Teaching "The Count of Monte Cristo" through guided reading instruction

¶ … Reading Skills

Motivation and Background Building: Pre-Reading Phase

Appropriate activities may include the following:

Vocabulary instruction

Prior knowledge connection

Skill Development (may be done throughout)

Establish purpose for reading

Predicting

Teacher think-aloud

Setting/location/context

Development of time/historical context

There were four vocabulary words that the students learned during this phase: imperious, treacherous, tenacity and betrothal. They were provided with contextual sentences (three sentences in length) to introduce them to the words, guessed what they meant, received dictionary definitions, and had to use the words in a sentence. The prior knowledge connection included a summary of the first two chapters of The Count of Monte Cristo, in which the children were introduced to the characters and the plot thus far. The development of the time/historical context contained information about the setting / location; I taught the children about the French Revolution and Napoleon's role in it, as well as the dangers of partisan politics in France in the early 19th century. This information was requisite for understanding the plot. Their purpose for reading was to identify why each of three characters (Caderousse, Danglers, and Fernand) were jealous of Edmund Dantes.

GUIDED READING (SILENT AND ORAL): During-Reading Phase

Appropriate activities may include the following:

Comprehension development

Questioning

Vocabulary skill instruction

Prompts

Teachable moments

Character education

Articulate predictions

The students were instructed to read the five-page, Chapter III in the Bantam Classic abridged version of this text. After completing each page, they were instructed to answer general comprehension questions about the information on the page -- notably who the characters were, and what their relationship to Dantes might be. They could only continue reading after successfully answering the questions; those who failed to do so worked with me to get the questions answered. Some of the questions were less related to comprehension and more so to vocabulary -- the children each had to identify a synonym for the aforementioned four vocabulary words. The skill development part of this assignment was detecting sarcasm in literature. The children were taught during the pre-reading phase that sarcasm might be difficult to detect in literature, but that it is frequently accompanied by exclamation marks, laughter and language that is inappropriate for what a character is feeling. The students also had to write down instances of sarcasm that occurred in the final three pages.

SKILL DEVELOPMENT AND PRACTICE: Integrated Throughout

Appropriate activities may include the following:

Word analysis

Word recognition

Vocabulary elaboration

Reading of related stories or genres

As part of a writing workshop activity which simultaneously included reading comprehension, the students then wrote half a page responses to the purpose for reading question: why Danglars, Caderousse and Fernand were jealous of Dantes. The students shared the results amongst one another first, and wrote criticisms of each other's papers in which they attempted to correct them for grammar, diction, syntax, and accuracy of content. Students then had the opportunity to read their works aloud. When their were grammatical / syntactical errors spotted, we wrote the sentence on the board which contained the error was and enabled everyone to have an opportunity to correct it before sharing the right response. Lastly, the children wrote a few lines predicting what the trio would do to Dantes because of their jealousy.

*Write your summary of the experience below (250-300 words):

I decided to teach a work of classic literature to this group of three students because they were proficient in reading comprehension and they desired a "challenge." I began the lesson by giving them the background information on the first two chapters of The Count of Monte Cristo -- to engage them in the characters and the book's overall plot. This information segued into the information I provided them regarding the French Revolution and Napoleon's role in it, as well as the dire consequences of political affiliations in those days. After explicating these facts I introduced the general purpose of the reading, and closed out by doing the vocabulary exercises for the four words the children would encounter while reading the passage. Lastly, I discussed the effect of sarcasm in conversation and in literature, and told them identifying points with which to recognize sarcasm. I had prepared handouts with the questions for the reading on them, which I distributed prior to the student's silent reading of Chapter III in this book. The students presented me with the handouts after the completion of each page. One of the three students was adept at detecting sarcasm, the other two needed a modest amount of help in doing so. They then engaged in the pair of writing assignments about the purpose of the reading. Workshopping these documents enabled us to work on grammar and the specific words that indicated sarcasm. Finally, the students predicted what they thought the three characters could have done to exact revenge on Dantes; none of them were remotely close.

*Write your reflective analysis below (250-300 words):

I actually thoroughly enjoyed completing this assignment. I was able to do it with motivated students who were fond of literature, and I was also able to "teach" one of my favorite pieces of literature. Although it appeared that some of the context of the excerpt from The Count of Monte Cristo was difficult to understand, it was noteworthy that they were largely able to comprehend the subject matter and identify with what was taking place. More than one of the students actually asked if it might be possible for us to continue reading this particular tale, which certainly helped me to feel as though I had made the correct decision in selecting this particular piece of literature. I was a little uncertain about the level of difficulty for the simple fact that I was assigned this book as pre-reading for my seventh grade English class. However, it largely appeared as though these sixth graders were able to get a lot out of this story. In addition to my pedagogy preparing them for the content in the excerpt, I also believe that the edition of this manuscript that I selected had a lot to do with both the students' level of engagement and their ability to understand it. I had actually taught another small group nearly the entirety of this same book, and there was one student whose father did not get him the abridged version. As such, he could not keep up with the reading and had a difficult time following the subject matter. The most convincing evidence for the fact that the students were able to comprehend the subject matter was their writing. The students not only wrote details that were in accordance with what they read in the excerpt, but actually enjoyed doing so!

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