History/Literature Circles

Rationale: History/Literature Circles offers students an opportunity to examine a time period beyond the scope of the traditional textbook. Students will select a book and with their classmates study it during regular study sessions that are organized and led by the pupils. Each group will assign daily responsibilities to each student that they will be required to fulfill. Students will be assessed based upon their successful completion of those responsibilities and their participation in daily discussions.

Procedure:

Students will determine the title they are interested in.
Students will form a group of classmates who also want to examine the work. Each group should be a minimum of four students and a maximum of six.
Students will meet on February 22 and 23 to agree on initial reading and role assignments
Students will meet with their history/literature circles each subsequent class period where they will discuss the book, share the results of their assignments, and agree on subsequent reading and role assignments. Students will meet in their groups about ten times over the quarter.
Students will put together a presentation on their book for April 6 to April 9. The details of these presentations can be found at the end of this packet.

Pre-approved titles

Students can select from a list of titles that have been pre-approved. Please check with your parents/guardians if you are interested in a title that may have objectionable content. They are:

Nonfiction

“Citizen Soldier” by Stephen Ambrose

“D-Day” by Stephen Ambrose

“The First World War” by John Keegan

“The Second World War” by John Keegan

“The Greatest Generation” by Tom Brokaw

“Flags of our Fathers” by James Bradley

“Fly Boys” by James Bradley

Fiction

“Grapes of Wrath” by John Steinbeck

“Babbitt” by Sinclair Lewis

“Sister Carrie” by Theodore Dreiser

“A Farewell to Arms” by Earnest Hemingway

“For Whom the Bell Tolls” by Earnest Hemingway

“Battle Cry” by Leon Uris

“Native Son” by Richard Wright (Graphic violent/sexual content)

“Snow Falling on Cedars” by David Guterson (Graphic sexual content)

“Slaughterhouse Five” and “Mother Night” by Kurt Vonnegut (Graphic content, language)

Roles

The available roles for the students are listed below, with some roles only existing in fiction or non-fiction. Students should rotate their positions every class period with every pupil serving regularly in each role. Each student should serve on each role at least once by the end of the activity, but do no role more than twice. This activity requires that students come to class with their materials ready so no late work will be accepted. Every group should always have a Discussion Leader for every meeting. No group should ever have more than one member on any one role. Each role requires written work that will be turned into Mr Koepping every day after the groups meet.

(Fiction and Non-Fiction) The Discussion Leader has the responsibility of coming to class with questions/issues/debates that will spark a meaningful conversation in the group. These questions should be generally tied to the material but not be too fact specific (which is the Fact Director’s job). So a discussion on the morality of strategic bombing in World War II would be appropriate, but a discussion of what cities were firebombed first would not.

If you are the Discussion Leader, compose five questions around general issues in the book and craft a three-sentence explanation for each question exploring why each query was important and appropriate.

The Discussion Leader is also responsible for keeping a tally of how many times each participant spoke during that day’s discussion. They will turn in that tally sheet at the end of every day.

(Fiction and Non-Fiction) The Summarizer has the responsibility of preparing a brief written summary (about a half page long) of the day’s readings. Your group discussion will start with your 1-2 minute statement that covers the key points, main highlights, and general idea of today’s reading assignment.

(Fiction and Non-Fiction) The Character Interpreter has the responsibility of identifying the values (in a half-page long analysis) of one or two main characters. Values include such inner qualities as greed, unselfishness, curiosity, and jealousy. What two or three values cause the character to act in the way he/she does? Find examples in the text which illustrate the values your have selected.

(Fiction and Non-Fiction) The Vocabulary Enricher has the responsibility of finding especially important vocabulary in the story. Vocabulary selected should focus on words that are unfamiliar, interesting, important, funny, puzzling, descriptive, and vivid or those used in an unusual way. Students will find and define at least 10 words in the text and write them down on a piece of paper.

(Fiction and Non-Fiction) The Theme Detector has the responsibility of leading a discussion about the themes, which you feel, are expressed in the book. What is the book saying about human experience? Is there a strong viewpoint about justice, love, friendship, family, religion, death, pain and pleasure, education, individuality, or others? The student will write a half-page analysis of the themes they want to discuss.

(Fiction and Non-Fiction) The Fact Director has the responsibility of getting the group to remember specific details about the text: who, what, where, when, why, and how. The director poses questions that help the rest of the team remember these details.

