Lesson 1 (from Front Matter and Section I to “8. Reservation Mary”)
Objective
The objective of this lesson is to understand a genre to which When My Brother Was an Aztec belongs—poetry. How and where a text fits influences how it is understood by its readers, as well as what readers it is likely to reach; readers interested in poetry might pick it up, while those who scorn such works might never read Diaz’s work.
Lesson
Class Discussion: When you go to a bookstore, online or in person, how are the books separated from one another and grouped together? What categories are present? How does a person know which book belongs in what group—or even what the groups are? Where might you find When My Brother Was an Aztec? Why?
Group Activity: Looking as a class at the title piece, what features of the text—diction, sentence length, content, figurative language, etc.—seem indicated as appropriate...
Aligned to the following Common Core Standards:
- ELA-Reading: Literature RL.9-10.1, 9-10.5, 9-10.10, 11-12.1, 11-12.3, 11-12.5, 11-12.10
- ELA-Writing W.9-10.1, 9-10.2, 11-12.1, 11-12.2
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