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Book Preview: Trevor Noah's "Born a Crime" is a memoir, in a way that is both comedic and serious, about Noah's own experiences, how they made him who he is, and how they relate to the place and time he grew up.
"Born a Crime" has 18 total chapters, broken into 3 sections.
Structural note: at the end of each chapter, Noah provides a segue into the next chapter to frame it. Pay special attention to how he sets up what's next!
The links here are from the document above (providing in case the doc won't load)
Pacing guide will be posted here soon!
Unit Guiding Questions
Identity vs. Society
Micro vs. macro
How do our individual stories fit with historical context?
How does our experience impact the way we interpret the world?
Why is there power in capturing our own story and controlling the narrative?
Who am I? What are my identities?
How does my world/society impact me? Ultimately, how much of who we are is defined by our era and society and how much is always held by us? How do I define my world and society? How does it define me?
Big Picture
There will be a portfolio component to this unit. Save all material and expect to have feedback from peers.
Annotations are encouraged but not required. I went back and forth on this a lot (and reserve the right to switch if I deem it necessary).
One of the reasons annotations are encouraged but not required is that we'll complete close reads of especially powerful parts of the book. Your annotations at that time will be evaluated as part of these grades.
The other main reason is that we'll go with a chapter review sheet to demonstrate basic understanding, areas of struggle, connections and critical thinking as we read. If you have quality annotations, feel free to show them to me as part of the evaluation for these grades (and these will help you do well with everything else).
I have also linked the audiobook. Noah is a great performer, use it!
We'll have Socratic discussions. There are 3 sections and we'll complete our first Socratic after reading Section 1.
We'll also have theme tracking and use a lens of critical reading theories. This will make more sense once you see it but know for now that it will help you dive deep and be more prepared, confident, and authoritative in your discussions and writing.
Of course you can expect some ACQC's and formal writing pieces. This may include a wide variety of connections we'll be making to history, current events, sociology, psychology, other literature, poetry, song analysis, film analysis, etc.
And I'm really excited to be planning some creative writing components! You can expect a weekly creative writing assignment (that also acts as a sneaky way to review plot from the book) with writing support to help progress and strengthen your writing.
You'll have cohort groupings to flesh out work and get constructive feedback.
Eventually everyone will workshop one of their selected pieces.
And everyone will submit to our anthology
Theme Wheel and Key (for all 18 chapters)
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