| |
This lesson encourages students to explore the ways in which powerful and passionate words communicate the concepts of freedom, justice, discrimination, and the American Dream in Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech. Paying attention to the details of King's speech as they read, students identify words to use in their own original poems.
This lesson encourages students to explore the ways in which powerful and passionate words communicate the concepts of freedom, justice, discrimination, and the American Dream in Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech. Paying attention to the details of King's speech as they read, students identify words to use in their own original poems. Students read (and listen or view, if resources and time allow) and pay close attention to King's use of literary devices, such as symbol and repetition, and analyze King's definitions of freedom, justice, discrimination, and dreams as demonstrated by the examples and details in his "I Have a Dream" speech. After a thorough exploration of the power of the speech, students select powerful words and themes from the text and arrange them into original diamante poems, seven-line, diamond-shaped poems based on contrasting words.
While this lesson focuses on the "I Have a Dream" speech, the activities outlined here may be adapted to other speeches by Dr. King or famous speeches by others, such as Franklin Delano Roosevelt's "Day of Infamy" speech, Lincoln's "Gettysburg Address," or Sojourner Truth's "Ain't I a Woman?"." (author/ncl)
|
|
|  |
|
| English Language Arts Standards |
|
|
| Reading Applications: Informational, Technical and Persuasive Text Standard |  |
|
| Benchmarks (8 - 10) |
|
| A. | Evaluate how features and characteristics make information accessible and usable and how structures help authors achieve their purposes. |
| B. | Identify examples of rhetorical devices and valid and invalid inferences, and explain how authors use these devices to achieve their purposes and reach their intended audiences. |
| D. | Explain and analyze how an author appeals to an audience and develops an argument or viewpoint in text. |
|
| Grade Level Indicators (Grade 9) |
|
| 1. | Identify and understand organizational patterns (e.g., cause-effect, problem-solution) and techniques, including repetition of ideas, syntax and word choice, that authors use to accomplish their purpose and reach their intended audience. |
| 5. | Analyze an author's implicit and explicit argument, perspective or viewpoint in text. |
| 6. | Analyze the author's development of key points to support argument or point of view. |
| 8. | Identify the features of rhetorical devices used in common types of public documents, including newspaper editorials and speeches. |
|
| Grade Level Indicators (Grade 10) |
|
| 1. | Identify and understand organizational patterns (e.g., cause-effect, problem-solution) and techniques, including repetition of ideas, syntax and word choice, that authors use to accomplish their purpose and reach their intended audience. |
| 5. | Analyze an author's implicit and explicit argument, perspective or viewpoint in text. |
| 6. | Identify appeals to authority, reason and emotion. |
| 8. | Describe the features of rhetorical devices used in common types of public documents, including newspaper editorials and speeches. |
|
|
|
| |
| Standards for the English Language Arts |
|
|
| Range of materials and purposes for reading | |
|
| Students read a wide range of print and non-print texts to build an understanding of texts, of themselves, and of the cultures of the United States and the world; to acquire new information; to respond to the needs and demands of society and the workplace; and for personal fulfillment. Among these texts are fiction and nonfiction, classic and contemporary works. |
|
| Students read a wide range of literature from many periods in many genres to build an understanding of the many dimensions (e.g., philosophical, ethical, aesthetic) of human experience. |
|
|
| Reading strategies, language use, and conventions | |
|
| Students apply a wide range of strategies to comprehend, interpret, evaluate, and appreciate texts. They draw on their prior experience, their interactions with other readers and writers, their knowledge of word meaning and of other texts, their word identification strategies, and their understanding of textual features (e.g., sound-letter correspondence, sentence structure, context, graphics). |
|
|
| Write, speak, and visually represent to create text | |
|
| Students apply knowledge of language structure, language conventions (e.g., spelling and punctuation), media techniques, figurative language, and genre to create, critique, and discuss print and non-print texts. |
|
|
| Purposes for using spoken, written, and visual language | |
|
| Students use spoken, written, and visual language to accomplish their own purposes (e.g., for learning, enjoyment, persuasion, and the exchange of information). |
|
|
|
|
|
 |
| RESOURCE TYPE |
| Instructional Resource |
| PRACTICE LEVEL |
| Promising Practice |
| STANDARDS ALIGNMENT |
| Grades 9 - 10 |
| TOPICS |
English Language Arts --
Reading-Strategies & Skills;
Vocabulary;
Reading;
Strategies - Informational Texts;
Literature;
Poetry |
| FOUND IN |
| AdLIT |
| KEYWORDS |
Martin Luther King, Jr.;
"I Have a Dream" speech;
original diamante poetry;
literary devices;
literary analysis |
|
Author: Sharon Webster
Publisher: IRA/NCTE
|
|