Unit Plan: Critical Literacy

English Language Arts / Grade 4-7

Big Ideas

Texts can be understood from a variety of perspectives. (Grades 4-5)

Exploring and sharing multiple perspectives extends our thinking. (Grades 6-7)

Concepts:

  • Reflection
  • Values
  • Beliefs
  • Perspective
  • Social Justice
Essential Questions

Students will keep considering…

  • What does it mean to be critically literate? 
  • What is the relationship between critical literacy and social justice? 
  • How do our personal values, beliefs, and perspectives influence our understanding of texts? 
  • How do texts communicate social relationships? 
  • What does it mean to consider a different perspective?
  • What strategies can readers use to critically analyze texts in a critical manner?
Evaluative Criteria

Teacher Evaluative Criteria:

Juxtaposing:
> Ability to compare texts

> Social implications of values, beliefs, perspectives are considered

> Depth of analysis- textual evidence used to support ideas

Switching:
> Ability to make switches in a text and show the impact of a switch on the text

Summative:
> Evidence that Critical Literacy skills have been applied

> Social implications are addressed, e.g., race, gender.

> Depth of analysis

> Textual evidence used to support ideas

Monitoring Progress

Teacher will monitor progress:

N/A

Potential Student Misunderstandings:

N/A

Resources

UNIT RESOURCES

PROFESSIONAL RESOURCES FOR CRITICAL LITERACY

Reflection

How will teachers and their students reflect on and evaluate the completed project?

Teacher:
Next time I teach this unit I would…

Student:
My students needed:

Process:
Product:
Content:

 

Potential Student Misunderstanding:

  • Students might assume that a story is just a story and does not communicate information about values and beliefs.
  • Students may forget to “read” the pictures along with the text and may need scaffolding to use viewing strategies to deconstruct the images.
  • Students may need concept of textual evidence reinforced and modeled several times.
  • Students may need additional practice identifying perspectives present, take time each day to model identifying perspectives for students. It is possible to extend this into other areas such as social-emotional learning and conflict resolution by having students identify and explain the perspective of others involved in real life situations.
Downloads

Stage 1 – Desired Results

Big Ideas

Texts can be understood from a variety of perspectives. (Grades 4-5)

Exploring and sharing multiple perspectives extends our thinking. (Grades 6-7)

 

Concepts:

  • Reflection
  • Values
  • Beliefs
  • Perspective
  • Social Justice
Transfer Goals

Students will be able to independently use their learning to…

 

  • Read texts in a reflective manner in order to understand power, inequality, and injustice in human relationships.
  • Reflect on the role their own perspectives, values, and beliefs play in understanding a text.
  • Analyze a text from multiple perspectives, including perspectives excluded from the text.
  • Consider the social implications of a text and identify personal actions that can be taken towards a just society.
Meaning

UNIT UNDERSTANDINGS:

Students will understand that…

  • Our prior knowledge, values, and beliefs can influence how we understand a text.
  • All texts communicate values, beliefs, and perspectives.
  • Texts can influence readers.
  • Good readers use strategies ask questions to deeply understand a text in a critical manner.

 

ESSENTIAL QUESTIONS:

Students will keep considering…

  • What does it mean to be critically literate? 
  • What is the relationship between critical literacy and social justice? 
  • How do our personal values, beliefs, and perspectives influence our understanding of texts? 
  • How do texts communicate social relationships? 
  • What does it mean to consider a different perspective? 
  • What strategies can readers use to critically analyze texts in a critical manner?

> Click here to learn more about Essential Questions

Acquisition

CURRICULAR COMPETENCIES

Students will be skilled at…

  • Considering different purposes, audience, and perspectives in exploring texts.
  • Identifying how differences in context, perspectives, and voice influence meaning in texts.
  • Recognizing the role of language in personal, social, and cultural identity.
  • Applying a variety of age-appropriate thinking skills and critical literacy strategies to gain meaning from texts.

CONTENT

Students will know that…

Grade 4-7

Reading Strategies

ELABORATIONS:

  • Using contextual clues; using phonics and word structure; visualizing; questioning; predicting; previewing text; summarizing; making inferences ting; previewing text; summarizing

Metacognitive strategies

ELABORATIONS:

  • Talking and thinking about learning (e.g., through reflecting, questioning, goal-setting, self-evaluating) to develop one’s awareness of self as a read and as a writer.

Grade 5

Story/text

  • Perspective/point of view

 

CORE COMPETENCIES

Which Core Competencies will be integrated into the unit?

Communication: I recognize that there are different points-of-view and I can disagree respectfully.

Critical and Creative Thinking: I can analyze evidence from different perspectives; I can analyze my own assumptions and beliefs and consider views that do not fit with them; I can ask open-ended questions and gather information. 

Personal and Social: I understand how my values shape my choices; I can analyze complex social and environmental issues from multiple perspectives; I can take thoughtful actions to influence positive, sustainable change; I can explain why something is unfair; I can advocate for others; I take action to support diversity and defend human rights, and can identify how diversity is beneficial for my community, including online. 

First People's Principles of Learning

The unit will make connections with:

Learning ultimately supports the well being of the self, the family, the community, the land, the spirits, and the ancestors.

Learning is holistic, reflexive, reflective, experiential, and relational (focused on interconnectedness, on reciprocal relationships, and a sense of place)

Learning requires exploration of one’s identity.

 

The following resources are made available through the British Columbia Ministry of Education. For more information, please visit BC’s New Curriculum.

Big Ideas

The Big Ideas consist of generalizations and principles and the key concepts important in an area of learning. The Big Ideas represent what students will understand at the completion of the curriculum for their grade. They are intended to endure beyond a single grade and contribute to future understanding.

Visit the Ministry of Education for more information

Core Competencies

orangecommunicationCommunications Competency

The set of abilities that students use to impart and exchange information, experiences and ideas, to explore the world around them, and to understand and effectively engage in the use of digital media

bluethinkingThinking Competency

The knowledge, skills and processes we associate with intellectual development

greensocialSocial Competency

The set of abilities that relate to students’ identity in the world, both as individuals and as members of their community and society

Visit the Ministry of Education for more information

Curricular Competencies & Content

Curricular Competencies are the skills, strategies, and processes that students develop over time. They reflect the “Do” in the Know-Do-Understand model of curriculum. The Curricular Competencies are built on the thinking, communicating, and personal and social competencies relevant to disciplines that make up an area of learning.

Visit the Ministry of Education for more information

 Additional Resources

First People's Principles of Learning

To read more about First People’s Principles of Learning, please click here.

For classroom resources, please visit the First Nations Education Steering Committee.