Unit 4 Essential Skills

• CHR 1.A: Identify and describe what specific details reveal about a character, that character's perspective, and that character's motives.  

• CHR 1.C: Explain the function of contrasting characters.  

• CHR 1.D: Describe how textual details reveal nuances and complexities in characters' relationships with one another.  

• SET 2.B: Explain the function of setting in a narrative 

• SET 2.C: Describe the relationship between a character and a setting 

• STR 3.A: Identify and describe how plot orders events in a narrative. 

• STR 3.D: Explain the function of contrasts within a text. 

Unit 4 Essential Skills

• NAR 4.A: Identify and describe the narrator or speaker of a text.  

• NAR 4.B: Identify and explain the function of point of view in a narrative.  

• NAR 4.C: Identify and describe details, diction, or syntax in a text that reveal a narrator's or speaker's perspective. 

• LAN 7.B: Develop a thesis statement that conveys a defensible claim about an interpretation of literature and that may establish a line of reasoning. 

• LAN 7.C: Develop commentary that establishes and explains relationships among textual evidence, the line of reasoning, and the thesis.

Character 1.A,C,&D

• The significance of characters is often reveal through their agency and through nuanced descriptions

  • Characters’ choices - in speech, action, and inaction - reveal what they value. 

• The main character is a narrative is the protagonist; the antagonist in the narrative opposes the protagonist and may be another character, the internal conflicts of the protagonist, a collective (such as society) or nature.

  • Protagonists and antagonists may represent contrasting values. 

• Conflict among characters often arises from tensions generated by their different value systems. 

Setting 2.B&C

• A setting may help establish the mood and atmosphere of a narrative. 

  • The mood and atmosphere will influence the characters and help to develop the conflict. The setting itself may be the cause of the tension/conflict.

  • It will also create a desired effect on the reader to promote the theme of the story.

• The environment a character inhabits provides information about that character. 

  • It can help the reader understand the character's motivations and/or perspective. Consider the societal, historical and cultural implications of the setting.

  • The weather may also provide information about the character and it can influence or reflection the character's emotions or conflict.

Structure 3.A&D

• Some patterns in a dramatic situation are so common that they are considered archetypes, and these archetypes create certain expectations for how the dramatic situations will progress and be resolved. 

• The differences highlighted by a contrast emphasize the particular traits, aspects or characteristics important for comparison of the things being contrasted. 

• Contrasts often represent conflicts in values related to character, narrator, or speaker perspectives on ideas represented by a text. 

Narrator 4.A-C

• Narrators may function as characters in the narrative who directly address readers and either recall events or described them as they occur. 

• Narrative distance refers to the physical distance, chronological distance, relationships, or emotional investment of the narrator to the events or characters of the narrative. 

• Stream of consciousness is a type of narration in which a character’s thoughts are related through a continuous dialogue or description

Read the story on the next page. Then answer the questions that follow.