Lesson Plan

Your name: Priya Patel

Date of Lesson: Monday, March 21, 2016
Length of Lesson: 50 minutes
Location: John Rennie, 558
Class - Cycle and Year: Cycle 2, Year 2
Number of Students: 24
Subject: English Language Arts (Enriched)
Context/Background: In the age of new media, schools are now participating in a process
of updating school curricula. As graphic novels make their way to classrooms, students need
to examine how the genre employs text and image. Students should understand how both
elements work individually, as well as in conjunction with one another to convey a new
meaning.
Subject Competencies:
Reads and listens to written, spoken and media texts:
Draws on prior experience and the features of a genre to make sense of a text
Situates meanings within own experiences and the world of the text, in order to
transform initial readings into more conscious interpretations
Considers possible reasons for own responses and the responses of others to clarify
and reshape the relationship between self as reader and the text
Explains the impact of a text on self as reader by returning to its social functions, as
well as the way meanings and messages are constructed
Draws on own reading profile, including knowledge of textual structures and features,
to locate textual details that support own interpretations
Constructs interpretations that embody both own world and the world of the text
Produces texts for personal and social purposes:
Immerses self in texts to learn how they are constructed
Investigates the codes and conventions of various genres
Applies codes and conventions of written and media language
Analyzes the elements of the context and shapes the text accordingly
Cultivates a variety of media and writerly practices
Cross Curricular Competencies:
-Uses information (gathers information, puts information to use)
-Uses creativity (becomes familiar with all the elements of a situation, explores, adopts a
flexible mode of operation)
-Cooperates with others (interacts with an open mind in various contexts)
Target Professional Competencies:
Competency 1: To act as a professional inheritor, critic, and interpreter of knowledge or
culture when teaching student
Competency 3: To develop teaching/learning situations that are appropriate to the students
concerned and the subject content with a view to developing the competencies targeted in
the programs of study.

Pre-Assessment/Hook: Students will be informally evaluated on their ability to render a

narrative from an image. This activity demands that students examine the images critically
by interpreting the mood, connotation of the background and foreground images, read facial
expressions etc. After reading the images, they will need to translate those ideas into written
text.
Vocabulary: Graphic novels, images, text
Teaching skill targeted: For this class, my aim is to minimize talking in-between activities
and to get students to share their writing and/or observations with the class.
Objectives: By the end of class, students should be able to read a panel in Persepolis and
identify features used in the graphic novel genre which help tell the story, with a particular
focus on visual elements.
Materials/Tools/Technology: Smartboard, handouts, copies of the novel
Development/Method Step-by-Step Procedures plus times:
12:05-12:09: Attendance and reminders
12:10-12:30: Opening activity
Teacher will model the activity by reading a short piece of fiction written as an interpretation
of an image. See appendix 1.
Project an image on the board for students to read and write a short story on. In pairs or
individually, students will receive up to 10 minutes to write a story or narrative as an
interpretation of the image. See appendix 2.
Share stories with the class
12:31-12:40: Short lecture on how graphic novels are different than literature and
similar.
How are graphic novels different from novels?
Discuss The main difference is that we get to read images, not just words. Just like we
dont just read words, we interpret and infer from them, likewise we can do the same with
images. Visual analysis is a fancy way to say that were reading an image, then interpreting
and inferring from it.
Go over some features in handout.
12:41-12:50: Read selected image as a class. See appendix 3.
Observation

Analysis

Shaded gray background

Seems ominous

Girl is smaller than the other

two

Smaller size = smaller/less

power
Bigger size = more power

Girl is wearing white clothes,

they are in black, detail-less
shapes

She seems more unique,

human. They seem more
uniform/less human.

They have frown lines and

pointy noses

Images we associate with

evil, badness, etc.

Black shapes of the older

women look like waves

Gives me the feeling that she

is being swamped by two
powerful waves.

12:51-12:55: Assign homework

-Read until page 25
-Formative assessment
Student centered learning group work: Students will have the opportunity to collaborate
with peers for the opening activity. The remaining time will be used for individual work to
develop students own interpretations of the texts.
Wrap-up/ Conclusion/Connection to real life: Students interact with visual images daily
whether it is in advertisements or in media. Learning to read images allows students to
critically examine when they are being manipulated to follow a specific interpretation or
meaning.
Evaluation: Students will choose a panel from pages 1-25 and do a reading of it. Using the
handout with the features and mechanics of graphic novels, they will do a short analysis of
different elements such as color, angle, foreground, etc. This assignment will count towards
the read competency. (See page 5-6)
Rationale: The purpose of this lesson plan is to develop the ability to read graphic novels by
analyzing how words and image work together. The opening activity gets students to
practice reading visual images and perceiving the narratives that the images depict. These
learning strategies teach students how to effectively read graphic novels.

Appendix:
Image 1:

Image 2:

Image 3:

Name: ____________________________________________
Persepolis - Panel Analysis
Grade 10 English
Task: Choose a panel from pages 1-25 of the novel and do a reading of it using the
mechanics of a graphic novel. You must have a minimum of four observations/analyses.
Page number: ________________
Panel number: ________________
Observations

Analysis

Additional Comments:
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________

Evaluation
Read Competency

- Transforms initial readings into more conscious interpretations

- Locates textual details that support own interpretations and embody the world of
the text
- Adjusts reading strategies and stance to the context
- Considers possible reasons for own responses
- Draws on knowledge of textual structures and features, to locate textual details that
support own interpretations
Excellent
100-88%

Very Good
87-76%

Good
75-67%

Needs development
66% or lower

Total: