This lesson plan highlights one episode in the "Divine Comedy" to provide students with an introduction to Dante's poem. After a brief introduction to the opening of the "Divine Comedy," which portrays Dante as a pilgrim guided by the poet Virgil on a journey through the Christian afterlife toward God, students read Canto 5 of…

This lesson plan complements study of plot and characterization in "Romeo and Juliet" by focusing on Shakespeare's use of lyric forms and conventions to spotlight moments in the drama and thereby heightens the impact of the action on the stage. Students look first at the sonnet in which Romeo and Juliet meet, analyzing the imagery to…

Anthologists and editors prepare the way for poetry readers, selecting works that reward close reading and assisting interpretation through annotation. But on the Internet people can return to poetry in its native state--one set of words among many others competing for appreciation--and read with fresh eyes. The learning objectives of this lesson…

This annotated bibliography contains 42 titles of teenager-selected favorite books, all of them published or reprinted between 1986 and 2000. Along with the bibliography is a 13-step rubric for evaluating adolescent literature. (NKA)

The presentation of American style of perception and expectations for group behavior has often been avoided by professional history. Afro-American history has a unique contribution to make in exploring the myths of identity which have held our culture together. (Author/KM)

A reevaluation of novelist Richard Wright's first book, which is a collection of five short stories-- Big Boy Leaves Home,'' Down by the Riverside,'' Long Black Song,'' Fire and Cloud,'' and Bright and Morning Star''--and an introductory essay, The Ethics of Living Jim Crow.'' (JM)

Painting and poetry are analyzed to exemplify education of the variety represented by the humanities movement, education which is designed to help people live rather than to merely earn a living. (Author/KM)

A sense of the value of history-as-study encourages students and teachers to find more opportunities for spontaneous examples of insightful historical study. (Author/KM)

A framework is offered with which to reconstruct Antimasonry and sectarian radicalism of the 1820's, as well as for other mass movements of the ante-bellum period. (Author/KM)

The state of research and the need for new and productive directions are examined while exploring the relationship of the historian to the study of the film industry. (Author/KM)

An assessment of the possibilities that schools will continue to evolve and adapt to changing circumstances as they have in the past, and that actual change in the classroom - at least on a large scale - will never match the frenzied rhetoric that has come to characterize discussions of educational problems both in the specialized journals and the…

Analyzes books in black literature selected to represent certain main lines of development in autobiography, fiction, poetry and criticism; the essay is limited in its coverage to books bearing a 1972 copyright. (Author/JM)

Abrahams' theme is the attempt of black men to regain their manhood and self-respect, which alone can help them to achieve true freedom in a world dominated by white men: how this is to be done is the subject of three novels, using three different political situations. (Author/JM)

Considered the fact that the scores of high school students taking the entrace tests for college acceptance have steadily declined. Author analyzed the validity of the testing process. (RK)