Towson University

Department of Secondary Education

Lesson Plan Template

Name: Emma Veteto & Alyssa Engelman Date: 3/14/18

Brief Class Description (contextual information including number of students, subject,

level, IEP/ELL/GT or other special considerations):

Not applicable

Unit: Lesson Topic: Prior Knowledge (How

Author’s Craft: Characters,
Diction and Structure
Point of View & Rhetorical do you know students are
Devices ready for this lesson?):
Students will have been
taught about rhetorical
devices as a whole, as well
as point of view as a whole.
In this lesson, students will
combine these
understandings.

Alignment:
Standard (State Objective Assessment Activity(ies)
{CCRS/Other} and
Professional Organization
Content Standard)

CCSS.ELA- Students will How does an author’s 1. Who Am I? Opener

LITERACY.RI.9-10.6 deconstruct an article in diction play a role in Activity
Determine an author's order to identify diction establishing POV and
point of view or purpose and its connection to purpose? 2. What is Diction?
in a text and analyze POV. Formative – Finding Lecture or “Teacher
how an author uses Diction includes small Talk”.
rhetoric to advance that group conversations;
point of view or purpose these conversations will 3.Finding Diction.
be indicative of how Informational text
well students understand activity.
POV.
Formative – Diction 4. Diction Write-Up.
Write-Up asks students Closing activity.
to prove their
understanding by using
their own diction
techniques.
Materials Needed:
Informational Text: Can Television Be Considered Literature and Taught in English Classes?
Mini-speeches for Who Am I activity.
Student laptops

Technology Integration/Needs:
https://www.commonlit.org/texts/can-television-be-considered-literature-and-taught-in-english-
classes
PowerPoint
Projector

Lesson Procedure:
Opening Activity (describe your warm-up, engagement/hook/motivation):
Who Am I? Matching activity. Half of students will be given a short “speech” and the other half
will be given a person’s title (i.e., student, parent, president, etc.) on a small notecard, students
must communicate in order to find out what which title matches their speech and vice versa.

Time Allotted: 5-10 Minutes

Adaptations (for IEP, ELL, culture, and other special needs): Instructor will consult IEPs to
consider any physical disabilities that may hinder the class’ ability to move around the room. This
activity requires a short reading and verbal communication, therefore, the instructor can offer
larger text sizes or an audible representation of their card.

Transition (explicitly linking concepts/activities/objectives): Students will be asked to take

out their notebooks/devices in order to take notes on the lecture to follow. “Please take out
something to take notes with. We are going to take some short notes about diction.”

Activity 1 (describe activity):

What is Diction? Instructor will use a PowerPoint to conduct a lecture on the meaning of diction.
Students will be encouraged to take notes, as this information is imperative in the analysis of any
text. This lesson will include the definition of diction, examples and the importance of diction in
relation to point of view. Additionally, instructor will make links and pinpoint differentiation
between fiction/non-fiction representations of POV.

Time Allotted: 10 Minutes

Adaptations: For students who need to access the PowerPoint in a more hands-on manner, we
will provide a physical copy of the lecture. Additionally, the digital copy will be on our class
portal that the students may access at any point.

Transition: Assign the groups a section of the article to read (based off the headers given) and
explain the activity.
“In the groups you are sitting with, we are going to work on a group activity. Please pull up the
article I posted on your devices. We are going to be reading short excerpts of a text,
independently, and once you’ve finished, you will talk with your small groups about diction and
point of view.”

Activity 2 describe activity):

Finding Diction. Students will be in groups based on where they are sitting. The groups will be
given excerpts from the informational text and they will be asked to search for POV-specific
diction. Students will annotate and communicate with each other to gain a better understanding of
the way diction is connected to POV. For the first 5 (or so) minutes, students will be asked to read
independently, and for the last 5 (or so) minutes, students will discuss in small groups.

Students will be asked to consider the following ideas in their discussions/annotations (i.e.
Planted Questions):
1. How does the author feel about media as a form of literature? Are they for or against it?
How can you tell?
2. What sort of work do you think the author does? How might they have so much
knowledge about media and literature? Does it make a difference?
3. What are some specific quotes that hint at the author’s point of view?

Time Allotted: 10-15 Minutes

Adaptations: The website where the informational text can be found includes an audio version
of the article and a “dictionary” tool that allows students to search terms they may not know. The
students have a device, therefore they will be able to access these things themselves. Additionally,
the text can be made bigger/smaller/highlighted/etc to account for UDL.

Transition: Have the students move back to their seats and get out a piece of paper. Pass out
the prompts for the closing activity.
“So now that you guys have a better idea about what diction is and how to find it in an article,
you are going to now practice writing it on your own.”

Additional Activity(ies) – add as necessary with time allotted, adaptations and transitions:
Not applicable.

Closing Activity: (summarize learning and/or revisit objective)

Diction Write-Up: Give the students a famous character (that they are familiar with from a
specific text) and a situation. There will be a few different characters/prompts dispersed,
including: Ponyboy (The Outsiders), Harry Potter (Harry Potter) and John Wilkes Booth
(Chasing Lincoln’s Killer). Taking the last 5 minutes of class, students will write from the
perspective of an assigned individual. In order to showcase their understanding of diction and
POV, students will be asked to use the same kind of speech their character used.
For example: “You are Ponyboy from The Outsiders, your brother Soda has gotten himself into
some trouble with the police and they’re asking you to make a statement. Consider the way
Ponyboy speaks, his morals and the events that have shaped him.”
Extension/Follow-up (homework, etc. – optional):
Not applicable.

Safety Valve (What will you have students do if you have time left in class?):
If the students have extra time, they will read their peers’ diction write-ups and make commentary
about their specific diction decisions, students can then make modifications based on their
classmate’s critique, and they may make modifications before turning theirs in.

After the Lesson:

Reflection (How did you adjust instruction based on student responses? What are the
implications for future instruction?)
After reading the quick writes the students did to end the lesson, it’ll be easier to see if they
grasped the concept and if further instruction will be necessary the following class period. To
adjust instruction, if students are unclear about the meaning of POV, an example could be
modeled in front of the class. If it looks like there is still confusion about how to write diction for
a specific point of view, it can be elaborated on at the beginning of the next lesson. If after
reading the responses it looks like they understand the concept, the next class can focus on the
next rhetorical device relating to POV.