THE CRUCIBLE LESSON PLAN

Grade Level:

/ 11th /

Subject:

/

English

/

Prepared By:

/ Keicha Kempsey

Overview & Purpose

  • Develop Concept Ladders that will help students establish a purpose for the reading.
  • Learn and apply the comprehension strategy of making connections
  • Define and understand the three types of connections (i.e., text-to-self, text-to-text, and text-to-world)
  • Make connections and react to various texts using a double-entry journal
/

Education Standards Addressed

Reading Comprehension/ Making reader/ text connections. Students read build an understanding of texts, of themselves, and of the cultures of the United States and the world.

Objectives

(Specify skills/information that will be learned.) /
  • In 17th-century New England, people were persecuted for allegedly practicing witchcraft.
  • Students of this period have looked into the allegations and offer alternatives to witchcraft to explain the people’s behavior.
  • Arthur Miller wrote the play The Crucible, using the 17th-century case of witch trials (and fictionalizing it) to comment on a 20th-century phenomenon—the hunting of communists as if they were witches.
  • How to apply concepts and themes from the novel to present day occurrences and personal experiences. Relevance in the text.
/

Materials Needed

  • Paper
  • Pencil
  • The text: The Crucible
  • Concept Ladder worksheet
  • Double entry journal

Information

(Give and/or demonstrate necessary information) /
  • Salem witch trials
  • 17th century colonial America
  • McCarthyism
  • Arthur Miller the author

Verification

(Steps to check for student understanding) /
  • Quiz after every act
  • Review of Journal entries
  • In-class discussion on readings, question prompts
  • Use of graphic organizers: concept ladder
/

Other Resources



Activity

(Describe the independent activity to reinforce this lesson) /
  • Introduce the text by reviewing key concepts and giving background on The Crucible, why Miller wrote it, the Salem Witch Trials, McCarthyism and Puritan belief. Have the students build their individual concept maps based on the introduction.
  • Explain the strategies
  • Demonstrate
  • Guide the students by practicing the strategy initially with them
  • Have them work in small groups to identify other connections
  • Build an interpretive understanding of the text based on the identified connections

Summary

/ 1.Introduce the historical significance of The Crucible
  • Salem witch trials
  • 17th century colonial America
  • McCarthyism
  • Arthur Miller the author
2.Review Concept Ladder with students. Show them an example of one created (Puritanism) and the purpose behind it. The questions developed within the concept ladder should be questions they anticipate the text answering for them based on the ideas presented during the introduction.
3.Explain the strategy about reading for connection to self. Show them how to keep a double entry journal. Use an overhead projector if available to demonstrate an entry. Explain to students that, in the first column, they should choose a quote or situation from the text that they can react to. Then, in the second column, they should record their reaction. Reinforce the fact that these reactions should make a connection between the text and themselves, another text, or the world.
4.Guide students to apply the strategy. After reading several pages of The Crucible and modeling the process, have students begin offering their reactions to the text as a way to practice the technique together as a class. Have students take part in completing the double-entry journal together.
5.Practice individually or in small groups. Divide students into groups of three. As they continue reading the story, stop every few pages and ask students to record their reactions to the text on their own copies of the double-entry journal and then share their reactions with their group. Continue reading and stopping periodically for reactions until the story is finished.
6.Reflect. Gather students as a whole class to discuss the process of making connections. Ask students which types of connections were the easiest and the hardest to make?
7.Enhancing their critical thinking. Have students take their connections and incorporate them into a comprehensive essay on the understanding of the text based on those connections. Did the connections help?
8.Revisit the Concept Ladder and have students respond to the questions they anticipated the text answering. Was the text purposeful in their assumptions? Were their questions addressed? If not, why? /

Additional Notes

DAY ONE:

  1. Show short online clip on Salem Witch Trials:
  2. Introduce the historical significance of the crucible
  • Salem witch trials
  • 17th century colonial America
  • McCarthyism
  • Arthur Miller the author
  1. Review Concept Ladder with students. Show them an example of one created (Puritanism) and the purpose behind it. The questions developed within the concept ladder should be questions they anticipate the text answering for them based on the ideas presented during the introduction.

Homework Assignment: Finish individual Concept Ladder. We will revisit them later on to see if we anticipated correctly.

DAY TWO:

  1. Journal entry: DO NOW assignment
  2. What is Hysteria? What has occurred in recent history that constitutes Hysteria?
  3. Start reading in-class. Assign characters to different students.
  4. Instruct on how to create a Double Entry Journal. Do a couple with the class to determine understanding. The journal can be used as a research tool for a unit assessment. Focusing the entries on a particular topic within the text will help align the ideas for a paper: Example- Topics: The portrayal of female characters, John Proctor as a tragic figure, The importance of a good name, The presentation of truth, Examples of authority/the true model of authority.

Homework Assignment:Finish reading at home to page ____. Prepare a Double Entry Journal. Choose two quotes from the first ___ pages and write a reflective statement on each. What does it remind you of? Another text? Personal experience? It interests you why?