Lesson 20: Analyzing the development of a theme About this lesson Students will finish reading the short story, “To Build a Fire” by Jack London, which has similar ideas and themes about human-animal relationships and the wild. In this lesson, they will finish the text and analyze a theme of the text, and how London uses the relationship between the man and dog to develop the theme. An audio recording of “To Build a Fire” is available at http://ia802308.us.archive.org/26/items/stories_003_librivox/to_build_a_fire_london_blb.mp3.

We continued reading “To Build a Fire” by Jack London and analyzed how the author creates suspense. Let’s Review! Teaching Notes Suggested Pacing: ~1 minute Directions: Briefly review the previous learning.

Finish reading the short story, “To Build a Fire” by Jack London. Today we will: Finish reading the short story, “To Build a Fire” by Jack London. Analyze the theme of the text and how it is developed through the relationship between the man and dog. Let’s Prepare! Teaching Notes Suggested Pacing: ~1 minute Directions: Read the slide. Briefly explain how this lesson prepares students for another lesson and/or the end-of-unit assessments. Throughout the lesson, compare students’ responses and work to the student look-fors. Determine the students who need additional support with reading, understanding, or expressing their understanding of complex, grade-level texts. During this lesson or before the next lesson, support those students individually or in a small group using the Additional Supports for Diverse Learners.

“To Build a Fire” by Jack London You will need: “To Build a Fire” by Jack London Your split-page notes for “To Build a Fire” Let’s Prepare! Teaching Notes Suggested Pacing: ~ 3 minutes Directions: Distribute the text. Ask students to locate their copy of the text and their split-page notes: “To Build a Fire” handout. This lesson uses accountable talk. Access the strategy one-pager to learn about accountable talk.

Using your split-page notes, discuss with your partner: What predicament does the man find himself in at the end of paragraph 30? Based on what you know about the man, his dog, and their situation, what do you anticipate will happen to the man? To his dog? Why? Let’s Discuss! Teaching Notes Suggested Pacing: ~6 minutes Directions: Divide the class into pairs using an established classroom routine. Purposefully pair together students with different levels of language proficiency. Direct pairs to select a partner A and B. Establish norms for the partner work and explain that students will be held accountable for their learning by turning in a completed split page notes handout. Direct partner A to begin the discussion by answering the first question on the slide: “What predicament does the man find himself in at the end of paragraph 30?” Allow 1 minute for partner A to share. Then direct partner B to respond and share for an additional minute. Repeat this process for the remaining questions, allowing an additional minute for each partner to share. Prompt pairs to use the conversation stems learning tool as they discuss. Monitor student discussion. Possible Supports During the Lesson: If students are not providing answers similar to the Student Look-Fors: Direct students to reread these lines: “At last, when he could endure no more, he jerked his hands apart. The blazing matches fell sizzling into the snow, but the birch-bark was alight. He began laying dry grasses and the tiniest twigs on the flame…. Small pieces of rotten wood and green moss clung to the twigs, and he bit them off as well as he could with his teeth. He cherished the flame carefully and awkwardly. It meant life, and it must not perish.” Ask: “What is the man trying to do?” Ask: “Why is it so difficult?” Ask: “What happens to the flame?” Student Look-Fors: Students should discuss that the man tries to create a new fire after his fire is put out by the fallen snow off of the branches. He realizes, though, that his hands are too frozen to work effectively to build a new fire. He lights all of his remaining matches in an effort to start a new fire, but ultimately the fire is extinguished by the twigs and moss that he is able to gather and arrange due to his frozen and burnt hands. Students should realize that, as the text says, fire “meant life” and since the fire has been extinguished and the man is out of matches, his life is in danger. Students might predict that the man will freeze to death or use his dog to go get help. The dog, being built to survive in the cold, will likely know how to bury in the snow to survive or will be able to run back to town and safety.

