Honors English 8
Unit III: Conflict and Unrest
Overview of Unit
This unit focuses on the analysis of the concept of conflict as it exists in fiction and non-fiction. With an emphasis on students developing understandings that surpass the superficial definitions of "internal/external" and "man vs. man or self" conflicts, this unit introduces an array of conflict types and levels found in a variety of texts.
Essential Questions:
Is conflict necessary?
What is the value in considering multiple perspectives?
What is the effect of conflict?
What is worth fighting for?
Enduring Understandings:
Conflict is an invitation to contemplate a complicated world.
Change is driven by conflict.
Reading Selections:
- Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
- Book Club Options
- Down the Rabbit Hole
- Tomorrow When the War Began
- Silent to the Bone
- House of the Scorpion
- Additional options include:
- Boy Who Saved Baseball
- Dark is Rising
- Extraordinary Adventures of Alfred Kropp
- Heat
- Hope Was Here
- Keeper of the Night
- Last Book in the Universe
- Les Miserables
- Schwa Was Here
- Stand Tall
- Step from Heaven
- Storm Before Atlanta
- Thief
- Thwonk
- Truesight
- "The Phantom of the Opera" by Arthur Kopit (teleplay)
- various poems
**This unit will take all of the 4th Six Weeks and part of the 5th Six Weeks to complete.
4th Six Weeks Grades
Assignments in the yellow boxes reflect daily grades, whiles those in the orange boxes reflect major grades. All redos and retakes must be completed by February 12th.
SSR Reflections
Students spend 10 minutes a day reading their SSR novels during English class, and they should be reading for at least an additional hour, if not more, over the course of each week.
Each six weeks, students are required to complete activities from SSR Response options (two daily grades worth), which are focused on discussing novels they read during the Six Weeks.
These items may be completed at any point during the Six Weeks but must be completed by February 12, 2016.
Reading Schedule for Fahrenheit 451
Tracking for: Similarities between the story’s society and our society
Reading Method: In class, out loud w/ student self-monitoring of comprehension
Discussion: Comprehension
Product: Record whole class discussion ideas in writer’s notebooks
Part II, January 26th - 29th
Tracking for: All the conflicts found in the story – from the personal to the societal
Reading method: Independent, marking for conflicts
Discussion: Small book club groups, comprehension and interpretation
Product: Record of book club discussions in writer’s notebooks, shared Post-it notes with one-sentence summaries of discussion points.
Part III, February 1st - 5th
Tracking for: Any one self-selected over-arching idea (use notes and shared ideas to select tracking concept, confer with teacher)
Reading method: Independent, while collected key quotes that support the self-selected tracking
idea.
Discussion: Small and whole group, interpretation
Key question: What does this text attempt to tell us about human nature?
Product: Dialectical journal focused on self-selected tracking topic
Novel Test: February 8th -9th
Study Guide provided, with advance information on short-essay topic.
Jennifer Penny
Joirdan Cole
Catherine Inge
469-752-6039
Tutorials
Tuesdays - 7:50 - 8:20am
Wednesdays - 3:30 - 4:00pm
Fridays - 7:50 - 8:20am
Fridays - 3:30 - 4:00pm