Teaching Guide for “To Kill a Mockingbird”
The following learning outcomes should guide your curriculum and should be shared with the students. The two most important parts of this Guide are the information on Learning Outcomes and the method of Assessing the Module Curriculum. These parts are required. The section in the middle of this guide provides teaching tips.
Learning Outcomes
1. Students will be able to explain why we study painful historical periods and events.*
2. Students will be able to define, in their own words, “prejudice” and identify/discuss three specific examples from the novel.*
3. Students will be able to define, in their own words, “civility” and identify/discuss three specific examples from the novel.*
4. Students will be able to define, in their own words, “hypocrisy” and identify/discuss three specific examples from the novel.*
5. Students will be able to identify themselves in two characters in the novel, one positive and one negative, and explain the basis for the identification.*
6. Students will be able to explain how three specific social-historical elements of the story are similar to their own life experiences.
7. Students will be able to explain how three specific social-historical elements of the story are different from their own life experiences.
8. Students will be able to define, in their own words, what it means for a person to have good “character” and explain, using specific details from the novel, why good “character” is important.
9. Students will be able to explain the perspective on education developed in the novel using three or more specific passages.
*The first five outcomes are essential outcomes; the remaining ones are optional outcomes.
Although To Kill a Mockingbird can be taught as literature or as history, or as both, in this class you will only have time to discuss the social and historical aspects of the novel. The learning outcomes above address these aspects. You are not required to address all nine of the outcomes. You must, however, address in your curriculum, and assess with an exam, at least five of them. Some suggestions on addressing the historical context of the novel are included below. Beyond this, the outcomes themselves suggest how to design your teaching curriculum and testing rubric for the module. Also, the outcomes cry out for this to be a discussion-rich module. For example, you should not give the students possible definitions for prejudice, hypocrisy, and civility until the students have provided many examples of their own definitions. Since students are to exemplify these terms, you should be prepared, if the students struggle, to provide one example only for each of the terms that they are having difficulty exemplifying. You may need to provide an example for outcomes 6 and 7, but only if students are struggling. It is critical that you do NOT provide all the examples, which would drain the module of its critical thinking possibilities and transform this into a pointless exercise in teaching to the test.
You should by now be tracking student progress in reading the novel. This module will fail to the degree to which some or many students have not read the novel—a real danger. You will find, for example, that if you ask students today how many have read more than 100 pages, the number will be probably be shockingly low. It will remain so in many cases unless you remind students each class of the importance of this reading. Remind students that they will not be force-fed the information but that every student will be expected to participate. When you pose questions to them about the book, you may wish to call on students randomly by name. This provides them an incentive to keep up the reading. It may be useful, if possible, to devote the last five to ten minutes of each class to a discussion of the novel, and require students to answer specific, narrowly-framed questions to keep students on track.
The novel as history (Useful web site for historical background: New Yorker article: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/08/10/090810fa_fact_gladwell)
To Kill a Mockingbird is a document of its time and place and a reflection of its author, as all novels and historical documents are. While it is a brilliant, moving and perceptive work of art, it is no aspersion to Harper Lee to say that it is an appropriate subject for criticism (as all historical documents are). Students should be invited to critique the novel and to analyze its strengths as well as weaknesses and limitations as a prescription for what ailed the nation at the time of the civil rights movement.
The above article provides rich information and possibilities for doing so. The article points out that Atticus’s ways reflect the approach of white Southern liberalism in the 1950s and 1960s. Students may be invited to reflect on the fact that those approaches did not bring to a successful conclusion the struggles of the civil rights movement (in the enforcement of legal rights, it was only the far more confrontational, albeit non-violent methods of the civil rights movement and federal intervention that ended legal Jim Crow in the South). The article takes Atticus, and by inference Lee, to task for counseling merely individual tolerance of all, and of the sins and failings of others, as the only possible responses to the failings of Maycomb. The article provides important historical background to the ways in which white Southern liberal perspectives differed from the approach of the civil rights movement. On the other hand, Atticus’s prescriptions were worlds removed and improved from the debased and oppressive attitudes and behavior toward people who were different represented by most of the citizens of Maycomb. Why did so few people act like Atticus at the time? Why was Atticus different when he came from the same milieu as they? How does living in a different time, as we do today, and having the benefit of historical perspective, allow us to criticize Atticus’s approach with some legitimacy? This article shows us specific passages in the novel where we and possibly the students can do so. We might want to lead students to these passages as guides on the side rather than just telling them as sages on the stage. We can also say that no one conclusion is “correct,” that they can agree or disagree with Lee, and we can criticize the critics, unsettling as it might be not to know exactly what to conclude from a great work of literature. That the open-endedness of criticism is its own reward may be an important thing for students to learn. Having said this, you are not required to use this article in the module.
