When Stars Are Scattered: A Literature Study Unit BUNDLE
- Google Docs™
Description
About this Unit & Novel
This is a Common Core-aligned literature study unit for use with the graphic novel, When Stars Are Scattered by Omar Mohamed and Victoria Jamieson. The lessons and activities here span the curriculum, from vocabulary and argument building to literary analysis and creative writing. Prompts appear in order of complexity, and simplified language appears in parentheses (delete or modify as needed). The unit is editable so you can pick and choose which elements and prompts will work best for you.
From Goodreads: Omar and his younger brother, Hassan, have spent most of their lives in Dadaab, a refugee camp in Kenya. Life is hard there: never enough food, achingly dull, and without access to the medical care Omar knows his nonverbal brother needs. So when Omar has the opportunity to go to school, he knows it might be a chance to change their future . . . but it would also mean leaving his brother, the only family member he has left, every day.
Heartbreak, hope, and gentle humor exist together in this graphic novel about a childhood spent waiting, and a young man who is able to create a sense of family and home in the most difficult of settings. It's an intimate, important, unforgettable look at the day-to-day life of a refugee, as told to New York Times Bestselling author/artist Victoria Jamieson by Omar Mohamed, the Somali man who lived the story.
This unit incudes the resources below. Click the links to preview.
When Stars Are Scattered | Omar Mohamed | Discussion Questions |Vocabulary
Poetry Workshop: The Ocean Instead |Mentor Author Study Victoria Jamieson & Omar Mohamed
When Stars Are Scattered | Omar Mohamed|Victoria Jamieson Mentor Author BUNDLE
Unit Components & Features
LITERATURE RESPONSE QUESTIONS
A set of prompts for each chapter of the graphic novel grouped for differentiated instruction. Since this unit is editable, you can choose the prompts that best fit your needs and/or break the class into groups and assign different prompts to each group.
TECH CONNECTIONS
Vocabulary-building on KAHOOT
Practice games for this unit’s vocabulary words are available to play on Kahoot, a free online platform where students compete game show-style. Find links to Kahoot games in the Vocabulary section of each literature response. Click here for an explainer video on how to duplicate and edit Kahoot games.
Comprehension & Concept Synthesis on QUIZIZZ
Practice games to assess reading comprehension and understanding of concepts introduced in the mentor text exercises are available to play on Quizizz, a free online platform where students compete game show-style. Check each chapter’s literature response for links to corresponding Quizizz games. To edit a game, open the link then click edit.
SHORT MENTOR TEXT EXERCISES
Designed to integrate into a writing workshop and built around a specific writing strategy, each mentor text exercise asks students to read as writers—to pay close attention to elements of craft—and apply the mentor author’s writing techniques to their own works in progress.
Passages from When Stars Are Scattered serve as springboards for these exercises which also include:
- Graphic organizers and sentence-frames.
- Slideshows and/or explainer videos.
- Links to student writing samples that model approaches to applying the mentor author techniques under consideration.
IN-DEPTH MENTOR TEXT MINI- UNITS & POETRY EXTENSION PROJECTS
Poetry Extension: Emotion is MotionPoetry Extension: The Texture of Vengeance, the Flavor of Fury
Poetry Extension: Growing Metaphor with “Seeds” & “Branches”
Poetry Extension • Instead
Poetry Extension • The Color of Memory
Mentor Text Mini-unit • What Was it Like? Telling Your Family’s History
Designed to spark and scaffold new creative writing projects, in-depth revisions to one in progress and/or build on concepts introduced in this unit’s mentor text exercises, each mini-unit is a detailed, 1-2 week lesson plan that includes:
- Introductions to each day’s reading, discussion and/or writing session.
- Excerpts of the mentor texts under consideration.
- Student examples that model the approaches under consideration.
- Questions to guide discussions.
- Prompts, graphic organizers and word banks to get students started.
A series of editable Revision Workshop hyperdocs to guide students through the revision process.
READ ONLINE OPTION
To accommodate students who do not have access to a copy of the graphic novel, each literature response includes a link to a read-aloud screencast of the pages prompts cover. To find the screencasts, look for the monitor icon at the top of each literature response. Students can click to open then listen to a teacher read, or mute to read on their own. Links to all of the screencasts also appear in a single Google doc.
Follow me for product updates & freebies.
Middle-grade writing workshop tips and tales from the trenches
