Materials

Students should come to class with their journals, class notes, and The Great Gatsby

novel
Prompt for the journal entry opening activity
Harlem by Langston Hughes
Excerpts from DuBois The Souls of Black Folk
Chapter Review Question homework assignment

Procedures
Opener (35 min)
1. (11) Introduce todays topic as exploring the idea of a dream deferred and begin class
with an individual journal reflection warm-up activity, where students discuss the
similarities/differences between our class constructed definition of the American Dream
by mainstream societys standards and the reality of their personal lives, using excerpts
from the What is Your Dream? journal.
a. Display the prompt on the projector screen
b. Before students begin, they should take out their annotated Harlem homework
reading and while students are writing, the instructor can go around and check
their work for completion.
2. (4) Students will find a partner that they have yet to work with this week and pair share
their reflections.
3. (5) Instructor will open the conversation to the group, requesting volunteers to share their
reflection and/or what they discussed in pairs.
4. (15) Instructor facilitates discussion about similarities/differences between students
views and experiences with regards to living the American Dream, exploring how this
may reshape our definition or the relevance of this ideology.
Body of the Lesson (43 min)
5. (5) Instructor will transition into exploring how discrepancies between our reality and
American idealism have and continue to be challenging for minorities in this country by
analyzing a dream deferred in Harlem. Instructor should provide brief
background/context of poet and poem.
6. (15) Using a smartboard, display the poem on the projector screen and have students
share how they annotated the poem and derived meaning from the use of figurative
language. As students present new ideas to their peers, have them come to the board to
show (write it) and tell (explain it) how they annotated the piece.

7. (5) Instructor should provide students with the DuBois handout and count students off
into 2 groups. The 1s will read and examine the quote on double consciousness and the 2s
will read and examine the quote about the veil.
8. (3) 1s and 2s will partner up to pair share what they examined.
9. (15) As a class, students will discuss the two concepts, relating them to messages in
Harlem.
Closure (12 min)
10. (10) Based off of the film, essay, short story, and epigraph we examined this week, the
class will briefly discuss ways in which Fitzgeralds view of the American Dream aligns
with the idea of a dream deferred.
a. Remind students to keep these ideas in mind as they prepare to start the novel.
11. (2) Instructor will assign homework. Students will read chapter 1 of The Great Gatsby
and complete the Chapter Review Questions assignment to prepare for discussion next
class.

Lesson Plan Supporting Materials

A Dream Deferred
Day 4
Materials:
1. Journal entry prompt
2. Harlem by Langston Hughes/Sample annotation for instructor reference
3. Excerpts from DuBois The Souls of Black Folk

4. Chapter Review Questions HW

Journal Entry Prompt
Using excerpts from the What is Your Dream? journal, reflect on the similarities and difference
between your definition of success and mainstream societys views on achieving the American
Dream.
Harlem by Langston Hughes
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/175884

Harlem
BY LANGSTON HUGHES

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over
like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
Langston Hughes, Harlem from Collected Poems. Copyright 1994 by The Estate of Langston Hughes.
Reprinted with the permission of Harold Ober Associates Incorporated.
Source: Selected Poems of Langston Hughes (Random House Inc., 1990)

Retrieved from: http://www.writingaboutliterature.com/poem-hughes-harlem.html

Excerpts from DuBois The Souls of Black Folk

Quote 1
The Souls of Black Folk

Of Our Spiritual Strivings

Chapter 1
The history of the American Negro is the history of this strife,this longing to attain selfconscious manhood, to merge his double self into a better and truer self. In this merging he
wishes neither of the older selves to be lost. He would not Africanize America, for America has
too much to teach the world and Africa. He would not bleach his Negro soul in a flood of white
Americanism, for he knows that Negro blood has a message for the world. He simply wishes to
make it possible for a man to be both a Negro and an American, without being cursed and spit
upon by his fellows, without having the doors of Opportunity closed roughly in his face.
-

W.E.B. DuBois

Quote 2
The Souls of Black Folk
Of the Dawn of Freedom
Chapter 2
I have seen a land right merry with the sun, where children sing, and rolling hills lie like
passioned women wanton with harvest. And there in the King's Highways sat and sits a figure
veiled and bowed, by which the traveller's footsteps hasten as they go. On the tainted air broods
fear. Three centuries' thought has been the raising and unveiling of that bowed human heart, and
now behold a century new for the duty and the deed. The problem of the Twentieth Century is
the problem of the color-line.
-

W.E.B DuBois

Retrieved from: http://www.gutenberg.org/files/408/408-h/408-h.htm

Name:

Date:

Class:
Chapter Review Questions

F. Scott Fitzgeralds The Great Gatsby

Chapter 1
Directions: Using examples from the text, answer the following questions in paragraph form.
Be sure to cite quotes by indicating the page number and be prepared to discuss these ideas in
class. You may type or handwrite your responses to submit in class.
1. Who is Nick Carraway? What significant role does he play in chapter 1? What are his
views on morality and judging other people?

2. What is the word he uses to describe Gatsbys personality? What do you think he means
by this?

3. Describe the geographical, socioeconomic, and culture differences between West Egg and
East Egg? Who lives in each part of town and what are these people like?

4. How would you describe the characters brief interaction with The Rise of the Colored
Empires? What does their reaction imply?

5. In the eyes of the wealthy society, who is Jay Gatsby? How does Nick perceive him?

6. The image of Gatsby standing on the lawn with arms outstretched towards a green light
by the dock is quite mysterious, yet important to the plot development. Based off what
weve read and studied thus far, what could this image represent? How does Nick react to
this curious sight?