Time Needed: seven weeks for the unit, with one week for the culminating project, depending on the amount of time provided in class, depth/complexity of the student projects
Curriculum-Framing Questions:
Essential Questions
- Why read a play over 400 years old? or
- What does Romeo and Juliet have to do with today?
Unit Questions
- What evidence of sixteenth century Elizabethan history is represented in the play?
- How does Shakespeare still speak to a twenty-first century audience?
- What dramatic forms are represented in Romeo and Juliet?
- What poetic conventions does Shakespeare use in Romeo and Juliet?
- How are literary themes represented in the play?
- What devices does Shakespeare use to shape the characters in Romeo and Juliet?
- What contemporary issues are represented in Romeo and Juliet?
Content Questions
- What is imagery, and what are some examples of how Shakespeare uses imagery in Romeo and Juliet to present a compelling and powerful message?
- What are the themes and issues in Romeo and Juliet that are relevant to today?
Students will understand that
- Blind alliances and judgments can led to destructive consequences.
- Love is sometimes irrational - passion sometimes colors perception.
Students will know
- How to define tragedy
- The characteristics of iambic pentameter
- The characteristics of sonnets and soliloquies
- Poetic literary terms and devices
Students will be able to
- Identify the literary elements and devices that Shakespeare uses to develop characters.
- Express through writing their thoughtful opinions of the text.
- Identify how directors interpret text differently.
Content and Topics
- Plotline
- Dramatic form
- Historical context
- Character development
- Poetic conventions
- Chronology of the play
- Themes explored
Resources: Online Text and Text;
Mini-Lesson Outline:
Day 1 - The teacher, as during all the school year, introduces a discussion about why people like a good story.
- What is it about the writing of characters that helps them “come alive” off the page?
- What kind of characters can students identify with?
- What do stories do for us, anyway?
- Are they just a means of escaping into fantasy?
The teacher will then, present and discuss the Essential Question that is used all year: How does literature help us better understand ourselves? The teacher will lead a discussion about the study's essential questions, unit questions, and content questions. The teacher will then have students complete the following questions on the board.
- What do you think you know about Romeo and Juliet?
- What questions do you wonder about in Romeo and Juliet?
- How will you find the answers to your questions?
Day 2 - The teacher will give a multimedia presentation on William Shakespeare and the Elizabethan Era of England (i.e., brief look at the geography, history, fashions, food, women, medicine, and entertainment). For homework students can choose an area of interest to research further and then bring in images, drawings, or examples of any of the following from sixteenth century England: the people, places, foods, fashion, music or musical instruments.
Day 3 - Each student will share his/her sixteenth century find from England to be displayed in the presentation display area. Students may volunteer to construct a display of the collection. The teacher will share a multimedia presentation about the Globe Theatre and Virtual Tour of the Globe Theatre (e.g., the theater in society, the Globe and its neighbors, actors, companies, gender, scenery, experience of watching a play).
After any questions and discussion by the class, the teacher will provide slips of paper with character descriptions from Romeo and Juliet. For homework, students must remember to be prepared with their required supplies of index cards, scissors, and glue sticks. Students will also read page 478 to 480 in the text.
Day 4 - The teacher will introduce two of the plays many themes - "the feud between families" and "love and hate." To highlight the theme of division, students will take their index cards and then divide and label them into two piles. One pile will be labeled "Montague" on each of the card's sides. The other pile will be labeled "Capulet" on each of the card's sides. Using the character slips that the teacher provided, students will match family members and their friends and servants to be family-labeled cards. Students will paste character description slips on each of the cards. [The cards can be used first to learn the drama's players and later to study when preparing for quiz assessment.]
Day 5 - Tragedy and a Prologue: The teacher will read from the text on pages 403 and 404 about the definitions of "tragedy" and "comedy."