Assessing the module curriculum (Required):
Because some instructors will have more than five of the learning outcomes above, the assessment may be different from one instructor to the other. On the other hand, five of the outcomes are required of all instructors and it is necessary to be able to assess the learning outcomes with some common assessment questions (as we do with General Education assessment). Accordingly, there will have to be some common questions on every examination of this module administered to students. Danielle will pull student answers on these particular questions as a random sample across sections, and the student success in answering these questions will be scored to determine success in meeting a selected two of the required five learning outcomes. Instructors will be required to the scored answers from students for the two standardized questions that instructors will be required to use (see below).
The two selected learning outcomes to be assessed for 2011
Just to make it clear, let me reiterate that although only two of the required learning outcomes are to be used to assess the success of the course in achieving the learning outcomes, all five of the required learning outcomes must be taught this semester, and all five must be assessed by your exam. The latter, your exam, is what is called an “embedded assignment.” That is, it does double-duty. The assessment of all five of the required learning outcomes is used to grade the student. The grades for the questions on the same exam that assess two of the learning outcomes are going to be pulled at the end of the semester to assess the success of the course.
The learning outcomes to be used to assess the course in 2011 are:
2. Students will be able to define, in their own words, “prejudice” and identify/discuss three specific examples from the novel.*
3. Students will be able to define, in their own words, “civility” and identify/discuss three specific examples from the novel.*
Here are the questions that every instructor must include in their exam for this course module. The grading rubric for these questions is also supplied below:
· Common question #1: Provide in two paragraphs a definition in your own words of the concept of “prejudice” when applied to the relationships among individuals in American society, and three examples of prejudice in action from the book. You may want to provide the definition in your first paragraph and the three examples in the second. Make sure your examples fit all parts of your definition.
Merriam-Webster defines “prejudice” as “irrational attitude of hostility directed against an individual, a group, a race, or their supposed characteristics.”
Grading rubric:
8-10
The student presents a definition that contains the concepts of irrationality, hostility and the targeting of individuals of the whole group. The student can present the definition in their own words, however lengthy it may be. All three examples will represent all parts of the student’s definition. The response may have spelling or grammatical errors or incomplete sentences but the latter will be very infrequent.
6-7
The student presents a definition that contains the concepts of irrationality, hostility and the targeting of a group if not of individuals. The student can present the definition in their own words, however lengthy it may be. Two of the three examples represent all parts of the student’s definition. The response may have spelling or grammatical errors and infrequent display of incomplete sentences.
4-5
The student presents a definition that contains the concepts of irrationality, hostility and the targeting of a group if not of individuals. The student can present the definition in their own words, however lengthy it may be. Only one of the three examples represent all parts of the student’s definition. The response may have spelling or grammatical errors and incomplete sentences with some frequency.
1-3
The student presents a definition that contains serious departures from the concepts in the definition. The student can present the definition in their own words, however lengthy it may be. None of the three examples represent all parts of the student’s definition. The response will have serious spelling or grammatical errors and many incomplete sentences.
· Common question #2: Provide in two paragraphs a definition in your own words of the concept of “civility” when applied to relationships among individuals in American society, and three examples of civility in action from the book. You may want to provide the definition in your first paragraph and the three examples in the second. Make sure your examples fit all parts of your definition.
Merriam-Webster defines “civility” as “a polite act or expression.” In the context of the question, the student will provide a definition that contains the concepts of politeness or respect, treatment, and “others,” whether the others are defined as individuals or groups.
Grading rubric:
8-10
The student presents a definition that contains the concepts of politeness or respect, treatment, and “others,” whether the others are defined as individuals or groups. The student can present the definition in their own words, however lengthy it may be. All three examples will represent all parts of the student’s definition. The response may have spelling or grammatical errors or incomplete sentences but the latter will be very infrequent.
6-7
The student presents a definition that contains the concepts of politeness or respect, treatment, and “others,” whether the others are defined as individuals or groups. The student can present the definition in their own words, however lengthy it may be. Two of the three examples represent all parts of the student’s definition. The response may have spelling or grammatical errors and infrequent display of incomplete sentences.
4-5
The student presents a definition that contains the concepts of politeness or respect, treatment, and “others,” whether the others are defined as individuals or groups. The student can present the definition in their own words, however lengthy it may be. Only one of the three examples represent all parts of the student’s definition. The response may have spelling or grammatical errors and incomplete sentences with some frequency.
1-3
The student presents a definition that contains serious departures from the concepts in the definition. The student can present the definition in their own words, however lengthy it may be. None of the three examples represent all parts of the student’s definition. The response will have serious spelling or grammatical errors and many incomplete sentences.
Goals/Target: 70% of the students will score at least a 6 on both questions included in the assessment