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Lesson 1

We will begin Part 4 of The Warmth of Other Suns and extend our understanding of the factors that influenced Southern African Americans to migrate, then we will compare those factors to the conditions the migrants faced in the North and West. We will revisit “The South” by Langston Hughes and then compare and connect the ideas presented in the poem to Wilkerson’s text. We will then consider the impact of Wilkerson’s choice to use an excerpt of the poem as an epigraph and title for Part 4 of the text.

Lesson Goals

  • Can I recognize and interpret important relationships among ideas and events within The Warmth of Other Suns?

  • Can I formulate and use questions to establish and deepen my understanding of The Warmth of Other Suns and the Great Migration?

Texts

Core

  • Tradebook
    • The Warmth of Other Suns, Isabel Wilkerson, Vintage Books, 2010
  • Digital Access
    • The Migration Series, Jacob Lawrence, The Phillips Collection, 2019

Materials

Tools

Question Sets

Editable Google Docs

Activity 1: Read

We will introduce the section by reviewing the Central Question and the framing questions for the unit.

Step 1

Listen and read along silently as your teacher or one of your peers reads the Central Question and the Framing Questions aloud.

Central Question:

How do we construct the story of a complicated history?

Framing Questions:

  1. What were the push-and-pull factors that impacted people’s decisions to migrate from the South?

  2. What is the relationship between the “end” of slavery and the Great Migration?

  3. How can a single decision change the trajectory of someone’s life?

  4. What were the long-term impacts of the single decision to leave the South?

  5. How do Wilkerson’s choices in terms of sources, organization, and structure convey her perspective and purpose?

  6. How does Lawrence’s The Migration Series represent and connect to the history Wilkerson constructs in her text?

  7. How and why do authors and artists help us to construct the truth of this history?

  8. How do Wilkerson’s structural choices impact our understanding of the Great Migration?

Step 2

In your Learning Log, locate the Notice and Wonder table that you created in Section 1, Lesson 1. Individually, review the Framing Questions, paying special attention to Questions 4 and 5. Those questions are the focusing questions for this fourth section of the unit and the Culminating Task. Write down additional responses and revise existing responses in your Notice and Wonder table to track your observations and questions about the Central Question, the Framing Questions, the Culminating Task, and your increased level of knowledge compared to the previous section.

Step 3

Discuss with a partner your revisions and additions to your Notice and Wonder table, your ideas about what you think we will be doing in this section of the unit, and how this section’s work supports your success on the Culminating Task.

Share your responses with the whole class.

Activity 2: Read – Discuss

We will read “In The North And West, 1915 2000” and “The North And West, 1915 To The 1970s” from part 4 of The Warmth of Other Suns and take note of details that stand out to us to help us begin to unpack the impact and effects of the decision to migrate.

Working with a partner, read and discuss pages 238-241 and 260-267, using the following questions to guide your reading and discussion:

  1. What were the conditions that migrants experienced in the North and West?

  2. How did these compare with the conditions that migrants experienced in the South?

  3. Why did Wilkerson choose to use an excerpt of "The South" by Langston Hughes as an epigraph and title for Part 4 of The Warmth of Other Suns?

Activity 3: Read

We will review some key vocabulary from this section of the text, focusing on important concepts and challenging words and paying attention to their use and meaning in the context in which Wilkerson presents them. We will write down important terms in our Vocabulary Journals so that we can refer back to them later in the unit.

Working as a whole class, review the Vocabulary List for this text. Locate the words as they are used in the text, referencing the provided page number, and consider the following questions for each word:

  1. What does the context suggest Wilkerson means when using the word? What is its connotation, and how does that compare with a dictionary definition?

  2. Why are this word and its meaning important to Wilkerson’s discussion and ideas in this part of the text?

  3. How might I use this word in my own thinking, speaking, and writing?

Write down each key word, with your notes about its meaning and importance, in your Vocabulary Journal.

Activity 4: Read – Write

We will deconstruct and analyze mentor sentences from The Warmth of Other Suns, focusing on the structure, style, grammar, and punctuation used by Wilkerson to convey her tone and create mood. We will then use her sentences as models, applying our understanding of the concepts we study and adding to our writing repertoire by mimicking her structure, style, grammar, and punctuation.

Step 1

Work through the following steps for each mentor sentence in Mentor Sentence Handout 5. Follow your teacher’s directions regarding grouping, materials, and which mentor sentences you will analyze.

Step 2

Read the sentence aloud. Unpack any unfamiliar vocabulary using your vocabulary strategies. Then, determine what the sentence is saying, and paraphrase the sentence to convey its meaning based on your initial understanding.

Step 3

Deconstruct the whole into parts. Split the sentence up into parts as directed by your teacher; sometimes your teacher will give you the parts, and sometimes you will have to split the sentence on your own. Complete the following for each part:

  • Determine the parts of speech and function.

  • Note other observations about the part, such as examples of effective diction or changes in verb tense or point of view.

Step 4

Follow along as your teacher reviews the relevant grammatical terms and concepts of specific phrases and clauses, punctuation, syntax, mood, and tone.

Step 5

Analyze the concepts. Review, discuss, and revise your deconstruction notes. Then, respond to the following questions:

  1. Which parts make up the main clause? The main clause is the main subject and predicate that expresses the central idea of the sentence. Write down the sentence, underlining the main clause.

  2. How do the other parts of the sentence (e.g., phrases, clauses, modifiers) enhance the main clause?

  3. How could you restructure this sentence so that it relays the same message to the reader? What is the impact of the different structures on your understanding?

  4. What revisions need to be made to your initial paraphrasing now that you have increased your understanding of the sentence?

Step 6

Analyze mood, tone, and meaning. Discuss the following questions:

  1. What mood does Wilkerson create in this sentence? How does she create it?

  2. What tone is conveyed by Wilkerson in this sentence? How is that tone conveyed?

  3. What does this sentence contribute to Wilkerson’s ideas in the book? How does it expand our understanding of the Great Migration?

Step 7

Follow your teacher’s directions about choosing one or two mentor sentences to mimic. Use your deconstruction analysis of your chosen sentences to write your own, mimicking what the author does in terms of structure, style, grammar, and punctuation. The specific content of your sentences is your choice. Be prepared to share your sentences with your peers.

Activity 5: Read – Discuss

We will piece together our understanding and examine how Wilkerson represents her ideas and delineates her perspective in this section.

Work in groups using the Evaluating Ideas Tool to deepen understanding and evaluate information while answering the following guiding question:

  1. What is Wilkerson's position about the conditions that migrants faced after they migrated?

Use details from the text to support your evaluation.

Activity 6: Discuss

We will discuss our understanding and examine how Wilkerson represents her ideas and delineates her perspective in this section.

In a whole class a whole-class debrief, discuss the following questions:

  1. What is Wilkerson's position about the conditions that migrants faced after they migrated?

  2. What are her supporting claims?

  3. Why does Wilkerson use quotations from sociologists, economists, and historians dating from the 1930s to 2001 to develop her position?

  4. What connections does Wilkerson make among the evidence?

  5. Are those connections logical and valid?

Activity 7: Read

For homework, continue to complete the Structure Note-Taking Tool for this section of the text.

For homework, continue to complete the Structure Note-Taking Tool for this section of the text.

Write new or interesting words you encounter in your Vocabulary Journal.