During my spring 2020 internship at Springdale High School, I planned to teach a 4-week long unit over F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. Unfortunately I did not have the privilege of teaching the unit to my remarkable students due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The unit incorporated a linked text set made up of print and non-print text in order to support students at various reading levels, encourage consideration of multiple interpretations of a text, and make texts  “accessible, engaging, and relevant” (Wold 392). Through my planning process, I identified three Arkansas English Language Arts Standards to be addressed in the unit: 

• RL.11-12.5: Analyze how an author’s choices concerning how to structure parts of a text (e.g. the choice of where to begin or end a story, the choice to provide a comedic or tragic resolution) contribute to its overall structure and meaning as well as its aesthetic impact. 

• RL.11-12.6: Analyze a case in which grasping a point of view requires distinguishing what is directly stated in a text from what is really meant (e.g. satire, sarcasm, irony, or understatement).

• RI.11-12.7: Integrate and evaluate multiple sources of information presented in diverse media or formats in order to address a question or solve a problem.

The goal of the unit is for students to define, evaluate, and critique the ideal of the American Dream and consider the role that they play in this ideal, as well as the impact this ideal has had in their lives and their families. Additionally, students will consider how literature has been a vehicle for exploration and criticism and how they can use it to express their own perspectives on cultural, historical, and social issues. 

 

     As a novice English teacher, I have experienced tremendous development in my understanding of teaching reading and literature throughout this semester. My unit plan reflects this development through its inclusion of frontloading activities. Through my Reading Methods course, I explored the importance of frontloading the study of literature in my reading of Doug Buehl’s “Frontloading: Addressing Knowledge Demands of Complex Texts.” In my reading, I learned that many students come to assigned literature lacking the assumed knowledge they need to fully comprehend, enjoy, and dissect the text. With this in mind, I designed my unit to include frontloading exercises that would immerse my students into the setting of the novel and fill in any gaps about the culture and history of 1920s New York. Most of my students have not been to New York, nor do they have a strong conception of what the state looked and felt like during the 1920s. The opening lesson of my unit invites students to enter a classroom decorated like Gatsby’s mansion where they assume the role of a character from the novel and interview fellow characters to gather information about the mysterious Gatsby. During the first week of my unit, students also engage in a Google Maps assignment that invites them to research several prominent locations in the book. The classroom bulletin boards are transformed to represent East Egg, West Egg, and the Valley of the Ashes, serving as constant visual aids of the novel’s setting. All of these activities serve the purpose of helping students to envision the places they read about and gain a deeper understanding of the text by giving them access to missing knowledge of the time and place of the book. 

 

     In connection to TESS Domain 1e, my unit plan communicates an ability to design coherent instruction by incorporating strong learning activities. Throughout the unit, students have the opportunity to be active participants in the classroom through instruction that is designed to help students learn collaboratively. This is demonstrated through the Gatsby Unit launch party lesson where students are practicing their speaking, listening, reading, and writing skills with each other as they collect evidence about Gatsby in order to draw conclusions about his character. Additionally, the unit plan’s learning activities reflect the design of coherent instruction through the spider web discussion from Lesson 13, which allows students to apply their knowledge of the text gained from close-reading and group discussion activities in a setting where students have the freedom and responsibility of leading a discussion that is student-driven. 

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     The Gatsby Unit plan also aligns with TESS Domain 1d “Demonstrating Knowledge of Resources.” Resources that are integrated into the lessons through the linked text set support students in their pursuit of the unit understandings as they are exposed to a graphic novel, articles, an essay, videos, and a film that clarify and communicate the American Dream and its achievability. Without the inclusion of those texts, the growing understanding students have by the end of the unit are limited because they have only engaged with the novel and are missing the enrichment that linked texts provide. The linked text set also invites students to pursue the unit understandings from several different perspectives and expand their knowledge of the American Dream and the role that privilege plays in the attainability of this "dream."