Read the rest of “To Build a Fire” with your partner. While you read, determine whether your predictions are right or wrong. Let’s Read! Teaching Notes Suggested Pacing: ~13 minutes Directions: Students should remain in pairs. Direct pairs to read the rest of “How to Build a Fire.” Say: “As you read with your partner, determine whether your predictions were right or wrong.” Possible Supports During the Lesson: If students have difficulty reading the text, provide additional support, such as helping students decode unfamiliar words or grouping students of different abilities together to engage in partner reading. If there is a larger group of students who need support, consider pulling together a small group and engaging in choral reading so students can hear a fluent reader reading the material while following along with the printed text. Some students may need support in understanding the vocabulary and syntax of this section. For these students, provide a glossary of words with student-friendly definitions for grade-level and above grade-level vocabulary words. Use the Academic Word Finder to determine which words to include. If students need support to comprehend the text: Ask: “Why does the man stop running? How does he decide he wants to die? What does this show about his feelings toward his impending death?” Ask: “Who does he see at the end of the text? What does he say in his vision? What does this show?” Ask: “In the final paragraph, what does the dog do as the man dies? After his death? What does this show?” Student Look-Fors: Students should read the text with a partner and actively discuss whether the predictions they made are right or wrong. Students should understand that the man at first intends to kill the dog and use the carcass to warm his hands. Then, after deciding he couldn’t kill his dog, the man decides to start running wildly, hoping to warm up his feet or maybe even make it to the camp. Ultimately the man decides to stop running “like a chicken with its head cut off” and “meet death with dignity.” He decides that he will accept the inevitable and try to die by lying down and going to sleep. In the man’s final moments, he sees himself - with the men from the camp - as they find his body. He also sees the Old Timer, and tells him that he was correct in his advice. The dog remains with the man as he dies and shortly thereafter. He sits and waits by his master, and begins to whine. When he “smells death,” and realizes the man will not build him a fire, he continues on toward the camp. This suggests that the dog’s instincts were right all along. Had the man listened to the dog and trusted his instincts, perhaps he would not have died on the trail.

Reason versus instinct Arrogance versus knowledge Human-animal relationships Man’s place in the natural world Let’s Discuss! Teaching Notes Suggested Pacing: ~12 minutes Directions: Ask student pairs to form small groups of four according to an established classroom routine. Ask a student to share the definition of theme, as a review for students, or as necessary, define theme for students: “Theme is the underlying meaning or message the author seeks to convey either directly or indirectly about the topic or subject of the text.” Remind students that themes are typically developed and conveyed through the character’s experiences and decisions and the relationships between characters (e.g., how they interact, and/or what they learn). Tell students the author comments on several topics or subjects in “To Build a Fire”: reason versus instinct, human-animal relationships, arrogance versus knowledge or experience, and man’s place in the natural world. Ask each small group to answer discuss the summary question on their split-page notes: “To Build a Fire” handout. To do this they must: Select one of the topics and identify what London’s is trying to convey about that topic (e.g., determine a theme of “To Build a Fire”). Then, they should review their split-page notes to identify how London develops that theme through the language, details, characters, and incidents in the text. Prompt them to include textual evidence which supports that theme. Monitor groups as they are working, providing support as needed. After 7 minutes, engage students in a brief whole-class discussion where students share possible themes from “To Build a Fire.” Use teacher talk moves so students [clearly express their ideas (Goal One), listen carefully to understand others’ ideas (Goal Two), provide evidence to support their claims (Goal Three), establish new ways of thinking (Goal Four)]. Possible Supports During the Lesson: As needed, remind students to consider the ways in which they identified themes in the previous section while reading The Call of the Wild. For example, prompt students to consider Dave’s death and the owner’s decision to allow him to remain in the traces. Ask: “How did that develop a theme of compassion between human-animal interactions? How did that demonstrate the theme of the harsh reality of survival in the wild?” Prompt students to see the way in which the character’s actions (the Scotch owner) toward the dog helped convey a theme of how humans can - and should - treat animals &/or have students consider how Dave’s death reflects the nature of the wild (death happens, in the wild, one needs to keep going for survival versus stopping to mourn, etc.). Student Look-Fors: Access the completed split-page notes: “To Build a Fire” handout.

Complete the summary question on your split- page notes. Let’s Express Our Understanding! Suggested Pacing: ~8 minutes Directions: Ask students to follow the directions on the slide. Monitor student writing time, and provide support as needed. If students need more time, ask them to finish writing their responses for homework. Student Look-Fors: Access the completed split-page notes: “To Build a Fire” handout.

In this lesson, you finished reading “To Build a Fire” by Jack London. You also analyzed the development of a theme. Let’s Close! Teaching Notes Suggested Pacing: ~1 minute Directions: Read the slide.