford Glossary of Critical and Literary Terms, Bedford, 2003)

Purpose: To engage, entertain and evoke emotion To cause the reader to reflect on society’s vices To incite social action through humor

Forms of Satire: Irony is a figure of speech in which the actual intent is expressed in words which carry

the opposite meaning. For example, in Julius Ceasar, Antony insists that, “Brutus is an honorable man.”

Parody – a composition humorously imitating another, usually serious, piece of work. Parody in literature is like caricature in art.

Sarcasm is verbal irony that pretends to praise, but intends to show bitter and personal disapproval. Sarcasm is personal, jeering and intended to hurt.

Innuendo is an insinuation or indirect suggestion with a harmful or sinister connotation.

Invective is harsh or abusive language directed against a person or cause.

Burlesque is a form of comic art characterized by ridiculous exaggeration

(adapted from Thrall, Hibbard and Holman, A Handbook to Literature, 1960, Odyssey)

Appendix #42


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