Secondly the teacher will discuss the setting: "The play Romeo and Juliet takes place, most generally, in the cities of Verona and Mantua, Italy, over the course of four short days. The setting is a representative place, meaning that the stage represents an actual place. All of the scenes occur in Verona, except Act V, scene 1, which takes place in the city of Mantua. Verona is the home of the Capulet and Montague families. Mantua is where Romeo is banished after he kills Tybalt. A majority of the action in the play takes place out-of-doors in Verona, from the fruitful Capulet orchard where Romeo and Juliet profess their love, to the bleak Capulet tomb where the lovers take their lives. The vision of the world that is suggested by the setting is social, in spite of the political connotations that arise when the lovers are told that they are to hate each other because of their names. The action neither befell a war between states, nor is it an abstraction. Much of the action of the play is centered on the civil disorder that occurs between the Capulet and Montague families."
The teacher will explain how both tragedy and setting are both introduced in the Prologue of Act I. The teacher will read the Prologue and relate its use to the chorus of old Greek plays. For homework, students will check the glossary in the text to write definition of "sonnet."
Day 6 - The class will continue a content discussion of the Prologue. Students will share the definition discovery of "sonnet." The teacher will help the class discover how the Prologue meets the definition of a sonnet.
The teacher will provide the template handout students will receive for each act's scene. Items on the handout include act, scene, setting, main characters, vocabulary words, literary elements, sequence of events and timeline. Each student will complete a handout for each scene in the play. The teacher will post literary elements and vocabulary element as needed.
The class will read Act I, scene i, while listening to an audio recording. The teacher will stop the recording as needed for clarification and discussion of plot elements, Elizabethan English, and literary terms. Literary terms for Act I, scene i, are pun, allusion, aside, characterization, metaphor, simile, oxymoron.
The teacher can present the following questions as appropriate:
- How do the metaphors help to paint a picture of Romeo’s state of mind?
- How does that imagery affect how we judge Romeo's true intentions or inclinations?
- How does the use of imagery add to the mood of this scene?
- How does the imagery affect the way we respond to this scene?
Day 7 - The teacher will provide the template handout students will receive for each act's scene. Items on the handout include act, scene, setting, main characters, vocabulary words, literary elements, sequence of events and timeline. Each student will complete a handout for each scene in the play. The teacher will post literary elements and vocabulary element as needed.
The class will read Act I, scene ii, while listening to an audio recording. The teacher will stop the recording as needed for clarification and discussion of plot elements, Elizabethan English, and literary terms. Literary terms for Act I, scene ii, are irony and analogy.
The teacher can present the following questions as appropriate:
- How do the metaphors help to paint a picture of Romeo’s state of mind?
- How does that imagery affect how we judge Romeo's true intentions or inclinations?
- How does the use of imagery add to the mood of this scene?
- How does the imagery affect the way we respond to this scene?
Day 8 - The teacher will provide the template handout students will receive for each act's scene. Items on the handout include act, scene, setting, main characters, vocabulary words, literary elements, sequence of events and timeline. Each student will complete a handout for each scene in the play. The teacher will post literary elements and vocabulary element as needed.
The class will read Act I, scene iii, while listening to an audio recording. The teacher will stop the recording as needed for clarification and discussion of plot elements, Elizabethan English, and literary terms. Literary terms for Act I, scene iii, are foil and comic relief.
Day 9 - The teacher will provide the template handout students will receive for each act's scene. Items on the handout include act, scene, setting, main characters, vocabulary words, literary elements, sequence of events and timeline. Each student will complete a handout for each scene in the play. The teacher will post literary elements and vocabulary element as needed.
The class will read Act I, scene iv, while listening to an audio recording. The teacher will stop the recording as needed for clarification and discussion of plot elements, Elizabethan English, and literary terms. Literary terms for Act I, scene iv, are pun, foil, characterization, foreshadowing, monologue.
The teacher can present the following questions as appropriate:
- How does the use of imagery add to the mood of this scene?
- How does the imagery affect the way we respond?
The class will discuss the imagery in Mercutio's speech about Queen Mab. For homework, each student will create a drawing of Queen Mab from Mercutio's description.
Day 10 - The teacher will provide the template handout students will receive for each act's scene. Items on the handout include act, scene, setting, main characters, vocabulary words, literary elements, sequence of events and timeline. Each student will complete a handout for each scene in the play. The teacher will post literary elements and vocabulary element as needed.
