In a recent article on this blog, I outlined both the dearth of online resources to help middle and high school educators bring philosophy into their classrooms given the lack of curricular opportunities and, in turn, the absolute necessity for teachers of English to find places to bring philosophical pedagogy to their students within the framework of their current discipline and the demands of both state guidelines and district practices.
In doing so, I stated that the objective of our plans should be threefold: one, for teachers to not simply lecture, but to allow students an opportunity for self-discovery. Two, to give students an invitation for what former director of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) Ernest Morrell calls “an opportunity to become” by giving them practical, real-world applications for philosophy and, three, to allow students the opportunity to share.
While pedagogically sound as a method of instructing students, we must also note, however, that our objectives are incomplete without a further unspoken opportunity for teachers to pair these lessons with a wide variety of texts, giving them an “excuse” to teach these philosophical concepts through the backdoor in order to stay compliant with district and state mandates.
This last opportunity, it turns out, is the most vital. It is generally well-known that students deepen their understanding of difficult concepts by making connections to other readings, to shared cultural experiences, and to their own lives. The study of philosophy, and more particularly moral virtue, is broad enough that many of the texts educators already teach as part of their regular curriculum will find natural pairings in one or more of the general categories of thought discussed in the mini-lessons, providing them with a natural connection to discuss philosophical themes and questions, and giving them maximum flexibility to bring these lessons into whatever curricular sequence they’ve already designed.
For the sake of demonstration, let’s go through what that might look like with one of the several domains and an associated paired text. Below, you will find all listed resources attached for use in your own classroom.
Stoicism, Batman and Hamlet
Our hypothetical high school class is reading William Shakespeare’s Hamlet. As opposed to reading a text in full and then discussing (as one might do for, say, summer reading) our hypothetical class, like most high school classes, is close-reading the text in sequence, deciphering the lines, themes, and references together. Perhaps our teacher is reading aloud with them. Perhaps she is showing a video. Perhaps the students themselves are acting it out. In any case, our class gets to Act II, scene ii where Hamlet says the following:
“Why, then, ’tis none to you; for there is nothing
either good or bad, but thinking makes it so: to me
it is a prison.”
It is here that are hypothetical educator might pause and say that Hamlet’s line is an example of a philosophy known as stoicism. But what is stoicism, and how does it relate to our pensive Dane?
The next day our class arrives in English to find a Free Write on the board, projected onto a smart board or available on their Google Classrooms using the below template. Free writes are a do now that charges students with writing whatever comes to their heads, and allows for them to write without fear of being wrong or even grammatically correct. “What things in life are actually under your control,” they are asked to contemplate. “How often do you let things you can’t control affect you?” Maybe they write their responses in journals, in their computers, or on a Free Write Response Template. Each of the philosophical domains in the curricular unit contain such a domain-specific free write.
If time allows (perhaps our school uses a block schedule and meets for longer than the typical forty minutes), our teacher might ask students to share, either peer to peer, in groups, or as part of a full-class “campfire.” In any event, our educator next pulls up the Mini-Lesson on Stoicism.Like all of the created mini-lessons, the stoicism presentation uses a superhero to allow students the opportunity for an instant connection based on hitting them “where they live.” In order to ensure our students are following along and taking good notes, our teacher hands out Philosophy Vocabulary Worksheet, which she can collect as either an in-class formative assessment or as homework.
It is at this point that discussion should center on what will be obvious to students, and that is the relationship between the philosophy of stoicism and our mentor text. Indeed, Hamlet (the character) is, at times, somehow either too stoic or not stoic enough – his central tragedy and conflict, it seems, being a war between his reason and his emotion, to quietly bear “the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune/or to take arms against a sea of troubles.”
At this point, an educator might choose to go back to reading Hamletand put aside our philosophical teaching. By simply introducing the concept and giving students an opportunity for discovery, the topic of stoicism can be assumed taught, and reintroduced in an eventual summative assessment or essay. Each of the domains in our self-created unit, however, also contain an opportunity for students to become more familiar with the philosophy through an Activity which invites them to use the ethical domain in practice. For stoicism, students are invited to prove the theorem that “the obstacle is the way” through a guided and hands on application of negative visualization and denial.
Finally, students are invited to test their understanding of the concept, and its relationship to the paired text, through the creation of a One-Pager. One-pagers are unique ways for teachers to assess student comprehension in creative and fun ways, combining understanding with freedom for color, drawing, and scaffolded learning. Teachers may consider modeling a response for their students or making a template of their own. These assessments can be used as exit-tickets, or in the place of quizzes, to test student comprehension. Teachers may also follow-up the creation of these one-pagers with gallery walks or other opportunities for their students to share.
If done with some minor expediency, all of the above can be completed in a single forty-minute class or, with no structural changes, in a seventy minute block with an opportunity for more student sharing and discussion. Students, of course, are invited to use their new understanding as an additional lens through which to read the rest of the text, and to recall their learning in a summative essay or project-based assignment. In future lessons, a teacher might provide further information on stoicism, for instance an excerpt from a secondary paired text (Meditations by Marcus Aurelius, perhaps, or How to Be a Stoic by Massimo Pigliucci).
Embedded in this sequence are some 5 or 6 common core standards including, but not limited to: CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.11-12.2 (Determine two or more themes or central ideas of a text and analyze their development over the course of the text, including how they interact and build on one another to produce a complex account; provide an objective summary of the text.) and CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.11-12.1 (Initiate and participate effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grades 11-12 topics, texts, and issues, building on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly and persuasively.) Most importantly, perhaps, the adaptability of the sequence works just as well if the mentor text isn’t Hamlet but instead some three score books and poems commonly taught in middle and high school, including everything from The Odyssey to A Farewell to Arms.
In all, I have created similar lesson sequences and resources for seven additional philosophical domains aside from stoicism. Together, this unit itself comes with philosophy specific final assessments, including essays and projects. They can be taught in sequence or as individual lessons across many months or simply as the opportunity presents itself.
For downloadable and shareable versions of all the lesson resources mentioned in this article, please visit my personal website.
Shawn Adler
Shawn Adler is a high school English and Psychology teacher at Cliffside Park High School in New Jersey. A former professional journalist and occasional college professor of composition, he is deeply invested in creating opportunities for middle and high school students to “become.” For more information or resources, or with opportunities to collaborate, you can reach him through email atsadler@cliffsidepark.edu