If you are the Fact Director, compose questions about details in the book and then answer them by showing why it's important to remember this particular detail. You should ask at least five questions about specific details. Questions should be answerable by referring to a particular page or set of pages in the text. They should not be hypothetical (that's the connector's job). After you pose each question, I expect at least a 3-sentence paragraph explaining WHY it's important.

(Fiction) The Passagist has the responsibility of getting the group to look at specific passages in the work that either 1) foreshadow something, 2) reveal something about the characters or situations, 3) are beautifully written or difficult to understand.

If you are the Passagist, you should identify passages by page number and paragraph or line number (in the margins of your text) and explain what is significant about them. You should identify a minimum of three passages for discussion. Your explanation of why these passages are significant should be at least three sentences long for each passage. After your passages, in a paragraph summarize why studying these particular passages helps to understand the theme of the book as you understand it.

(Fiction and Non-Fiction) The Connector makes connections between the reading and either other readings, a movie or TV show, or something in the current news.

If you are the Connector, you should make at least four connections between the work and other things, such as (and not limited to) other readings, a movie or TV show, something in the current news, or something in your life. You should explain each connection with a paragraph of at least four sentences. Draw a Venn diagram of one of the connections to show visually how each text is similar and different.

(Fiction and Non-Fiction) The Researcher looks up author information and contextual (historical or cultural) information that help people understand the work better.

If you are the Researcher, you should be able to the historical terms and references used in the particular story or poem being discussed. Look up references to songs, history, and allusions to works of literature whenever possible. When possible, you should locate material about this particular author or historical reference. You are responsible for processing that information and writing at least a half-page analysis showing its connections with the work. If you have printouts of information from the Internet, for example, you still need to write a paragraph explaining how this information helps us understand the work.

(Fiction and Non-Fiction) The Illustrator will draw an illustration of a scene or location in the book. The student’s effort should be well done and show careful effort but will not be graded on artistic ability. The submitted illustration should include a title, a reference to the page where the scene or location is discussed, and a five-sentence description of why this scene/location is important to the topic of the book.

Assessment: Students will be graded on three areas

A. Participation in Lit Circle meetings (as measured by the group and the instructor; this is an individual grade).

B. Preparation for Lit Circle meetings (as measured by the written requirements for each role, this is also an individual grade).

C. Final presentation (as measured by the group presentations to be given from April 6 to April 9)

Final Presentation of Literacy Circles

After you complete your book you will create a formal presentation. Your presentation will include the following aspects and will be graded as a whole. As always each criteria will be graded based on quality, presentation, and content.

Requirements for novels

Description of the novel ___/____

· Includes a description of the setting of the novel. Include scope and sequence of the novel. How does the novel correspond with world events during this time? Please do not summarize the novels every development, but instead focus on crucial events and actions.

Description of Main Characters ___/___

· Who are the main characters in the novel, what are their personality traits, names, background, and other historically relevant information?

· What characters are meant to be the most sympathetic/ most reviled?

· How do world events affect the characters in the story?

Presentations of Visuals ___/____

· Create a visual, or collection of visuals that portray important events or character changes in the novel. This can include art embedded in a PowerPoint.

Author’s perspective ___/___

· What was the author’s political perspective or interpretation of historical events? What groups are portrayed sympathetically? What groups are portrayed negatively? Do you think this portrayal is accurate?

Closing ___/___

· Characterize how the historical period you read about affected America.

· What impacts might this work have had on our perspectives on history, government, and the United States?

· What is your opinion of the project? How did literacy circles affect your group’s knowledge or understanding of history?

Requirements for non-fiction books

Description of book ___/___

· what time period/topics did the book cover?

· what was the author’s central thesis? What examples, anecdotes, studies or other evidence does the author use to support their position?

· What paradoxes drove the decision makers during this historical period?

Qualifications and support ___/____

· Does the author prove their assertions through credible evidence? Was evidence correctly and adequately cited? Is the author qualified to write about this topic?

· Does the author seem objective on the topic or do you sense a bias? Why?

Relevance ____/____

· Is the topic of this book still important today? Why?

· What contributions does the book make to our understanding of this time period and topic?

Presentations of Visuals ___/____

· Create a visual or collection of visuals that portray important events or character changes in the novel. This can include art embedded in a PowerPoint.

Criticism ____/____

· What are the strengths of this book? What are its weaknesses? Focus on factual and historical criticism as well as questions of how entertaining and interesting the work is.