The class will read Act I, scene v, while listening to an audio recording. The teacher will stop the recording as needed for clarification and discussion of plot elements, Elizabethan English, and literary terms. Literary terms for Act I, scene v, are metaphor, sonnet, aside, irony. The teacher can present the following questions as appropriate:
- How does the use of imagery add to the mood of this scene?
- How do the metaphors help to paint a picture of not only Juliet, but Romeo’s state of mind?
- How does that imagery affect how we judge Romeo's true intentions or inclinations?
- How does the use of imagery add to the mood of this scene?
- How does the imagery affect the way we respond to this scene?
- Considering how Romeo talks about Juliet, what does that suggest about Romeo's character and primary focus?
XXXXXX SONNET CONCEIT PILGRIMAGE XXXXXXX
Day 11 - The teacher will show Act I of the movie Romeo and Juliet.
Day 12 - The teacher will provide the template handout students will receive for each act's scene. Items on the handout include act, scene, setting, main characters, vocabulary words, literary elements, sequence of events and timeline. Each student will complete a handout for each scene in the play. The teacher will post literary elements and vocabulary element as needed.
The class will read Act II, scenes i and ii, while listening to an audio recording. The teacher will stop the recording as needed for clarification and discussion of plot elements, Elizabethan English, and literary terms. Literary terms for Act II, scenes i and ii, are metaphor, irony, personification, imagery, and analogy. The teacher can present the following questions as appropriate:
- How does the use of imagery add to the mood of this scene?
- How do the metaphors help to paint a picture of not only Juliet, but Romeo’s state of mind?
- How does that imagery affect how we judge Romeo's true intentions or inclinations?
- How does the use of imagery add to the mood of this scene?
- How does the imagery affect the way we respond to this scene?
- Considering how Romeo talks about Juliet, what does that suggest about Romeo's character and primary focus?
For homework, student will paraphrase Romeo's soliloquy, lines 1 through 32, and Juliet's soliloquy, lines 85 - 106.
Day 13 - The teacher will provide the template handout students will receive for each act's scene. Items on the handout include act, scene, setting, main characters, vocabulary words, literary elements, sequence of events and timeline. Each student will complete a handout for each scene in the play. The teacher will post literary elements and vocabulary element as needed.The class will read Act II, scenes iii and iv, while listening to an audio recording. The teacher will stop the recording as needed for clarification and discussion of plot elements, Elizabethan English, and literary terms. Literary terms for Act II, scenes iii and iv, are personification, metaphor, irony, dramatic irony, simile, soliloquy, monologue, aside, and foil.
The teacher can present the following questions as appropriate:
- How does the use of imagery add to the mood of this scene?
- How do the metaphors help to paint a picture of not only Juliet, but Romeo’s state of mind?
- How does that imagery affect how we judge Romeo's true intentions or inclinations?
- How does the use of imagery add to the mood of this scene?
- How does the imagery affect the way we respond to this scene?
- Considering how Romeo talks about Juliet, what does that suggest about Romeo's character and primary focus?
Day 14 - The teacher will give the Act I quiz.
The teacher will provide the template handout students will receive for each act's scene. Items on the handout include act, scene, setting, main characters, vocabulary words, literary elements, sequence of events and timeline. Each student will complete a handout for each scene in the play. The teacher will post literary elements and vocabulary element as needed.
The class will read Act II, scenes v and vi, while listening to an audio recording. The teacher will stop the recording as needed for clarification and discussion of plot elements, Elizabethan English, and literary terms. Literary terms for Act II, scene v and vi, are listed for Day 13.
The teacher can present the following questions as appropriate:
- How does the use of imagery add to the mood of this scene?
- How do the metaphors help to paint a picture of not only Juliet, but Romeo’s state of mind?
- How does that imagery affect how we judge Romeo's true intentions or inclinations?
- How does the use of imagery add to the mood of this scene?
- How does the imagery affect the way we respond to this scene?
- Considering how Romeo talks about Juliet, what does that suggest about Romeo's character and primary focus?
