Grade 11 ELA: Performance-Based Assessment 1

Grade 11 ELA: Performance-Based Assessment 1

Course: / 11 / Unit: / 1 / PBA
Assessment Title: / Growing Up American
A novel-inspired television series
Task: / Rationale: The purpose of this PBA is to apply literary analysis skills to a real-world context.
Prior to this assessment, students will have a completed a study of a full length novelrelated to the unit theme. It would be helpful if students made analysis notes during their independent reading in preparation for this PBA.
  1. (This analysis step is essential. Consider it the prewriting needed to include in the actual television series plan.)
Complete an analysis of the novel studied in this unit that includes the following:
  • a discussion of how this text attempts to represent/portray the experience of growing up American.. Consider what aspect(s) of young life is examined and what the author’s purpose is for that examination.
  • an analysis of the novel’s structure. Consider and discuss how the structure of specific parts of the text contribute to its overall meaning and its aesthetic impact.
  • an analysis of the novel’s point of view. Specifically, consider and discuss the intentional use of satire, sarcasm, irony, or understatement and its intended impact on the reader.
  1. Create a plan for a television show based on the analysis of your chosen novel that includes the following:
  • A creative title for the television show
  • Intended audience demographic
  • Proposed number of episodes
  • Genre (drama, comedy, sitcom; fantasy, sci-fi, mystery, realistic, etc.)
  • Log line (attention getting hook): one or two sentence description of your show, similar to what you might see in a TV guide or on a poster.
  • Series synopsis that includes:
  • what the show is about. Reference your analysis of how the text attempts to represent the experience of growing up American. Textual support is required.
  • the setting
  • key characters. Reference your analysis of point of view and the intentional use of satire, sarcasm, irony, or understatement. Textual support is required.
  • the source of conflict
  • how the series will begin and overall series structure. Reference the discussion of structure you completed in your analysis.
  • audience appeal: why will people want to watch this?

RL11.5 Analyze how an author’s choices concerning how to structure specific parts of a text (e.g., the choice of where to begin or end a story, the choice to provide a comedic or tragic resolution) contribute to its overall structure and meaning as well as its aesthetic impact.
RL11.6 Analyze a case in which grasping a point of view requires distinguishing what is directly stated in a text from what is really meant (e.g., satire, sarcasm, irony, or understatement)
W.11.2 Write informative/explanatory texts to examine and convey complex ideas, concepts, and information clearly and accurately through the effective selection, organization, and analysis of content.
Materials: / Teacher Materials:
  • rubric
  • sample student response
  • Loglines
  • How To Write the Perfect Logline
  • Logline Examples: Good and Bad
  • Logline Examples
  • Logline and Premises
/ Student Materials:
  • novel (and related notes, if completed)
  • rubric
  • sample student response

General Notes: / The PBA should require 1-2 class ninety minute class periods (possibly a partial period for text analysis and 1 period to compose the television series plan.

Student Directions

  1. (This analysis step is essential. Consider it the prewriting needed to include in the actual television series plan.)

Complete an analysis of the novel studied in this unit that includes the following:

  • a discussion of how this text attempts to represent/portray the experience of growing up American.. Consider what aspect(s) of young life is examined and what the author’s purpose is for that examination.
  • an analysis of the novel’s structure. Consider and discuss how the structure of specific parts of the text contribute to its overall meaning and its aesthetic impact.
  • an analysis of the novel’s point of view. Specifically, consider and discuss the intentional use of satire, sarcasm, irony, or understatement and its intended impact on the reader.
  1. Create a plan for a television show based on the analysis of your chosen novel that includes the following:
  • A creative title for the television show
  • Intended audience demographic
  • Proposed number of episodes
  • Genre (drama, comedy, sitcom; fantasy, sci-fi, mystery, realistic, etc.)
  • Log line (short pitch/descriptive Hook): one or two sentence description of your show, similar to what you might see in a TV guide or on a poster.
  • Series synopsis that includes:
  • what the show is about. Reference your analysis of how the text attempts to represent the experience of growing up American. Textual support is required.
  • the setting
  • key characters. Reference your analysis of point of view and the intentional use of satire, sarcasm, irony, or understatement. Textual support is required.
  • the source of conflict
  • how the series will begin and overall series structure. Reference the discussion of structure you completed in your analysis.
  • audience appeal: Why will people want to watch this?

