Edgar Allan Poe Lesson Plan: Craft and Structure

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This lesson accompanies the BrainPOP topic Edgar Allan Poe, and supports the standard of analyzing the impact of literary elements on text meaning. Students demonstrate understanding through a variety of projects.

Step 1: ACTIVATE PRIOR KNOWLEDGE

Prompt students:

• Think about a scary movie or story you know of. What is the setting? How would you describe the characters? 

Step 2: BUILD BACKGROUND

• Read the description on the Edgar Allan Poe topic page.
• Play the Movie, pausing to check for understanding. 
• Have students read one of the following Related Reading articles: “Myths” and “Unsolved Mysteries”. Partner them with someone who read a different article to share what they learned with each other.
  

Step 3: ENGAGE

Students express what they learned about Edgar Allan Poe while practicing essential literacy skills with one or more of the following activities. Differentiate by assigning ones that meet individual student needs.

• Make-a-Movie: Produce an animation that answers this question: How does Edgar Allen Poe use personification and other literary devices in his poems?. (Essential Literacy Skill: Demonstrate understanding of figurative language, word relationships, and nuances in word meaning)
• Make-a-Map: Make a concept map identifying examples of different literary devices Poe uses. (Essential  Literacy Skill: Acquire and use domain specific words and phrases)
• Creative Coding: Code a game challenging players to sort phrases based on their literary device. (Essential Literacy Skill: Make logical inferences from explicit details)

Step 4: APPLY & ASSESS 

Apply: Students complete the Edgar Allan Poe Challenge, applying essential literacy skills while demonstrating what they learned about this topic.

Assess: Wrap up the lesson with the Edgar Allan Poe Quiz. 

Step 5:  EXTEND LEARNING

Sortify: Writers Challenge players to categorize writers by attributes, such as genre, time period, and more in this sorting game.  

Related BrainPOP Topics: Deepen understanding of craft and structure with these topics: Figurative Language, Poetry, and Mood and Tone. 

Additional Support Resources:

• Modifications for BrainPOP Learning Activities: Strategies to meet ELL and other instructional and student needs.
• BrainPOP Learning Activities Support: Resources for best practices using BrainPOP.