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Section 2: Overview

Race and Socio-Economic Issues

We will read and analyze Chapters 5 and 6 of Friday Night Lights, considering the following question: How do race and socioeconomic issues shape the perspectives of the student athletes? To further explore the impact of race and socioeconomic issues on student athletes, we will read and analyze the supporting texts, “Unchecked, Unchallenged and Unabashed: Is Racism in High School Sports Being Tolerated?” and “The White Flight From Football.” We will continue our analysis of the author’s craft by examining how the authors convey perspective in their writing.

  • Lesson 1:

    We will continue reading Friday Night Lights and begin analysis of the ideas of race and socioeconomic status in the text and their relationship with high school athletics. We will analyze the author’s tone and how this impacts the meaning and the author’s perspective in the text. We will analyze claims about the author’s tone and identify evidence that supports these claims. We will discuss and identify the author’s use of symbolism throughout Chapter 5.

  • Lesson 2:

    We will continue our analysis of how the author uses symbolism and tone to explain his perspective in Friday Night Lights. We will also continue to discuss and analyze the role of race in high school athletics. By completing the Analyzing Relationships Tool, we will identify how Bissinger develops claims through his tone. Through reading and discussion of text-dependent questions, we will identify how race relations play a role in how the players of Permian see American society.

  • Lesson 3:

    We will analyze the article “Unchecked, Unchallenged and Unabashed: Is Racism in High School Sports Being Tolerated?” by Ivey DeJesus as we continue to explore the impact of race on high school athletes. We will focus on the language the author uses to create a tone that is reflective of her perspective.

  • Lesson 4:

    We will compare the word choice in Friday Night Lights and “Unchecked, Unchallenged and Unabashed: Is Racism in High School Sports Being Tolerated?” to see how each author uses language to express their perspectives. We will return to reading Friday Night Lights and the analysis of race and socioeconomic status and their impact on high school athletes and the players. We will begin by using what we learned about tone and perspective in the previous lesson to compare how two authors use tone for the same purpose. We will then proceed to read Chapter 6 in Friday Night Lights.

  • Lesson 5:

    We will read the article “The White Flight from Football” by Alana Semuels and analyze her argument regarding race and youth sports. We will identify supporting evidence from the text to answer a question about the article and identify the author’s claim based on this evidence. We will discuss how this claim and evidence compares to the claims made by Bissinger in Friday Night Lights about race and sports.

  • Lesson 6:

    We will compose a response to the following questions for the Section 2 Diagnostic: How does Bissinger portray how factors of race and socioeconomic status affect high school football in Odessa? How does Bissinger’s perspective compare to those of the authors of the other section texts?

  • Lesson 7:

    We will review feedback on the Section Diagnostic. We will use the feedback to make revisions to our work.

  • Lesson 8:

    We will share the understanding we have gained through our independent reading and continue reading our texts.