Important Locations
Themes and Topics
Objectives
Vocabulary
Materials and Resources
Instructional Procedures and Activities
Students can familiarize themselves with the contents of this section by reading the episode summaries page before the lecture begins.
The class should first be introduced to the real world locations of Mount Kōya and Kumano. This information can be found on the Google site under Book 10. On these pages should be interesting background information: who visits these places and why, celebrations that occur there and how those could potentially tie into the chapter, and overall the significance of these places to tourists, locals, and Buddhists.
Following the introduction of these locations, students should then be introduced to the vocabulary sheet that will give them background information on unfamiliar terms before they get discussed in lecture.
Now students can be introduced to or reminded of the purpose of the telling the The Tale of the Heike. Then, the instructor can proceed with going over the information under the themes page on the Google site. Here, students will learn about the important overarching themes in the The Tale of the Heike and why the audience follows Shigehira and Koremori on their journeys after being captured and defeated by the Minamoto/Genji.
Afterwards, students will be distributed the activity sheet which is attached at the end of this lesson plan as well as located on the google sites under book 10 end of lesson activity sheet. For this version of philosophical chairs, students will be asked to fill out both agree and disagree boxes for the claim stated at the top of the sheet: “Book 10 of The Tale of the Heike does a good job in aiding the purpose of telling the tale which is to appease the deceased Heike spirits.” Students will then choose agree or disagree and defend why using evidence and page numbers from the text. The instructor will then ask the agrees to go on one side of the room and the disagrees to the other side. If it is overwhelmingly one way over another, the instructor can ask or choose students to play devil’s advocate for the lesser picked side. Undecided students can wait at the front of the class until the debate has commenced. Shortly in to the debate, the instructor will then make the undecided students choose and side and state why they made the decision that they did. Each side will have opening statements and then students will go back and forth supporting or refuting the claim until the end of the class period. The instructor can decide to grade the students or not. If they are graded, the students will be graded based on their participation and performance in the debate and how they backed up their claim with evidence from the chapter. Instructors will tally marks near the students names on a sheet of paper each time they make a contribution to the debate.