Subject:ESL/American History/Art

Grade Level: 10-12

Materials: Poems: "Mother to Son," "Dream Deferred," "Dream Variations," "Theme From English B," "I, Too, Sing America," and "The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain" by Langston Hughes and "We Wear the Mask" by Paul Lawrence Dunbar; play: "A Raisin in the Sun" by Lorraine Hansberry; Slides: "Blues" by Archibald Motley and "Into Slavery" by Aaron Douglas; prints of artwork by other African American artists; article: "Bombing of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church"; recordings of various African American performing artists: Billie Holiday, Mabel Mercer, Ella Fitzgerald, etc.

About: Students read, analyze, and discuss poems and relate them to their own life experiences, as well as to what they have learned about the African American experience in their history classes. They write original poems about their own experiences, using the poems we have read as models. They select other poems by African American writers, and study and teach them to the class, using methodology they have learned in class. Students examine artwork and describe what they see. They learn how to analyze a work of art in terms of composition, color, theme, etc.

Students are asked to choose a topic for a PowerPoint presentation and written report. Topics have included: "The Cotton Club of Harlem"; "The Abbysinian Baptist Church"; "Louis Armstrong"; and "Paul Robeson." The first part of the project is a two-page typed report that include a bibliography. The second part is a Power Point presentation that include visual images and, if relevant, audio. The presentation must include 10 homework questions as well as as five new vocabulary words.

This program draws materials and ideas from across the curriculum. Students get a sense of the interrelation of history, politics, personal biography, art, and music. They use the computer as a tool for learning and teaching, rather than just for entertainment. By working independently on a subject of their choosing, students learn how to do Internet research and to evaluate the reliability of the information they find.

In implementing the PowerPoint segment of the syllabus, teachers establish and enforce a strict timetable. Students work at different rates, of course, but too often time on the computer is used inefficiently. They need to know the due dates for each section of the project. It really helps to break down the project into benchmarks with understood completion dates, and to have students do the research before they begin working on their slides. This way, their work can be edited before it is transferred to the slide.

Beth Elstein

elsteinbe@aol.com

Louis D. Brandeis H.S.
145 West 84th Street
New York, NY 10024

Beth Elstein, a former CPA who began teaching high school ESL twelve years ago, is currently on the staff of Louis D. Brandeis High School. Her professional activities have included writing and evaluating test items for the NYSESLAT examination and review of questions for the ELA Regents exam. She has worked extensively with both Theater Development Fund and the Shakespeare Society, as well as the school arts program at Lincoln Center, to bring teaching artists into her classroom. She and her students regularly attend New York Philharmonic School Day Concerts and open rehearsals, as well as exhibitions at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. They have also taken literary tours of Salem and Concord, Massachusetts.

Important documents for this lesson plan.