ENGLISH III - UNIT 1: Native Voices through Colonial Literature and Puritanism

Unit Description: Unit 1 focuses on early American literature, including Native American literature, literature of exploration and exploitation, and Colonial Literature. 

 

Unit Objectives: 

Focus Standard(s) Reading Standards for Literature• Standard 4: Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in the text, including figurative and connotative meanings; analyze the impact of specific word choices on meaning and tone, including words with multiple meanings or language that is particularly fresh, engaging, or beautiful. (Include Shakespeare as well as other authors. • Standard 5: Analyze how an author’s choices concerning how to structure specific parts of a text (e.g., the choice of where to begin or end a story, the choice to provide a comedic or tragic resolution) contribute to its overall structure and meaning as well as its aesthetic impact. • Standard 6: Analyze a case in which grasping a point of view requires distinguishing what is directly stated in a text from what is really meant (e.g., satire, sarcasm, irony, or understatement).

 

Supporting Standards Standards for Language • Standard 3: Apply knowledge of language to understand how language functions in different contexts, to make effective choices for meaning or style, and to comprehend more fully when reading or listening. o a. Vary syntax for effect, consulting references (e.g., Tufte’s Artful Sentences) for guidance as needed; apply an understanding of syntax to the study of complex texts when reading.

 

Long-Term Learning Targets (Knowledge & Skills) • I can define culture. • I can recognize and appreciate diversity—in my own culture, as well as the culture of others. • I can make connections between a person’s cultural diversity and their belief system.

 

Big Ideas/Key Concepts • How can studying colonial documents and Native American myths help to understand American culture and diversity? • What makes the study of American colonial literature and Native American myths universal (includes real world insight)?

Academic Vocabulary (high frequency, interdisciplinary words) Analyze, comprehension, synthesize, text, genre, coherent, memoir, rhetoric, and argument.

Content Specific Vocabulary Creation Myths, Storytelling, Historical Narratives, Archaic Language, Inverted Syntax, Plain Style, Sermons, Great Awakening, Puritanism, Colonialism, Author’s Purpose, Metaphors, Allusion (Biblical), Diction, Tone, Syntax, Imagery, Details, Point-of-View

 

Included Texts: 

• "The World on the Turtle's Back" / "Earth on the Turtle's Back"
• "The Man to Send Rain Clouds"/"When Grizzlies Walked Upright"
• "The Way to Rainy Mountain"/"The Legend of O"
• La Relacion
• Of Plymouth Plantation
• "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God"