Lesson Plan: Scripture, Essay Example

Learning Goals

• To identify the way that Saint John uses descriptive words in his account.
• To identify the use of metaphors in this passage.
• To identify the grammatical person that Saint John uses in his account (I, You, We).

To establish the relevance that this lesson has on other aspects of student learning, the lesson will begin by reviewing the main points in the Gospel of John to refresh the students on this topic. This review will be mainly conducted by asking students questions about the Gospel to see what information they remember from their previous studies. Then, the instructor will continue by discussing the different literary elements and define what is mean by description, metaphors, and grammatical person. As a quick exercise to get the students into the proper mindset for this lesson, the instructor will read a line from the Gospel of John and then ask the students to explain it in their own words. If there are disagreements as to the meaning of the individual sentence, the class will be allowed to enter a debate on the topic and the instructor will provide the final explanation if needed.

This will: connect to a previous lesson, introduce materials, connect to student interest, orient students to an activity, develop learning skills, and reflect on prior learning.

 Examples:

The instructor will read “Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water” (4:10) and then ask the class to identify the metaphor in the statement. The students will be expected to identify “living water” as a phrase that can have several different meanings. In the literal sense, “living water” can refer to a moving stream or body of water. In a religious sense, this can mean the gift of God’s spirit.

The instructor will then read “We have heard from the law that the Messiah remains forever. How can you say that the Son of Man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of Man?” (3:14). Students should identify “lifted up” as a phrase that can have both a literal and spiritual meaning. This could refer to the ability to physically lift something, or that the spirit will be lifted.

The instructor will read “Nevertheless many, even of the authorities, believed in him. But because of the Pharisees they did not confess it, for fear that they would be put out of the synagogue; for they loved human glory more than the glory that comes from God” and ask the students to identify description words. These words include “fear”, “love”, and “glory”.

The instructor will then read “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself” and the students will identify the grammatical person. This is a complex example because technically “I” is in the first person, although this is Saint John’s account of words that Jesus himself spoke.

Action!

Students do: fearless talking and listening, reflecting, discussing, investigating, reasoning, developing understanding, applying concepts, discovering relationships, exploring, group work, building team communication skills.

Students will be asked to break into small groups and they will be provided with a portion of the Gospel of John. They will be asked to work together to find examples where descriptive words are used and then asked to interpret the meaning of these sentences and how this plays into the larger role of the information that the reading provides. Students will be given 15 minutes to find as many examples as possible, with the team who finds the most as the “winner”, which will motivate the teams to work quickly (). This exercise will be repeated using metaphors and grammatical person. The students will be encouraged to record their answers on a group sheet. These examples will be discussed as a class for about 10 minutes following each group exercise ().

Teachers plan: construct student groups in order to make teams even in terms of number and ability, ask questions to students based on their work, listen carefully, observe during group exercise, offer prompts during review component.

Consolidate Debrief

There will be some debate and disagreement about what constitutes description, metaphors, and grammatical personifications among the different groups. The groups will be restructured to include students with contrasting views and they will be asked to argue out their opinions and provide evidence for why they believe the examples they selected are ideal. However, these groups will be asked to find one solution to their difference in opinion. This will allow students to learn the point of view of the other students, justify their reasons, and come to an understanding of why the other student believes based on evidence. These conclusions will then be discussed as a class.

Home Activity or Further Classroom Consolidation

The take home assignment will consist of the students needing to find 3 new examples of each of the literary elements learned in class and to provide at least one paragraph explaining how this is used in the gospel.