Day 15 - The teacher will show Act II of the movie Romeo and Juliet.
Day 16 - The teacher will discuss the following as an introduction to Act III:
- Reversal - the turning point where the forces of the conflict come thogether and the situation either begin to improve (comedy) or get worse (tragedy)
- Dramatic irony - words or acts of a character in a play tha may carry a meaning unperceived by himsel but understood by the audience (Usually the character's own interest are involved in a way that he cannot understand)
- Climax - The high point to which the plot consistently builds
The class will watch Elizabethan Streetfighting from Floger.edu
For a final project presentation, students will collect items and create an artifact box for a character in Romeo and Juliet. Each student will include symbols for the character's personality, as well as his or her story.
Day 17 - The teacher will give the Act II quiz.
Day 18 - The teacher will provide the template handout students will receive for each act's scene. Items on the handout include act, scene, setting, main characters, vocabulary words, literary elements, sequence of events and timeline. Each student will complete a handout for each scene in the play. The teacher will post literary elements and vocabulary element as needed.
The class will read Act III, scene i, while listening to an audio recording. The teacher will stop the recording as needed for clarification and discussion of plot elements, Elizabethan English, and literary terms. Literary terms for Act II, scene i, are heroic couplet, simile, epithet, allusion, dramatic irony, irony, and climax.
The class will discuss the escalating violence between the families and the similarities of situations in a current day.
Day 19 - The teacher will provide the template handout students will receive for each act's scene. Items on the handout include act, scene, setting, main characters, vocabulary words, literary elements, sequence of events and timeline. Each student will complete a handout for each scene in the play. The teacher will post literary elements and vocabulary element as needed.
The class will read Act III, scene ii, while listening to an audio recording. The teacher will stop the recording as needed for clarification and discussion of plot elements, Elizabethan English, and literary terms. Literary terms for Act II, scene ii, are allusion, metaphor, and foreshadowing.
Day 20 - The teacher will provide the template handout students will receive for each act's scene. Items on the handout include act, scene, setting, main characters, vocabulary words, literary elements, sequence of events and timeline. Each student will complete a handout for each scene in the play. The teacher will post literary elements and vocabulary element as needed.
The class will read Act III, scenes iii and iv, while listening to an audio recording. The teacher will stop the recording as needed for clarification and discussion of plot elements, Elizabethan English, and literary terms. Literary terms for Act II, scenes iii and iv, are heroic couplet, simile, epithet, allusion, dramatic irony, irony, and climax.
The class will discuss the explosive scene between Juliet and her father, framing it with the lens of what was expected of children, especially, girls, during that time period. The class will discuss what has and has not changed in parent-teenage relationships.
For homework, students will paraphrase Friar Laurence's speech in lines 108 through 154.
Day 21 - The teacher will provide the template handout students will receive for each act's scene. Items on the handout include act, scene, setting, main characters, vocabulary words, literary elements, sequence of events and timeline. Each student will complete a handout for each scene in the play. The teacher will post literary elements and vocabulary element as needed.
The class will read Act III, scene v, while listening to an audio recording. The teacher will stop the recording as needed for clarification and discussion of plot elements, Elizabethan English, and literary terms. Literary terms for Act II, scene v, are metaphor, personification, symbolism, foreshadowing, irony, dramatic irony, and aside.
Day 22 - The teacher will show Act III of the movie Romeo and Juliet.
Day 23 - The teacher will discuss meter and iambic pentameter;
- Introduce iambic pentameter with the reading of Green Eggs and Ham.
- Have the class clap out the beat of the lines to better hear the iambic pentameter.
- Explain how Shakespeare uses the rhythms that are already in language to create the patterns in a line of poetry.
- Clap out the example "But soft, what light in yonder window breaks?"
- Discuss and illustrate how Shakespeare mostly wrote in blank verse, which is a metric pattern composed of lines of unrhymed iambic pentameter.
The teacher will lead a discussion about the explosive scene between Juliet and her father, framing it with the lens of what was expected of children, especially girls, during that time period. The class can discuss what has and has not changed in parent-teenage relationships.
