Subject: Language Arts Grade: Seven

Standard: #3 Literary Response and Analysis

Key Concept: Points of view in writing indicate how the work is to be read. By retelling a story in a different point of view, a different understanding of the story and a more complete understanding of characterization may emerge.

Generalization: Students will choose a different character in the short novel, The Cay by Theodore Taylor, as they retell the story.

Background: Students have read the novel. They have been studying point of view in literature as one important element. This lesson focuses on using the same content to focus on different points of view. All students know the story told in the book.

This lesson is tiered in content according to interest.

A special note on grouping: For this task, groups of three or four (maximum) are preferred. This is to ensure maximum interest and focus by each member. More than one group per character is fine. All students should work with the point of view they prefer.

Tier I: Students Interested in Timothy's Point of View

These students will retell the story from Timothy's point of view. Before they meet in their group, they will write ideas down that they think best characterize Timothy and how he responded to the following events:

The wreck of the S.S. Hato

The weather while they were on the sea

Phillip's blindness

Survival on the raft

Landing on the Cay

Building the hut

The need for a "jumbi"

Friendship and caring

The tempest

Any other aspects they think are important concerning Timothy are encouraged. As a group, discuss ideas on writing the story from Timothy's point of view. Important to Timothy's character is his dialect. The retelling of timothy's story must be done using his special Caribbean dialect. When this group tells its story, it should do it with dialect. .

Tier II: Students Interested in Stew Cat's Point of View

These students will retell the events of the story from Stew Cat's Point of View. Again, before meeting in the group, students will generate ideas concerning the following events:

The wreck of the S.S. Hato

The food at sea

The weather

Phillip's blindness

Survival on the raft

Landing on the Cay

Timothy's strange ideas about him (Stew Cat)

The tempest

Timothy's death

The rescue

Since Stew Cat is a cat, any meows that the group wants to add in the retelling are fair. This can be a very creative retelling but must be true to the story and what we know about the cat.

Tier III: Students Interested in Mrs. Enright's Point of View

Students in this group need to retell the events of the story from Phillip's mother's point of view. This is difficult because the reader knows less about her than about the other two above. However, there is enough to do a good retelling. The student will need to speculate a bit from the information provided from the beginning and the end of the story. To be included are the following elements:

The wreck of the S. S. Hato

The reason for leaving Curacao

Her fear of the war

What happened to her when she was rescued

How she feared for her son

Her change in attitude and return to Curacao

How she felt when she received the call that Phillip had been found

Phillip's blindness

Phillip's operation

Students should stay as close to what they know from the text as possible, but may speculate what they think happened from her point of view.

Assessment: Since all students read the same content, this will be a terrific sharing among them. Each group can share the reading responsibility or groups could split into new groups of one person per point of view to share the different retelling tasks in a smaller unit (of course this depends on how many students chose each point of view). Each group should turn in a group project of their story for assessment at the end.

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7LI-FAD