Context: I will be teaching this unit in an 8th grade ...
I. Title: Teaching Writing through the Lyrical Essay
II. Introduction:
A. Teaching Context: I will be teaching this unit in a 12th grade Advanced English classroom located in a small town in Northern Michigan. This classroom is in a high school with about 450 students. 50 of these students are in my class, broken up into two sections of 25 students. The town itself has very little diversity both in race and financial background. Most of the students have been in this same school district since elementary school and know each other fairly well, and those who were new this school year have sense been welcomed by the class and a sense of community has been formed within my classroom.
I would be teaching this unit in the last few months of the school year. This unit is very challenging, but there are many skills that the students will develop that will be useful to them after high school. In college, they will be able to use these skills they learned in this unit to write effective papers.
B. Rational for Unit: This unit will prepare students to write their own lyrical essays. Although lyrical essays are only one form of essays, students will be working with many essential tools used in other essay writing to experience a unique form of the genre. By writing lyrical essays, students will be working with researching information and writing about it, citing multiple sources in MLA, creating a certain voice of their essays, and focusing on the flow of their essays all while writing about their personal experiences.
1. What students will learn:
▪ Not all essays are boring.
▪ While writing about yourself gives you a lot of freedom, there are technicalities that are still required, such as a certain sentence structure, grammar, and mechanics.
▪ A good essay flows wells, which varied sentence structure promotes.
▪ Developing a good essay may require thought outside of the direct writing process as well as a continuation of writing over a long period of time.
▪ Others’ work must be credited
▪ Polished writing typically requires writers to compose multiple drafts, share with others for input, and revise their work.
Students will be able to:
▪ Correctly punctuate sentences.
▪ Use a variety of conjunctions to vary sentence structure.
▪ Use research material effectively in an essay.
▪ Make connections between several diverse pieces of information.
▪ Write about themselves while following general rules.
▪ Write his or her own lyrical essays.
▪ Cite sources of multiple varieties.
▪ Give and receive helpful feedback.
▪ Compose multiple drafts and polish their essay to share it with the class.
2. What will be assessed: Students will be continuously adding to their drafts as the unit moves along, so they will have to date their different segments. Each portion that is written in class will have a specific goal in mind, such as writing out different sentence types, for which students would label and be assessed to be sure they completed that goal. Students will also be assessed on their feedback to their peer-editing partner, and students will turn in their lyrical essays and be assessed based on the rubric I have provided.
3. What students will do:
▪ Students will learn what an “essay” is
▪ Students will be exposed to personal and lyrical essays
▪ Students will discover how to write a lyrical essay and what the steps involved are
▪ Students will write about an experience or something in their life that is significant to them
▪ Students will learn about voice and flow
▪ Students will research and learn how to integrate researched material into their essays
▪ Students will learn or review sentence types and different conjunctions
▪ Students will be required to cite their sources in MLA.
▪ Students will provide feedback to others and rely on others’ feedback to improve their essays
▪ Students will experience writing as a continuous process.
4. How students will learn: When students hear the term “essay,” they do not often jump from their seats from excitement. Rather than staying within the confines of a five-paragraph essay form, I want to expose my students with other ways of writing an essay that will also contribute meaning to their lives. Beginning the unit, students will learn what an essay is, and get exposure to two different essays, a personal essay and a lyrical essay. The personal essay will provide them with an example of an essay where the writer explores their own life and beliefs. This is fairly basic, but will allow students to understand why a lyrical essay, which seems to stem from the personal essay, is unique. As a class, we will talk about the purpose of a lyrical essay.
When we have learned what a lyrical essay is, we can write one. Because a lyrical essay is complex, we will problem-solve as a class to figure out where we should start. I will suggest that we begin with writing about what personal subject they would like to explore in their essays so they can expand on that as they add other things into their essays. When they begin writing their personal essays, they will be free writing and not given a lot of direction. As we continue throughout the unit, students will be adding in portions that focus on voice, sentence structure, and flow. By learning these elements through expanding their own essays, they are more likely to be able to learn these elements and apply them to not only this assignment, but other writing as well. Students will then research on an object and a person, which they will choose from a compiled list made by the entire class. Students will take this information and figure out how they can connect it to their essays and then begin integrating it into their essays. By doing it this way, students will focus mainly on their personal reflection and then have to connect it. Building this connection between the personal and outside research will help them later by developing critical thinking skills. After creating their drafts, students will be peer editing according to a list of components to look for or help other students’ improve.
