Lesson Plan # 5

Title: Comparing Theme

Lesson Overview: In this lesson, students will work to compare and contrast the themes
representing in two medieval tales. Students will first define theme, then describe the
theme of two works, and finally compare and contrast the two themes.
Resources or Materials Needed:
Favorite Medieval Tales by Mary Pope Osborne,pencils,readingjournals,plotdiagrams,
compare/contrastsentenceframes,themesentenceframe
Standards:
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.4.1
Refer to details and examples in a text when explaining what the text says explicitly and
when drawing inferences from the text.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.4.2
Determine a theme of a story, drama, or poem from details in the text; summarize the
text.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.4.9
Compare and contrast the treatment of similar themes and topics and patterns of events in
stories, myths, and traditional literature from different cultures.
Lesson Objectives: Given two literary works from within the same genre, students will
refer to specific textual evidence as they synthesize information from the texts in order to
compare and contrast, verbally and/or in writing, the themes presented in the works,
scoring at least three out of four on the theme rubric.
Time: Approximately two hours

Step 1: Pre-Instructional Activities:

Oh Game
Have students guess the message that one is trying to convey by saying, Oh in a
specific way. This will help to orient students to the concept of theme, in that what is
directly said may have greater implications. Students will use the terminology, explicit
and implicit. Example: What was explicitly said? Oh. What was implicitly said? I
am so bored.
Step 2: Content Presentation
1. What is theme? The teacher will connect the Oh Game activity to the definition of
theme.
2. The teacher will give examples of themes in recently read texts and well know
movies
3. Introduction of the theme sentence frame: ____is___, because____. Example:
Bravery is an essential quality for a good hero because it helps heroes take risks
for others.
4. Monitor students for comprehension, ensuring students are not just citing topics
5. After students have a grasp of how to use the frame and are appropriately
identifying themes, the teacher will task students to try combining the compare
and contrast frames from lesson four with the theme framesthe teacher will
model prior to releasing students to work in pairs.
6. The teacher will monitor as students compare and contrast themes from wellknown movies and recently read texts.
7. The teacher will urge students to consider characters responses to conflict and
character traits as they think about the overall theme of works.
Step 3: Learner Participation
1. Students will use appropriate resources to determine the meaning of theme.

2. Students will record and share theme frames from well-known movies as they
work in pairs.
3. Students will participate in a conversation about the difference between topic
and theme.
4. Students will use a combination of compare and contrast frames and the theme
frame in order to compare and contrast themes from recently read texts and wellknown movies.
5. Students will first work in pairs, then independently, as they gradually show
competence with the frames.
Step 4: Assessment and Evaluation Method
For informal assessment, the students will complete sentence frames that convey
an understanding of theme, and how two themes can be compared. Students will orally
share the work they complete with partners. Students will later record a comparison of
theme in two works as an exit ticket so that the teacher can determine if students are
ready for a formal assessment.
Summative assessment: The students will compare and contrast the themes
represented in two literary works of the same genre. Directions, and the rubric with which
students will be assessed, appear in appendix K.

Step 5: Follow-Through Activities

Students will continue to use their knowledge of theme as they work through the
remainder of this unit. Furthermore, understanding the concept of theme, and being able
to communicate such an understanding, will prove beneficial as students take on
increasingly more complex texts through out their school careers. The sentence frames
will prove to be useful in class conversations and in their further writing.