Day 24 - The teacher will give Act III quiz.
Day 25 - The teacher will provide the template handout students will receive for each act's scene. Items on the handout include act, scene, setting, main characters, vocabulary words, literary elements, sequence of events and timeline. Each student will complete a handout for each scene in the play. The teacher will post literary elements and vocabulary element as needed.
The class will read Act IV scene i, while listening to an audio recording. The teacher will stop the recording as needed for clarification and discussion of plot elements, Elizabethan English, and literary terms. Literary terms for Act IV, scene i, are allusion, aside, irony, and imagery.
The class will discuss the impact of Juliet's "first" death and the Friar's involvement.
The class will discuss what "fate" is. The teacher will presente the idea of fate as understood in the time of Shakespeare. The teacher will ask were "fate" intervenes in the play. The teacher will present for discussion another quote from a play that shows a different look at fate that admits that what happens to us may have more to do with our own shortfalls than fate:
"The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our fate/ But in ourselves that we are underlings." - Julius Caesar
Day 26 - The teacher will provide the template handout students will receive for each act's scene. Items on the handout include act, scene, setting, main characters, vocabulary words, literary elements, sequence of events and timeline. Each student will complete a handout for each scene in the play. The teacher will post literary elements and vocabulary element as needed.
The class will read Act IV, scenes ii and iii, while listening to an audio recording. The teacher will stop the recording as needed for clarification and discussion of plot elements, Elizabethan English, and literary terms. Literary terms for Act IV, scenes ii and iii, irony and conflict.
For homework, students will paraphrase Juliet's soliloquy in Act IV, scene iii, lines 14 - 56.
Day 27 - The teacher will provide the template handout students will receive for each act's scene. Items on the handout include act, scene, setting, main characters, vocabulary words, literary elements, sequence of events and timeline. Each student will complete a handout for each scene in the play. The teacher will post literary elements and vocabulary element as needed.
The class will read Act IV, scenes iv and v, while listening to an audio recording. The teacher will stop the recording as needed for clarification and discussion of plot elements, Elizabethan English, and literary terms. Literary terms for Act IV, scenes iv and v, are irony, simile, and personification.
Day 28 - The teacher will provide the template handout students will receive for each act's scene. Items on the handout include act, scene, setting, main characters, vocabulary words, literary elements, sequence of events and timeline. Each student will complete a handout for each scene in the play. The teacher will post literary elements and vocabulary element as needed.
The class will read Act V, scenes i and ii, while listening to an audio recording. The teacher will stop the recording as needed for clarification and discussion of plot elements, Elizabethan English, and literary terms. Literary terms for Act V, scenes i and ii, are irony and metaphor.
Day 29 - The teacher will provide the template handout students will receive for each act's scene. Items on the handout include act, scene, setting, main characters, vocabulary words, literary elements, sequence of events and timeline. Each student will complete a handout for each scene in the play. The teacher will post literary elements and vocabulary element as needed.
The class will read Act V, scene iii, while listening to an audio recording. The teacher will stop the recording as needed for clarification and discussion of plot elements, Elizabethan English, and literary terms. Literary terms for Act V, scene iii, are aside, metaphor, conflict, personification, irony, resolution.
For homework, students will paraphrase Friar Laurence's speech in lines 229 - 269.
Day 30 - The teacher will show Acts IV and V of the movie Romeo and Juliet.
Day 31 - The teacher will help the class list contemporary teen problems. The class can discuss what has and has not changed since Shakespeare's time. On a chart, the class can compare and contrast contemporary teen issues to the teen issues in Romeo and Juliet. In small groups, students can determine alternative solutions to the problems in the play using a contemporary context (i.e., If this happened today, how might the problems have been solved?)
Day 32 - Together the class will identify and describe the play's five elements of plotline by completing a diagram.
Each student will compose a four to six line epitaph for either Romeo or Juliet using iambic pentameter.
Day 33 - The teacher will give the quiz for Acts IV and V.
Days 33, 34, 35 - Each student will present an artifact box project.
