Faces of the Essay: An Orientation to the Form - Grade 8
This unit is built around a small collection of essays. A large portion of the work is devoted to reading and re-reading these texts using a few questions to guide the readings and to focus the discussions and other work that follows. The object, then, is to work carefully with a small set of texts in order to make some first-hand discoveries about the nature of informative/explanatory texts: What they can look like, what they can do, and how they are similar and different.
Table of Contents
Text Audio
The Basketball Kidnappings: How the Good People of Hyde Park are Sucking the Life Out of Urban Childhood by William Upski Wimsatt
In San Francisco, Making a Living From Your Billionaire Neighbor’s Trash by Thomas Fuller
Writing Tasks
Title: S-15-16: The Essay Writing Project
Session 15-16
Checks for Understanding
Title: S-1: Understanding Essays: (Title of Essay)
Session 1
Title: S-2: Characteristics of a Good Small-Group Partner
Session 2
Title: S-6: Characteristics of the Author’s Presence
Session 6
Title: S-7: Signs of Author’s Presence
Session 7
Title: S-9-11: Small-Group Work: Problems and Solutions
Session 9-11
Title: S-20: Short Assignments for My Essay
Session 20
Title: S-C: Peter Jacobi’s Basic Rules for Interviewing
Session C
Title: S-D: Six Things to Do Before the Interview
Session D
Title: S-E: Six Things to Do At the Interview
Session E
Title: S-F: Things to Do After the Interview
Session F
Forms and Graphic Organizers
Title: S-1: Understanding Essays: A Protocol for Working with Texts
Session 1
Title: S-6: The Essay: Ideas to Consider
Session 6
Title: S-22: Essay Project Description
Session 6
Title: S-31: Faces of the Essay: Self-Assessment
Session 31