Replacing Venn Diagrams: a deeper way to compare texts

Problem: Students are filling out a Venn Diagram comparing two texts and surface level, comprehension-based information is quickly filling it. Maybe 1 or 2 students show any depth of thought, and you are worried that not many kids are actually growing in their skills.

Solution: Throw out the Venn Diagram and begin with the depth with abstract concepts.

1, Create a mini-lesson introducing or reviewing abstract ideas vs. concrete details. I prefer a Nearpod "draw it" activity where students are circling. With BYOD, this can be collaborative.

Love the look of Mentimeter!

2, For the each text, create a class brainstorm list of all the possible ideas for each text. You could keep Mentimeter or Answer Garden.
this going in Nearpod collaborate feature or use

3, Now students find abstract concepts that are the same or antithetical - I use the metaphor of a coin: one side is heads and one is tails but it is really the same coin. Same thing with ideas: injustice and justice are just two sides of the same coin. - and put that in the middle column. Then they determine the theme (for narrative) or claim (expository/persuasive) that goes along with that text and write it in a complete sentence under "Text A/B" and then provide textual evidence. I always have students do this in pairs.

This is the graphic organizer I created to get depth in across text comparison. 

Blended Learning station: Use Office Mix or a screen casting for the mini-lesson. For brainstorming, set up a discussion board in Schoology with the setting in such a way where students can not see other responses until they themselves have responded. Use a collaborative Office 365 or Google Document for the application of the strategy for the graphic organizer. Use a resource like Common Lit for student choice in texts!

Analyze Decisions in Drama

Reading narratives lets you analyze decisions of characters and authors, but when that narrative is a piece a drama there is an entire world of decisions waiting to be analyzed. Directors, actors, costume designers, and lighting directors make a multitude of decisions as they work with the texts. To me, what a waste of Shakespeare if we don't have students take this opportunity to look at interpretations of his work! 

In A Midsummer Night's Dream, I love to have students look at Act 3, scene 2, where Hermia and Helena are fighting and Lysander and Demetrius are torn between wanting to protect Helena and wanting to fight. The scene has so much action, and comedy, and conflict that watching it three times in three ways doesn't feel arduous. I prefer to use stage productions, where possible, although the benefit of a movie version thrown in does them lead to some interesting questions: What are they able to do in movies that can't be done on stage? How is the movie of an audience different than that of a theater?

I like to match a traditional clip (you can actually find clips from The Globe on YouTube!), a clip set in a past time period (there is a great one set in the 1960s by the University of California), and a very modern clip, which is actually part of our Wordplay Shakespeare.

The most important reason I think students should experience analyzing different versions of the same scene is that if they only see one version they think that is the way to do it.

Paired Passage Idea: Berry Picking Poems

FYI:
Seamus Heaney's "Blackberry-Picking" pairs really well with Joyce Armstrong Carroll's "August Picking" at first they seem like they are both merely poems about picking berries but then kids realize they are about emotional loss and the juxtaposition between that and physical satisfaction, Guilt and regret, Childhood memories, and that all good things come to an end. Very
rich opportunities for students to analyze the thematic topics that resonate within.

Text Smash/App Smash

With commonlit.org, creating a project-based learning experience is easy in that the website is organized by PBL questions! This makes it perfect for across text comparison and an opportunity for students to examine two texts answering the same question.

Thinking of across text comparison got me thinking of App Smashing - combining apps to make a project. So why not a text smash/app smash?

My instructions are specifically for The Outsiders, but check out my lesson flow on graphite to get a generic lesson that can fit no matter what whole class text your students have read.

Perfect Pairings

Peanut Butter and Jelly. Chocolate and Strawberries. Steak and chimichurri.

Sometimes two things are just destined to go together. When you find two books that just make sense as pairings, an English teacher can't help but get a little excited. The Giver has long been on our district list of approved whole class novels as well as a core text (one of the two books we must teach) as well as the only book that is core for both on-level and Pre-AP ELA. Our 8th grade team put it on the summer reading last year to make room in the year for other text throughout the year. Dissatisfied with last year's pairing to How to Read Literature Like a Professor for Kids*, I was on the search for the perfect match.

 I started with my list of wants: female protagonist (all the core books have male protagonists!), can be easily connected to The Giver, and is preferably non-fiction. So what better to pair with a futuristic dystopia in which all people are the same than to pair it with a memoir in which entire groups of people were being threatened with annihilation to make the world Hitler's version of his "perfect place"? Enter one of the most beautifully written Holocaust memoirs I have ever read: The Cage by Ruth Minsky Sender.

It is obvious something major happened prior to The Community coming into being, and that major thing was most likely a genocide. What a great way to root us in the purpose of The Giver - to warn us against giving up rights for the "safety" of sameness - in the very real tragedy of The Holocaust. Add in that Jonas and Riva share much in common (character traits, the position of having to take on a parental role to siblings, etc) while the plots and settings being radically different. Match made in literary heaven!

While my students read, they will be comparing and contrasting the texts. A copy of this assignment is in my TpT store for FREE!

*Make sure you do preview How to Read Literature Like a Professor for Kids prior to ever assigning it. I purposefully had students only read the 10 chapters that applied to The Giver, which made students skip the two chapters that unfortunately reference sex, the vampires and ghosts chapter (which  while I wish they had done more hinting than blatant talk, I understood keeping the topic int he kids version), and The Shakespeare chapter that references a Woody Allen movie for no reason. Ugh! I wouldn't know of any middle schooler that would even watch a Woody Allen movie and there are so many better references to Shakespeare kids would get. And referencing the phrase "sex party" anywhere in a book designed for tweens? What editor let that go through?! I can't imagine the amount of teachers that have not assigned that book because of those two chapters, which is really unfortunate.

Narrative and Expository Project

I am a huge fan of pairing books. I'm also a huge fan of kids getting to choose what they read. How to give kids freedom but also pair? Enter the brainchild of my first year teaching 7th grade! After teaching narrative the first quarter and expository the second, I knew I wanted to have the kids do something with both in the third quarter - the very same quarter leading up to writing STAAR where kids would have to write in both modes.

Students read the narrative of their choice and then pair it with an expository book to check it for accuracy. I then had them present their findings by finding quotations from each, writing an overall thesis statement of accuracy, and compiling it all on a presentation. Some kids used Prezi and others PowerPoint.

Examples of pairings:
Colin Fischer paired with a book about autism
Lightening Thief paired with a book about Greek Mythology
Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry paired with a book on the Jim Crow Era

Get the handout for free here!