ELA Pilot 11 Unit 1 PBA Rubric

3 / 2 / 1 / 0
Reading Comprehension
Literature
RL.11.5
RL.11.6 / The student response demonstrates fullcomprehension of ideas stated explicitly and/or inferentially, by providing an accurate analysis of how an author’s choices concerning how to structure specific parts of a textcontribute to its overall structure and meaning as well as its aesthetic impact.
The student response demonstrates full comprehension of ideas stated explicitly and/or inferentially by providing an accurate analysis of a case in which grasping a point of view requires distinguishing what is directly stated in as text from what is really meant (e.g., satire, sarcasm, irony, or understatement). / The student response demonstrates comprehension of ideas stated explicitly and/or inferentially by providing a generallyaccurate analysis of how an author’s choices concerning how to structure specific parts of a text contribute to its overall structure and meaning as well as its aesthetic impact.
The student response demonstrates comprehension of ideas of ideas stated explicitly and/or inferentially by providing a generally accurate analysis of a case in which grasping a point of view requires distinguishing what is directly stated from what is really meant (e.g., satire, sarcasm, irony, or understatement). / The student response demonstrates limited comprehension of ideas stated explicitly and/or inferentially by providing a minimally accurate analysis of how an author’s choices to structure specific parts of a text contribute to its overall structure and meaning as well as its aesthetic impact.
The student response demonstrates limited comprehension of ideas stated explicitly and/or inferentially by providing a minimally accurate analysis of a case in which grasping a point of view requires distinguishing what is directly stated in a text from what is really meant (e.g., satire, sarcasm, irony, or understatement). / The student response demonstrates no comprehension of ideas by providing an inaccurate analysis thatdoes not includean analysis of how an author’s choices to structure specific parts of a text contribute to its overall structure and meaning as well as its aesthetic impact.
The student response demonstrates no comprehension of ideas by providing an inaccurate analysis of a case in which grasping a point of view requires distinguishing what is directly stated in a text from what is really meant (e.g., satire, sarcasm, irony, or understatement).
Written Expression
W.11.2 / The student response
addresses the prompt and provides an effective development of the analysis that is appropriate to the task, purpose, and audience;
uses clear reasoning supported by relevant text-based evidence in the development of the analysis;
is organized with clear and coherent writing;
establishes and maintains aneffective style / The student response
addresses the prompt and provides some development of the analysis that is somewhat appropriate to the task, purpose, and audience;
uses some reasoning and text-based evidence in the development of the analysis;
demonstrates some organization with somewhat coherent writing;
has a style that is somewhat effective. / The student response
addresses the prompt and provides minimal development of the analysis that is limited in its appropriateness to the task, purpose, and audience;
uses limited reasoning and text-based evidence in the development of the analysis;
demonstrates limited organization and coherence
has a style that is minimally effective / The student response
is undeveloped and/or inappropriate to the task purpose, and audience
includes little to no text-based evidence in the development of the analysis
lacks organization and coherence;
has an inappropriate style
Knowledge of Language and Conventions / / / The student response to the prompt demonstrates command of the conventions of standard English at an appropriate level of complexity. There may be errors in mechanics, grammar, and usage that occasionally impede understanding, but the meaning is generally clear. / The student response to the prompt does not demonstrate command of the conventions of standard English at the appropriate level of complexity. Frequent and varied errors in mechanics, grammar, and usage impede understanding.

Sample Student Response

Title of Show: Finding Dana

Inspired by Octavia Butler’s Kindred

Intended Audience:

Young Adults: some episodes may contain graphic images and sexual content that may not be appropriate for viewers under 13. Viewer discretion advised.

