Questions the Story Helps us to Consider How do the rules of our society: Shape who we are? Affect how we feel? Impact the decisions we make? Change how we think about the world and ourselves?

Warm-Up 1. How do the things in this image compare with our reality? 2. What do you think the future will be like? 3. Why do we naturally wonder what the future will be like? 4. How does the thinking about the future help us today? Drawn in What artist believed Earth would look like in the year 2020

The Last Dog Written in the 1990’s by Katherine Patterson

Katherine Paterson Background Born in China in the year 1932 to U.S. Missionaries At age 5, her family was forced to leave China during the Japanese invasion of 1937 The family moved to Richmond, Virginia for a short while before returning to China to live in Shanghai In 1940, the family was forced to flee again, this time to North Carolina Her family moved 18 times between 1937 and 1950 because of the war in China and her Father’s job

Chinese Civil War Nationalists Vs. Communists

Katherine Paterson Background Katherine Paterson always felt like an outsider, because she was always moving When she arrived to the U.S., she says she felt “poor, small, and foreign” on the playground, even though she was technically an American She claims that being an outsider has made her a better writer

The Last Dog: Science Fiction Combines real and scientific information, with elements from author’s imagination Usually takes place in the future What power does imagining the future have? What is the purpose of thinking about what the future might hold for humans or society?

Earth in the Future The Earth has been poisoned by pollution and global warming In this future, the world is uninhabitable, so people live in a dome The society in this story is only slightly different from our own

H OW G LOBAL W ARMING W ORKS Fossil fuels (coal, oil, natural gas) Carbon Dioxide (CO 2 )

The Sun’s energy passes through the car’s windshield. This energy (heat) is trapped inside the car and cannot pass back through the windshield, causing the inside of the car to warm up. Example of the Greenhouse Effect

E FFECTS OF G LOBAL W ARMING Increased Temperature Habitat Damage and Species Affected Changes in Water Supply Rising Sea Level

P ORTAGE G LACIER Alaska Photos: NOAA Photo Collection and Gary Braasch – WorldViewOfGlobalWarming.org

C OLORADO R IVER Arizona June 2002Dec 2003

Global Atmospheric Concentration of CO 2

Leaning Goal Analyze the text effectively by: Making inferences using logic and reason Citing evidence from the text to sound more logical Elaborating on ideas in order to communicate more effectively