C. Texts:
▪ Personal Essay by Ben Kuzniar (tentative)
▪ Wine Paired with a Great American Author and My Life by Rachel Melke
▪ “Outline Toward a Theory of the Mine Versus the Mind and the Harvard Outline” by Ander Monson
▪ “I Have Been Thinking About Snow” by Ander Monson
▪ “Index for X and the Origin of Fires” by Ander Monson
D. Big Ideas: As this is a higher level class, there will be plenty of opportunity to expose students to other types of writing, but this “lyrical essay” goes beyond many of those other genres. In this “essay” – from “assay,” or, “to attempt” – students will be writing about their own experiences, and tying in other pieces of information through research. This sort of braided essays “can help students begin to make connections between their personal experience, their powers of observation, and their hopefully-to-be-honed ability to research” (Schuette). From my personal experiences, writing a lyrical essay takes a lot of deep thinking about the information you have at hand and forces you to connect that information with your life, which often leads to some sort of realization that you did not know before. Since this experience, I have thought about the world around me more deeply and analytically, trying to find a deep connection between two dissimilar ideas. Challenging students with this task will help them to form this critical thinking, which is a highly necessary tool for college students as they will soon be. Students will be learning about themselves, and also dipping into research – although informal – which will also help them prepare for college. Students will be refreshed on MLA citation and be required to cite every outside source they used for information, although they will not necessary be citing this in their papers.
In regards to the texts they will be reading, I have students first read a personal essay as a way of easing them into the genre. We then read multiple samples of Ander Monson’s lyrical essays, all of which show a variety of structure of the essay (one uses elipses, another uses an index form, another outline.) Although students do not have to master this genre they will be writing in, I will provide examples of them to guide them. Students do not have to go for something obscure; Students may choose simply to write their paper in the form of emails or letters – whichever is fitting to their essay. This aspect of the unit will also give students freedom and room for creativity.
With this unit, I am hoping that I will broaden students’ prospective of essays. Is it completely off the wall and not exactly applicable to future writing? Maybe. Regardless, the braided essay will teach students how to do many different things when writing an essay, and I’m sure that whether students love the assignment or hate it, they are sure to gain something from it for the future.
Alterations: While writing this essay, I had already known that it was going to be difficult to teach. I had such a great experience writing my own lyrical essay in the past that I was determined to find a way. It took a lot of thought to find the way I thought would help students understand best. One of the ways I did this was to first introduce a personal essay. Easing them into the genre seemed the most appropriate, but I added in the lyrical essay as I went on. In class, students first begin writing about themselves and adding different parts into this to improve their personal essay before they actually start researching and integrating that research. I had to make sure to focus on what students needed to learn to do and take it step by step rather than giving them an assignment without direction and expecting the best. Also, from feedback on my first unit plan, as well as what we learned in class about continuous and scheduled writing, I learned that I needed to give my students more time to write in class and have instruction limited to mini-lessons they could apply to their writing afterward.
1 Works Cited
Kuziar, Ben. “My Example of Creative Non Fiction & Assessment.” Benkuziar2012. Wordpress. April 3, 2012. Web. April 17, 2012.
Monson, Ander. Neck Deep and Other Predicaments. St. Paul, Minn.: Graywolf Press, 2007. Print
Schuette, Allison. “AWP 2012: Exploding the Narrative Line: Benefits and Drawbacks of Teaching the Braided Form.” Brevity. Wordpress, March 2, 2012. Web. April 17, 2012.
