UNIT 4: DO THE RIGHT THING
Unit Overview
How do the choices we make affect others?
What are common symbols and themes in contemporary young adult literature?
In our last unit, we'll leave the history behind us and enter the world of modern young adult fiction. We will read a variety of poems, short stories, personal narratives, a fable, and an allegory and analyze them for symbolism and theme. We will read a contemporary young adult fiction novel and track the development of symbols and themes throughout. Then, we will compare how those themes and symbols are addressed in the novel’s film adaptation. Our end of the unit performance task will be an original narrative which students will revise for characterization, descriptive details, and dialogue.
Reading & Writing Skills
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Theme
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Symbolism & Allegory
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Characterization
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Irony
- Comparing a novel to its film adaptation
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Writing a fictional narrative
UNIT 4 TEXTS
The voices in this collection have so much to question, so much to grieve. They have so much to celebrate, so much to rage against. They’re ready to speak up and begin the conversation — with you and with the world. More than thirty uncensored poems are accompanied by Nina Nickles’s masterful photographs, which sensitively capture the moods and essence of adolescence. Here, painted in the words of teenage girls, is a portrait of their dreams and desires - a record of hope, disillusionment, anger, joy, sadness, and most of all, strength. (Source)
"Speak up for yourself--we want to know what you have to say." From the first moment of her freshman year at Merryweather High, Melinda knows this is a big fat lie, part of the nonsense of high school. She is friendless, outcast, because she busted an end-of-summer party by calling the cops, so now nobody will talk to her, let alone listen to her. As time passes, she becomes increasingly isolated and practically stops talking altogether. Only her art class offers any solace, and it is through her work on an art project that she is finally able to face what really happened at that terrible party.
In Laurie Halse Anderson's powerful novel, an utterly believable heroine with a bitterly ironic voice delivers a blow to the hypocritical world of high school. She speaks for many a disenfranchised teenager while demonstrating the importance of speaking up for oneself. Speak was a 1999 National Book Award Finalist for Young People's Literature. (Source)
"If thirteen is supposed to be an unlucky number...you would think a civilized society could come up with a way for us to skip it."
-- from "What's the Worst That Could Happen?" by Bruce Coville
No one will want to skip any of the twelve short stories and one poem that make up this collection by some of the most celebrated contemporary writers of teen fiction. The big bar mitzvah that goes suddenly, wildly, hilariously out of control. A crush on a girl that ends up putting the boy who likes her in the hospital. A pair of sneakers a kid has to have. By turns funny and sad, wrenching and poignant, the moments large and small described in these stories capture perfectly the agony and ecstasy of being thirteen. (Source)
Language Skills
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Modifier Phrases
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Using Conjunctions
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Prepositions
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Suffixes
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Active vs. Passive Voice
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Colons & Semicolons
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Apostrophes & Hyphens