Assessing and Reteaching Key Ideas with Langston Hughes Short Stories
Explain to students that this focus series will help them think deeply about key ideas in short literary works. First, we want to get a pulse for how well students can comprehend the story on the first read. Then, we will break it down over the next couple of days.
Pre Test
Hand out the pdf of Langston Hughes' "Thank You, Ma'am.":
Have students read the story and use their own annotation strategies to mark the text. Then, they will use their note and the text to take the pre-assessment.
Pretest:
Scoring Guide:
Tip: Create a Google Form of the assessment and send to kids to make data collection easy!
Class Activities
After the pretest, explain that the story was written by famous American author Langston Hughes. To really understand the vocabulary, setting, and characters of this tale, it helps to know about the Harlem Renaissance, the era in which Hughes wrote his famous poems and stories.
Background Information
View the video, "A Walk Through Harlem" in the OER Commons:
http://www.oercommons.org/courses/what-was-the-harlem-renaissance/view
View the short biography on Langston Hughes at Biography.com:
http://www.biography.com/people/langston-hughes-9346313#synopsis
Discussion Questions:
- Based on these two videos, what sharp contrasts do you see between Harlem and our own town?
- In the story, Mrs. Jones dragged Roger into her house after he attempted to steal her purse. How would that be perceived in modern times? What about Harlem in the mid-1900s may have made that permissible?
Close Read-- Whole Group
- Take turns reading "Thank You Ma'am" aloud.
- Emphasize the importance of reading with expression-- how would these characters sound? What tone of voice would be appropriate for a woman who is being robbed? A young man who is being bullied by an older woman?
- As they read: Circle vocab words they are unsure of. We'll come back to them later!
- They may also use the metacognitive symbols from the previous focus lesson (download below).
- Read aloud together, while students mark the text.
[1]Metacognitive Marker activity modified from the Close Reading "Tears of a Slave" lesson on "Share My Lesson."
Vocabulary Study
- Turn and talk: have students discuss the words they did not know.
- Whole group: ask which words were confusing. Did they figure out any of the meanings from the context clues?
- Guide students to understand the vocabulary. Make sure they notice the following: m'am, blue suede shoes, icebox, ten-cent cake, gas plate, yes'm, no'm.
- Have them write student-friendly definitions in the margins.
Closing Activity
- Draw a representation of their favorite new word in the story.