III. The Unit Itself:
|M |T |W |Th |F |
|1 |2 |3 |4 |5 |
|Free-write: What is an |Mentor texts: Read a |Mentor texts: Read two |Discuss: What the purpose|Compare and contrast |
|essay? Teach the etymology |personal essay and |lyrical essays in class. |of a lyrical essay is and|personal essays and |
|of the word “essay.” |discuss the purpose of it|Discuss: the individual |what its effect is – |lyrical essays |
|Introduce/Explain creative | |essays |compare and contrast | |
|non-fiction, lyrical essays | | |lyrical essays. | |
|6 |7 |8 |9 |10 |
|How does one go about |Minilesson: voice – how |Minilesson: conjunctions,|Minilesson: how to |Students will choose what|
|writing a lyrical essay? |to bring voice into your |sentence types |maintain flow over |to research. |
|Have students give a person,|writing. | |multiple topics |Minilesson: researching |
|object, and structure, begin|Write: students expand on|Write: Students will |throughout essays – | |
|research of these over week.|their essay, encouraged |expand on their essays, |practice connecting |Students will be given |
| |revise on what they have |encouraged to write an |different ideas, words. |time to research in |
|Write: about an experience |written to add voice. |example of each | |library and continue this|
|or thing in their life that |Discuss: changes they may|conjunction | |over the weekend. |
|is very significant to them.|have made | | | |
|11 |12 |13 |14 |15 |
|Write: about the person they|Write: How can you |Minilesson: integrating |Minilesson: staying on |Students think about how |
|researched |connect what you found in|research with paper. |track, keeping a theme |they can write their |
|Conference: in groups, how |your research with your |Write: begin to add what |Discuss: mentor texts and|essays differently |
|can they tell a story |personal essay? |students have researched |how they were effective |(structure of writing |
|better? | |what they started writing|at staying to one point, |list) and are given time |
|Write: about the object they|Review flow |about. |how the meaning came |to begin taking their |
|researched | |Discuss: challenges they |across to readers’ |essay and putting it into|
|Conference: in groups, how | |had, how they can | |this form. |
|can they bring life to the | |overcome these | | |
|object? | | | |Homework: Over weekend, |
| | | | |create a first draft |
|16 |17 |18 |19 |20 |
|Students bring in a draft |Discuss: what is most |Minilesson: MLA citations|Write: continued time for|Final essays are due. |
|for peer editing. Peers |challenging about this | |drafting, editing, | |
|assess their essays (1) |assignment? What do you |Write: student expand on |discussion |Discuss: How can we bring|
|clarity (2) integration of |need help on? |drafts, improve based on | |what we learned in this |
|person, object, and personal|Conferencing as a class. |suggestions, are able to | |unit into other essay |
|experience (3) form (4) | |meet with me for help | |assignments? |
|meaning | | | | |
|Day 6: Where to Start a Lyrical Essay |
|Materials: examined lyrical essays, whiteboard, marker, student notebooks, pencils |
|Connection |Good morning everyone! I hope you all had a great weekend. Last week, we dipped our toes into what we call |0 |
| |the “lyrical essay.” We found that it is very different from the regular five-paragraph essay you have been | |
| |taught to compose in high school, and it is similar to a personal essay. | |
|Teaching Point |Although we’ve talked about what a lyrical essay is, we have to know where to start writing it. To do this, |2 |
| |we need to figure out what our first step should be. We are going to get into groups of about three or four | |
| |for about five minutes, and I want you to think of what should come first in the writing process based on | |
| |what you already know about lyrical essay. Think about what is included in lyrical essays and how they are | |
| |formed. | |
|Active Engagement |Students will get into groups to discuss this. |4 |
|Teaching Point |Okay, I am going to go around to each group, and I want someone to say what they think should be the first |9 |
| |step. As they say what they think should be first, I will write their first steps on the board. In the end, | |
| |each group will explain why they put their first step first, and as a class, we will order the steps in | |
| |which they students have given. If they are not quite sure where to start, I will assist them and make sure | |
| |to say why it would be necessary or helpful to start there. By the end, we will have a plan of action for | |
| |this unit. | |
|Active Engagement |Please take out your notebook and write the date in the upper right hand corner. I want you to begin writing|30 |
| |about something that holds a lot of significance in your life. This can be anything. You have fifteen | |
| |minutes to develop your ideas and free-write about whatever you choose. You will not be turning this in | |
| |today, but we will be expanding on this throughout the next few weeks, and I will be checking to make sure | |
| |you completed all requested writing assignments. | |
|Active Engagement |I’m handing out a note card to each of you. When you get it, please write the name of a person – it can be |45 |
| |anyone, living or dead – as well as an object. Once again, this can be anything. I also would like you two | |
| |write down an idea of a structure of writing. Examples of this would be an email, a letter, an outline, or | |
| |an advertisement - anything that involves writing. These can be as detailed or as broad as you choose. | |
|Formative Assessment |I will be taking notes of participation through the first activity. All students should have something | |
| |written by the end of the day, which will later be assessed by check/no-check. | |
|Reinforcement |Thank you for your participation today! |48 |
|Sending |We’re out of time! Tomorrow we will begin writing about an experience or something in our lives that is very|50 |
| |important or significant. Please be prepared with ideas. As you leave, turn in your note card, and I will | |
| |compile a list of what the class wrote. | |
|Day 8: Review of Sentence Types and Emphasis on Conjunction |
