8th Grade English Language Arts Unit 5: Determining Themes Anchor The Color of Water by James McBride Pacing 7 weeks Text(s) Unit Overview James McBride wrote The Color of Water: A Black Man’s Tribute to his White Mother in order to understand his past and explore his identity. The memoir alternates between two first-person voices; chapters alternate between James’s mother Ruth recalling her Orthodox Jewish upbringing in the South and James recounting his experiences growing up as one of twelve biracial children struggling to understand their place in the world. Throughout the novel, we learn more and more about Ruth’s past, which helps us to better understand the woman she became and the impact she had on her children’s lives and identities. These two parallel stories confront issues of race, prejudice, opportunity, education, identity, religion, and the past. The raw and honest tone that accompanies both stories creates a unique experience for readers to learn about Ruth and James’s complicated paths to discovering their identities. The book deals extensively with the desire to fit in and to define who you are in relation to those around you, as both James and Ruth grapple with feelings of uncertainty about where they truly “belong.” The author struggles with these feelings largely within the context of building his own racial identity, but the challenges extend well beyond race and provide ample entry points to discussion and meaning making. Throughout the unit, students will examine how and why McBride digs deeply into his family’s past, and students will explore the impact of race, religion, and family on McBride’s development of self. In the beginning of the unit, students will analyze how the first-person point of view and unique structure of the book develops our understanding of James and Ruth. The text’s unique structure also allows readers to make connections between emotions and experiences Ruth and James both had while growing up in different places and times. Students will analyze the impact of setting on a person’s growth, and explore how the past impacts the present and future. Another major goal of this unit is to determine themes that we as readers can pull out of this memoir and apply to our own lives. By gradually learning about how two people came to terms with the past and developed a sense of self, students will make connections to their own lives at a critical turning point for them – the transition to high school. Supplemental texts are included in some weeks to build knowledge or to provide additional context for themes and ideas. Guidance on how and when these texts should be used can be found in the notes and teaching points. In the unit’s final two weeks, students will complete two writing tasks to synthesize understanding of the memoir itself and the themes it conveys. There is no MCLASS assessment required for this unit. Each week, students should have opportunities to write for various purposes in response to readings, and to participate in a range of discussions about the story’s events, author’s craft, and developing themes. Unit 8.5: Determining Themes - The Color of Water Essential Questions Genre and Standards-Based Vocabulary Cutting to the Core Standards-Based Essential Questions: • genre I: Building knowledge through content-rich • memoir nonfiction and informational texts I. How can a story’s structural elements • infer and point of view help us better • synthesize Ø “Students need to be grounded in information understand an authors themes? • explicit vs. implicit meaning about the world around them if they are to • theme develop the strong general knowledge and II. How can setting (historical and • development vocabulary they need to become successful cultural characteristics of a time or • dialogue readers” place) influence people and events? • incident • turning point II: Reading and writing grounded in evidence III. How can we analyze a character’s • characterization from the text response to internal and external • provoke Ø conflicts to better understand who • structure “Quality text-based questions, unlike low-level they are? "search and find" questions, require close reading • alternating and deep understanding of the text” • point of view IV. What are characteristics of a memoir, • font and how are memoirs unique from III: Regular practice with complex text and its style other genres? What makes a memoir • academic vocabulary worth reading? • tone • refine Ø “The ability to comprehend complex texts is the • determine most significant factor differentiating college- Thematic Essential Questions: • analyze ready from non-college-ready readers. This shift • purpose toward complex text requires practice, supported I. How does the past impact the present • conflict (internal and external) through close reading” and future? What are the benefits and • motivation risks of digging into the past? • intrinsic • compare II. What role do family, religion, and race • evaluate play in a person’s identity formation? • impact What other factors do we use to define • influence who we are? • recurring • concept • symbol • drive (as in “drives the story forward”) • identity Unit 8.5: Determining Themes - The Color of Water Common Core State Standards (Including how the standards progress across grade levels) RL.7.1: Cite several pieces of textual evidence to RL/RI.8.1: Cite the textual evidence that most RL.9.1: Cite strong and thorough textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly as strongly supports an analysis of what the text says support analysis of what the text says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text. explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text. well as inferences drawn from the text. RL.7.2: Determine a theme or central idea of a text RL.8.2: Determine a theme or central idea of a text RL.9.2: Determine a theme or central idea of a text and analyze its development over the course of the and analyze its development over the course of the and analyze in detail its development over the text; provide an objective summary of the text. text, including its relationship to the characters, course of the text, including how it emerges and is setting, and plot; provide an objective summary of shaped and refined by specific details; provide an the text. objective summary of the text. RL.7.3: Analyze how particular elements of a story RL.8.3: Analyze how particular lines of dialogue or RL.9.3: Analyze how complex characters (e.g., those or drama interact (e.g., how setting shapes the incidents in a story or drama propel the action, with multiple or conflicting motivations) develop characters or plot). reveal aspects of a character, or provoke a decision. over the course of a text, interact with other characters, and advance the plot or develop the theme. RL.7.6: Analyze how an author develops and RL.8.6: Analyze how differences in the points of RL.9.6: Analyze a particular point of view or cultural contrasts the points of view of different characters view of the characters and the audience or reader experience reflected in a work of literature from or narrators in a text. (e.g., created through the use of dramatic irony) outside the United States, drawing on a wide create such effects as suspense or humor. reading of world literature. RI.7.2: Determine two or more central ideas in a text RI.8.2: Determine a central idea of a text and RI.9.2: Determine a central idea of a text and analyze and analyze their development over the course of analyze its development over the course of the text, its development over the course of the text, the text; provide an objective summary of the text. including its relationship to supporting ideas; including how it emerges and is shaped and refined provide an objective summary of the text. by specific details; provide an objective summary of the text. RI.7.3: Analyze the interactions between individuals, RI.8.3: Analyze how a text makes connections RI.9.3: Analyze how the author unfolds an analysis events, and ideas in a text (e.g., how ideas influence among and distinctions between individuals, ideas, or series of ideas or events, including the order in individuals or events, or how individuals influence or events (e.g., through comparisons, analogies, or which the points are made, how they are introduced ideas or events). categories). and developed, and the connections that are drawn between them. RI.7.5: Analyze the structure an author uses to RI.8.5: Analyze in detail the structure of a specific RI.9.5: Analyze in detail how an author's ideas or organize a text, including how the major sections paragraph in a text, including the role of particular claims are developed and refined by particular contribute to the whole and to the development of sentences in developing and refining a key concept. sentences, paragraphs, or larger portions of a text the ideas. (e.g., a section or chapter). Unit 8.5: Determining Themes - The Color of Water RI.7.6: Determine an author's point of view or RI.8.6: Determine an author's point of view or RI.8.6: Determine an author's point of view or purpose in a text and analyze how the author purpose in a text and analyze how the author purpose in a text and analyze how an author uses distinguishes his or her position from that of others. acknowledges and responds to conflicting evidence rhetoric to advance that point of view or purpose. or viewpoints.