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Lesson 12

We will participate in a philosophical chairs discussion where we create and defend a claim about the directors’ choices in transforming Romeo and Juliet.

Lesson Goals

Reading and Knowledge

  • Attend to Details: How well do I recognize and interpret language, sentence structures, and directorial choices to identify connections to themes in Act 5, Scene 3?
  • Compare and Connect: How well do I recognize points of connection among the play Romeo and Juliet and the film adaptations to make logical, objective comparisons?
  • Evaluating Effects: How well do I evaluate the effects of directors’ choices in films?

Speaking

  • Form Claims: How well do I develop and clearly communicate a meaningful and defensible claim about how the film directors’ choices enhance or detract from the themes introduced in Act 5, Scene 3 of Romeo and Juliet?
  • Develop Ideas: How well do I use devices, techniques, descriptions, reasoning, and evidence to support and elaborate on a coherent explanation of how the film directors’ choices enhance or detract from the themes introduced in Act 5, Scene 3 of Romeo and Juliet?

Texts

Core

  • Tradebook
    • Romeo and Juliet, William Shakespeare, Folger Shakespeare Library, Simon and Schuster, 2004

Materials

Tools

Reference Guides

Editable Google Docs

Activity 1: Discuss

We will examine the protocols for philosophical chairs discussions.

For this Section Diagnostic, you will participate in a structured philosophical chairs discussion.

In a philosophical chairs discussion, you will do the following:

  • Listen to a statement presented by your teacher. Write down your ideas about the statement and decide what position to take.

  • Discuss with the class your position and supporting evidence.

  • Write a reflection that explains how your thinking was changed or refined during the discussion.

As with other academic discussions, philosophical chairs discussions allow for a rich understanding of a variety of viewpoints. They also present opportunities for you to use academic language and new vocabulary, practice your listening and speaking skills, and assess whether you are clearly expressing your ideas and claims to demonstrate your knowledge of the text or topic. The academic language used during academic discussions also allows for disagreements to be discussed in a polite, but critical, way.

For sample conversation stems discussion norms, you can consult the Conversation Stems section of the Academic Discussion Reference Guide.

Activity 2: Listen – Write – Discuss

We will participate in a philosophical chairs discussion to demonstrate our understanding of how the directors’ choices in the film adaptations enhance or detract from the themes of Romeo and Juliet.

Listen to the statement provided by your teacher.

Take 2-4 minutes to jot down your ideas about the statement and decide what position to take using the Philosophical Chairs Discussion Tool. Be sure to use at least one significant word from your Vocabulary Journal in your response.

Participate in a respectful philosophical discussion. Be sure to do the following:

  • Elaborate and clarify your ideas.

  • Support your ideas with specific textual evidence from the play and details from the films.

  • Ask clarifying questions.

  • Build on or challenge the ideas of others.

  • Take notes on the intriguing ideas of others.

Repeat the process for each statement provided by your teacher.

Activity 3: Write

We will reflect on how the discussion refined our original ideas.

By engaging in a discussion with others, you are provided the opportunity to examine other points of view. As a result, you will often refine your own ideas. Examples of refinement include the following:

  • changing one’s position on the topic

  • maintaining the same position but clarifying the idea

  • incorporating new information

  • disregarding weaker evidence in favor of stronger evidence

  • adequately anticipating and refuting counterclaims

On your Philosophical Chairs Discussion Tool, write a reflection on how your thinking was refined during the discussion. Be sure to identify a comment of a peer that most challenged your thinking and explain how it refined your ideas. Also, complete the self-assessment of your participation in the discussion.

Activity 4: Write

For homework, we will reflect on our work on the Section Diagnostic and assess our progress toward the Culminating Task.

Step 1

For homework, choose at least three of the questions below and respond to them in your Learning Log:

  1. How well did you take the necessary actions to prepare for the task?

  2. What went well for you during the completion of this task?

  3. What did you struggle with during the completion of this task?

  4. How did you push through that struggle?

  5. How well did you actively focus your attention during this independent task?

  6. How well did you develop and use an effective and efficient process to maintain workflow during this task?

  7. What would you do differently during the next Section Diagnostic?

Review your Culminating Task Progress Tracker. Think about all you have learned and done during this section of the unit. Evaluate your skills and knowledge by answering the following questions:

  1. How prepared are you to succeed on the Culminating Task?

  2. What do you need to do to succeed?

Step 2

Review the Central Question of the unit:

Why do we still read Shakespeare?

Use the following questions to guide your reflection:

  1. What new knowledge do you have in relation to the Central Question?

  2. What are you still curious about in relation to the Central Question?

  3. What is the relationship between the question and the texts you have read so far? How do the texts shed light on the question? How does the question help you understand the texts?

  4. How has your response to the question evolved, deepened, or changed?

In your Learning Log, write your response to Question 4. You will return to this response in a later lesson to examine how your understanding of the Central Question has evolved.