|Materials: powerpoint, lyrical essays, pencils |
|Connection |We have begun writing lyrical essays, starting our personal essays and incorporating voice into these | |
| |essays. Like every essay, it is important to include a variety of sentence types, which includes a variety | |
| |of conjunctions. | |
|Teaching Point |Present PowerPoint of sentence types (simple, compound, complex) including their corresponding conjunctions.|1 |
| |In order to allow your essay to flow, you must utilize a variety of sentence types and conjunctions. Please | |
| |out your essays. I would like you to read through what you have so far and identify each sentence as either | |
| |simple, compound, or complex. If you have a conjunction, also label that. | |
|Active Engagement |Students will complete this task. |15 |
|Formative Assessment |I will later be checking their labeling of these different elements of sentence structure. | |
|Teaching Point |You have labeled each of your sentences – now take a few minutes to tally how many sentences are which types|30 |
| |of sentences. Students will be given time. How many simple sentences do you all have? How many compound? | |
| |Complex? Now that you know how you typically write, take some time to expand on your essay to incorporate | |
| |varying sentence types. | |
|Reinforcement |You have all done such a great job writing so far! Keep up the good work and remember to try to mix up your |48 |
| |sentences as you go. | |
|Sending |Tomorrow we will be talking more about how to maintain flow in your essays. Have a great rest of your day! |49 |
|Day 13: Making connections |
|Materials: Paper, pencils |
|Connection |Lyrical essays are tough, but so far, you have all done really well at creating them. To write a lyrical | |
| |essay, we’ve learned you don’t just need your personal thoughts and reflections on life, but you also need| |
| |some other sort information, which often seems unrelated. The challenge that you have is to connect | |
| |everything in your mind and then convey that connection to readers without coming out and saying how they | |
| |may be connected. | |
|Teaching Point |When you find that connection, whatever it may be, you want to develop it. When you start writing, you can|5 |
| |start talking about the person you researched. From there, you will go into writing about what object you | |
| |researched. Throughout all of this jumping around, you will write about your personal reflections. You | |
| |have already written small pieces on the two things that you have researched, and you have been developing| |
| |your personal essay as well. Today I want to present you with a challenge: combine them. However you may | |
| |need to do this, I want you to take the time do so. I will be here if you have trouble connecting your | |
| |ideas. | |
|Active Engagement |Students will be given much of the class period writing and connecting their ideas. I will be assisting | |
| |students, suggesting ways that the three things are connected. | |
|Formative Assessment |Their writing will serve as formative assessment, and their understanding of the task will be discovered | |
| |when briefly speaking with them during this time. | |
|Active Engagement |In the last few minutes, I just want to talk about your experiences during this class period. How |40 |
| |difficult was it for you to connect these several abstract ideas? | |
|Reinforcement |I am very impressed by the work you have done. It is really difficult to tie these ideas together, but |49 |
| |this skill will be helpful in your future writing and analysis of other ideas. | |
|Sending |Although these things may seem loosely connected or unrelated, tomorrow we’re going to focus on how to |50 |
| |keep your essays focused. Keep thinking of how these things relate to one another! I will see you | |
| |tomorrow! | |
IV. Summative assessment plan:
| |5 |3 |1 |0 |
|Multiple Ideas |I included two items of |I included most of what is |I included most of what is |I did not include more than |
|(x2) |research, personal |typically included in a |typically included in a |two parts of what is |
| |reflections, and did so in a|lyrical essay with the |lyrical essay with the |typically included in a |
| |creative structure. |exception of one part. |exception of two parts. |lyrical essay. |
|Presentation of Ideas |I thoroughly researched and |I researched and shared my |I researched and shared my |I did not show much or any |
|(x3) |shared my personal |personal reflections, but |personal reflections, but |research or personal |
| |reflections in my essay. |some of my information was |only somewhat. |reflections. |
| | |broad or vague. | | |
|Sentence Structure/ |I included three types of |I included two types of |I included only one type of |I did not correctly |
|Conjunctions |sentences and at least two |sentences and two different |sentence and conjunctions |highlight or label any |
| |different conjunctions in my|conjunctions in my essay and|and highlighted and labeled |examples of different |
| |essay and both highlighted |both highlighted and labeled|them. |sentence types or |
| |and labeled them. |them. | |conjunction. |
|Flow |My lyrical essay flowed well|My lyrical essay flowed well|My lyrical was lacking flow |I did not attempt to allow |
|(x2) |throughout. |in most parts. |in most areas. |my lyrical essay to flow. |
|Grammar & mechanics |I had less than three minor |I had less than three |I had three to five |I had more than five |
| |grammatical mistakes. |grammatical mistakes, but |grammatical mistakes that |grammatical mistakes and the|
| | |they were distracting to the|were distracting to the |quality of my story greatly |
| | |reader. |reader. |suffered. |
|Editing |I used suggestions from my |I used suggestions from my |I only used a few |I failed to use suggestions |
| |peers effectively and |peers, but changes between |suggestions from by my peers|by my peers and made slight |
| |demonstrated a major change |my first and polished draft |and changes between my first|to no changes from my first |
| |between my first and |were lacking. |and polished draft were |and polish draft. |
| |polished drafts. | |minimal. | |
Total _____/ 60
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