Lesson Plans and Worksheets
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Literary Analysis Teacher Resources
Find teacher approved Literary Analysis educational resource ideas and activities
Introduce literature circles with Roland Smith's novels. Your seventh graders will see the activity modeled as you read The Three Little Pigs together and apply the format to a Roland Smith novel of their choice. The lesson includes synopses of novels to pass out to your class, as well as a link to The Three Little Pigs. Not all materials mentioned are attached here.
Response to literature and collaborative group discussion are the key foci of this thorough guide to teaching Phyllis Reynolds Naylor's Newbery-winning novel Shiloh. Detailed sections enable readers to examine each chapter in depth. Activities that reinforce literary analysis and vocabulary are listed by chapter, helping you efficiently plan your unit.
Analyzing Island of the Blue Dolphins, elementary readers discuss the main characters, setting, and plot of the story. Individuals then write a short summary, illustrate, and choose a piece of music to enhance one chapter. Each individual's work is compiled in a class movie.
Explore communication through media by analyzing different advertisements and artwork. Budding artists view videos, websites, plays, and other artistic endeavors while discussing the true meaning of the work with their classmates. They utilize charts to break down the specific characteristics of each artistic piece.
Here are ideas for book projects to help students analyze literature.
Analyze layers of meaning by exploring denotation and connotation. By examining a photograph of the famously controversial Marilyn Monroe, high schoolers interpret the connotative and denotative meanings of the given information. Then they choose images of their own to analyze! This plan has learners use the Internet to find images, but consider bringing in magazines and images of your own.
Examine the contributions of African-Americans in the worlds of art and literature. Over the course of a few days, young scholars will read and analyze a poem, a short story, and a piece of art. They complete a range of comprehension-building activities, including writing poetry based on their reflections, comparing different people groups through a graph, and creating a class mural.
Groups of high school learners conduct research on a particular era of African-American history, focusing on events, people, and places important to that era. Next, they review children's literature in four different genres. As a culminating activity, group members combine what they have learned in their research and readings to create their own piece of children's literature based on African-American history.
Investigate Native American literature and culture by reading the biblical story of creation in Genesis. Afterward, small groups research an assigned tribe, focusing on culture, famous members, literature, and myths. As they research, they must evaluate sources and record information on an evaluation form. After each group creates and presents a PowerPoint on their tribe, individuals write a comparison essay on two Indian myths, or one Indian myth and the biblical creation story.
Define figures of speech with your high schoolers. They listen to you read aloud the Alice Walker poem "Did This Happen to Your Mother? Did Your Sister Throw Up a Lot?" Then they identify and analyze any figures of speech found in the reading. An essay writing prompt and a rubric are included. Designed for use with Texas Instruments learning tools, but it is easily usable with no such technology.