Lesson 12 - Analyzing "The Tell-Tale Heart"

🕐 Lesson Overview

Bellringer - Turn & Talk
Point of View in "The Tell-Tale Heart"
Begin working on RACECE Paragraph

⭐ Objectives

I can identify the mood and tone of a literary text.
I can analyze how an author’s choices create mood and tone.

📏 Standards

🗽 NYSNGSS

8R4:
Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, including figurative and connotative meanings. Analyze the impact of specific word choices on meaning, tone, and mood, including words with multiple meanings.
8R6 - RL:
In literary texts, analyze how the differences between the point of view, perspectives of the characters, the audience, or reader create effects such as mood and tone.
8W5:
Draw evidence from literary or informational texts to support analysis, reflection, and research. Apply the grade 8 Reading Standards to both literary and informational text, where applicable.

🗒️ Lesson Plan

Anticipatory Set

As a bellringer, students will engage in a Turn & Talk in which they must brainstorm words they would use to describe the mood and the tone in "The Tell-Tale Heart." The teacher will take attendance as students brainstorm. Students will then share their ideas in a Whip around the Room. The teacher will record students' ideas in a T-chart on the board (one column for mood, one for tone). The class will then review the agenda and objectives.

Developmental Activity

The teacher will briefly review the difference between first-person and third-person narration in a story. The teacher should show screenshots from video games as visual examples: Mario Kart is a third-party game because the player can see their selected character; a racing game where the player can shift the camera to behind the wheel is first-person. The teacher will share that readers can tell the difference between the two by asking themselves about the narrator's role — are they a character in the story or separated from it — and the language used (I, me, and my vs. he said/she said). The teacher will then ask the class which point of view "The Tell-Tale Heart" is told from.

Once established, students will engage in a Turn & Talk around the following prompts.

Why did Poe choose to tell the story from the murderer’s point of view? What impact does it have on the story?

How would “The Tell-Tale Heart” be different if it were written from the old man’s point of view? What about the police officer’s? Think about how the tone would be different!

The teacher will allow students a few minutes to discuss then invite them to share their responses. After each question is sufficiently discussed, the teacher will connect to prior learning: writers can use point of view to create the mood and tone of the story.

The teacher will then review the prompt and graphic organizer for "The Tell-Tale Heart" Paragraph. The teacher will provide a scaffold for the first "CE" section of the paragraph by recommending that students relate the point of view of the story to the tone; the teacher may also recommend that students look in the early paragraphs of the story for this evidence, where the narrator insists to the reader that he is not mad and discusses the old man's eye. For the second "CE," students will have to locate their own evidence, but they may use the scaffolds from Lesson 9 - Mood & Tone to help guide their search (word choice, sentence structure and punctuation, imagery, and figurative language). The teacher will also remind students of the quote integration diagram in their journals from Lesson 7 - RACE Review.

Closure

Students will work on "The Tell-Tale Heart" Paragraph. The teacher will circulate to assist them in the writing process.

⚙️ Modifications

An additional class day of writing and revising time may be provided to students.