Number of Episodes:

8: The Prologue,TheRiver, The Fire, The Fall, The Fight, The Storm, The Rope, Epilogue

Genre:

Sci-Fi Drama

Logline:

A strong, independent 26 year old woman time travels to the antebellum South to save her ancestors.

Series Synopsis:

Octavia Butler’sKindredchronicles the journey of 26 year old Dana as she learns thatthe pastdefines her future. She time travels from California in the 1970s to Maryland in the 1800s where she must save a white boy named Rufus Weylin. She quickly realizes that Rufus is not just a boy she needs to save: Dana is there “to insure [her] my family’s survival, [her] my own birth” (Butler29).As she plays this new role, Dana realizes that she must hide her strength in order tosurvive. Through her actions and her speech, Dana convincinglyplays the role as slave. She even goes so far as to feign submissiveness when addressing fellow slaves, saying to Sarah,“‘Mymaster will buy me some better ones sooner or later’ ” (Butler71).Only through Dana’s thoughts will she remind the audience that she is not powerless: she is free.Each episode chronicles her trips to the past: five of them, in fact. With each trip, Dana becomes closer to understanding who she is and who she needs to be.

The series finale leaves Dana in the 1970s. However, she decides to visit theWeylinplantation in Easton, Maryland… or what’s left of it.Although Dana does not fully understand why she is drawn to the place where she lived as a slave, where she was whipped and tormented not once but multiple times, Kevin tells her that“ ‘Youprobably needed to come for the same reason I did.’ He shrugged. ‘To try to understand. To touch solid evidence that those people existed.’ ” (Butler264).Because we are never truly free of the past: that’s the lesson Butler needs us to learn. This is a tale of loss, of strength, of power… and a story that shows us that sometimes we must lose ourselves to find who we are.

Butleris perhaps the only black, female science fiction writer of our generation. She skillfully weaves together the motif of time travel with the themes of racial tensionand powerthat are further examined through a black woman named Dana and her white husband, Kevin. On a surface level, Kindred appears to be a story about the power of love. We may ask ourselves how this love survives over space and time, cringing when Kevin must treat Dana not as a wife but as a slave, anxiously waiting to find out what happens to Kevin when he becomes trapped in the 1800s for years without Dana. We don’t know. And perhaps she doesn’t want us to know.

Because the truth is, this is not a love story. This is a story that warns our generation what can happen when you become blind to the inequality around you, when you begin to accept that maybe you don’t deserve more than you’ve received. Dana’s bond with Kevin is logical, not emotional. More than love connects these two characters: it is acceptance that binds them with one another. This acceptance of one another is what allows Dana to realize just how strong she actually is when abruptly thrown in to life or death situations.

As she travels back and forth between the past and present, the line between Dana's experiences in the 1970s and the 1800s blur, with the motif of time travel never fully addressed, focusing not on the mechanics of time travelling but on the results. Butler blurs this line to show that we are never truly free of our past: as Dana’s view on home adapts and changes, she begins to question where she belongs and acknowledges how quickly someone accepts his or her place in society. This is how our society allowed hundreds of women and men to be sold into slavery and forced to live in deplorable conditions. This is how our society allowed innocent children to be stripped of dignity, respect, and hope. This is how our society becomes immoral. This is how our society becomes corrupt…and this is how our society still allows for this unjustness today.

Dana is never free of the past because we are never truly free of the past: that’s both the tragedy and beauty of it all. We are all part of a much larger purpose, and this purpose requires us to remember the mistakes of the ones who came before us so as not to repeat them in the present.Surrounded by shows like Game of Thrones and Walking Dead, our youth become inundated with make believe. Octavia Butler’s Kindred is not a tale of make believe. It is a warning against intolerance, inequality, and most notably, indifference. America is never free of the mistakes our country made when we decided that power was worth more than a human life.

Baltimore County Public Schools Spring 2016

Secondary English Language Arts

Top View