Today was all about Venn-diagrams and the Grim Reaper! To my shock and surprise, students in both my Form 3 and Form 4 classes had never heard of or seen Venn-diagrams before. The idea to do a lesson on comparing and contrasting came to me after I noticed that students struggled on their midterm with the questions that asked them to compare and contrast. Many students had difficulty organizing their thoughts or answering both parts of the question. So the purpose of today's lesson was to show students a simple way to compare two things. I presented students with the challenge to compare and contrast Appointment In Baghdad by Edith Wharton with the poem, Incident In a Rose Garden by Donald Justice.
Comparing and contrasting is often difficult because that is such a broad question, so I asked students to focus on what they knew. As we read, I asked my students to pay attention and find similarities and differences between the two readings based on the story elements we had learned about in a previous class (the characters, the setting, the conflict, and the resolution).
I read the first story Appointment In Baghdad aloud. This is a short story about a sultan and his young assistant. One day the young assistant entered the Sultan's palace "out of breath and wild with excitement" and he asked the Sultan if he could borrow one of his best race horses. The Sultan asked the assistant why, and he replied, "'Because just now, as i was walking in the palace garden, I saw Death standing there. And when Death saw me, he raised his arms in a frightening motion. Oh, it was horrible! I must escape at once!'" The Sultan gives the assistant his best horse and the young man rides to Baghdad, then the Sultan confronts Death in the palace garden and he asks him why he frightened his young friend. Death answers the Sultan, telling him that he did not mean to frighten the young man. "'You see, I raised my arms only in surprise. I was astonished to see him here in your garden, for I have an appointment with him tonight in Baghdad.'"
The next story that we read was a poem Incident In a Rose Garden. This poem has three speakers, the gardener, the master, and Death. I had three students read the three parts of dialogue. Students discovered that this poem is about a gardener who sees Death in the rose garden. Frightened, the gardener tells the master that he is quitting because he saw Death standing there with a scythe. He tells the Master, "'I think he would have spoken, / Seeing his mouth stood open.'" When the master confronted Death to ask why he scared the gardener, Death answered him "As for your gardener, / I did not threaten him. / Old men mistake my gestures. /I only meant to ask him / To show me to his master. / I take it you are he?'"
Form 4 boys reading Incident In a Rose Garden aloud to the class.
Form 3 boys reading the parts of the gardener, the master, and Death aloud.
After reading and discussing both stories, I asked students to compare the story elements in each to find similarities. Students came up to the board to fill in the Venn-diagram.
After discussing similarities, we looked at the differences in each story as students filled in the appropriate parts of the Venn-diagram.
Finally, we were finished comparing and contrasting these stories!
Form 3 boys Venn-diagram completed!
Form 4 boys completed Venn-diagram!
I feel the need to justify to students every time I don't use the textbook to do a lesson. Students were thankful today because they got to read about the Grim Reaper instead of a short story about beauty contests!
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