Skip to Main Content

Lesson 2

We will discuss the first part of Book 12 and read Book 12 using a jigsaw activity.

Lesson Goals

  • Can I participate collaboratively in a jigsaw discussion activity, building on the ideas of others and contributing relevant information?

  • Can I paraphrase and summarize Book 12 of The Odyssey in ways that maintain meaning and logical order?

  • Can I discuss and write about the explicit or implicit meanings of Book 12 of The Odyssey?

  • Can I analyze how themes are developed through characterization and plot in Book 12 of The Odyssey?

Texts

Core

  • Tradebook
    • The Odyssey, Homer, translated by Robert Fagles, Penguin Publishing Group, 1996
  • Unit Reader
    • “The Odyssey,” from the introduction to The Odyssey (pp. 8–11), Bernard Knox, Penguin Publishing Group, 1996

Materials

Tools

Question Sets

Editable Google Docs

Activity 1: Discuss – Review

We will review our summaries and discuss Circe’s warnings to Odysseus.

Step 1

Share your summary aloud with a partner. As you speak, try to use your Summarizing Text Tool for mental prompts to develop a more complete description of what happens in 12.1-179.

As you listen to your partner, consider adding or modifying your summary.

Step 2

Discuss the following questions with your partner:

  1. Describe Circe’s warning to Odysseus.

  2. What is Circe’s advice to Odysseus on how he can overcome each threat?

Activity 2: Read – Write – Present – Discuss

We will read and analyze Book 12.

Step 1

In this jigsaw, you will first work with your expert group (e.g., Expert Group 1, Expert Group 2, Expert Group 3, or Expert Group 4). As you read and analyze your assigned section of Book 12, you become an expert in that section.

After you meet with your expert group, you will form home groups made up of experts from each expert group. In your home group, you will share your analysis for the assigned section from your expert group in a jigsaw discussion.

Get into your expert groups as assigned by your teacher.

As you read and discuss your section, consider the following guiding questions:

  1. How does the presence or absence of power affect characters’ actions in your section of the text?

  2. Would the events have a different outcome if the power dynamic were different? How?

  3. What evidence from the text supports your responses?

In your Learning Log, write a summary of the events and your responses to the guiding questions. When you rejoin your home group, in addition to sharing your responses to the guiding questions, explain the events from your assigned reading.

Step 2

In your home group, retell the events of your assigned reading and explain your responses to the guiding questions. Cite the text evidence that supports your responses.

Step 3

As a class, discuss whether any of the events could have been prevented if power was used differently by the characters.

Activity 3: Homework

For homework, we will read an excerpt from the introduction of The Odyssey.

For homework, read "The Odyssey,” from the introduction to The Odyssey (pp. 8-11) by Bernard Knox. In your Learning Log, answer the following question:

  1. What is Knox’s claim about the order in which The Odyssey is presented?

Add any interesting or provocative sentences you find to your Mentor Sentence Journal. Add unknown or interesting words to your Vocabulary Journal.

Then, in your Learning Log, organize the major events in the poem up to this point in order of their telling.