Unit 8 — A New Home
Description
This unit focuses on how people adapt to new experiences and new places through poetry, informational texts, and realistic fiction. Texts like "Moving to a New Country," "A Movie in My Pillow," and "Inside Out and Back Again" explore themes of displacement, adaptation, and finding home. Students identify elements of poetry and author's craft, recognize figurative language, and understand how poets convey emotion and experience. The unit culminates in students writing their own lyric poems about home, belonging, or change, using poetic devices effectively. The focus on poetry develops literary appreciation and creative expression.
Essential Questions
- How do people adapt to new experiences and make a new place home?
- How do you utilize the elements of poetry to write a lyric poem?
- How do you utilize elements of poetry and author's craft to understand unfamiliar texts?
Learning Objectives
- Identify and analyze elements of poetry including imagery, rhythm, and figurative language
- Determine theme in poetry and explain how it is supported by details
- Recognize author's craft in poetic texts
- Make inferences about characters' experiences and emotions
- Write lyric poems using poetic devices
- Use transitions and sensory language in narrative writing
Suggested Texts
- Moving to a New Country: A Survival Guide — informational text/guide (week 1)
- A Movie in My Pillow — poetry (week 1)
- From Scratch — realistic fiction (week 2)
- Elisa's Diary — realistic fiction (week 2)
- Inside Out and Back Again — poetry (week 3)
Supplemental Resources
- Chart paper for displaying poetic devices and examples
- Sentence strips with metaphors and similes
- Graphic organizers for identifying poetic elements
- Printed mentor poems for study and analysis
- Index cards for recording figurative language examples
Reading: Literature
Writing
Students examine historical periods, cultures, geography, economics, and civic themes through literature and informational texts about westward expansion, immigration, inventors, and global perspectives.
Formative Assessments
- Close reading of poetry with emphasis on figurative language
- Analysis of poetic devices and their effects
- Drafting lyric poems with peer feedback
- Fluency practice with expression appropriate to poetry
- Vocabulary strategy practice with homophones and homographs
Summative Assessment
Lyric Poem and End of Unit Assessment
Benchmark Assessment
— not configured —
Alternative Assessment
Students may demonstrate understanding of poetic elements through oral explanation of imagery and figurative language in provided poems, supported by visual aids such as word banks or annotated text samples. Alternatively, students may create a labeled graphic organizer identifying poetry devices rather than writing analytical responses.
IEP (Individualized Education Program)
Students may benefit from pre-teaching key poetic vocabulary (such as imagery, stanza, and figurative language) alongside visual anchor charts that illustrate each concept with examples. For the lyric poem writing task, teachers can offer graphic organizers that scaffold the drafting process, and students may express their ideas through dictation or oral composition before transferring to written form. Extended time for close reading and poetry analysis supports deeper processing, and highlighting or annotating printed texts can help students track figurative language and sensory details. Modifications may include reducing the required length of the lyric poem while maintaining the expectation that students use at least one or two poetic devices with intention.
Section 504
Students should be provided with printed copies of all poems and reading materials so they can annotate and follow along without relying solely on board or screen display. Extended time for both close reading activities and the lyric poem drafting process supports access to the unit's literary analysis and writing demands. A low-distraction setting during independent reading or writing work, along with preferential seating during read-alouds and poetry discussions, helps students engage fully with the emotional and linguistic nuances of poetic texts.
ELL / MLL
Teachers should build background knowledge around the themes of displacement, home, and belonging by connecting to students' own experiences and, where possible, providing visual supports such as illustrated vocabulary cards for key poetic terms and content-specific words. Simplified directions for analysis tasks, paired with sentence frames for discussing figurative language and theme, help students participate meaningfully in literary conversations. Allowing students to draw on their home language when brainstorming ideas for their lyric poems — or to incorporate words or phrases from another language as a poetic choice — honors their linguistic identity and enriches the creative writing process.
At Risk (RTI)
Teachers can support access to this unit by beginning with poems that use clear, concrete imagery before progressing to more abstract figurative language, helping students build confidence in reading and interpreting poetry. Connecting the themes of home, change, and belonging to students' own lived experiences provides a meaningful entry point for both analysis and writing. For the lyric poem, offering a simple structural model or mentor text as a starting point reduces the open-endedness of the task, while focused feedback on one or two poetic devices at a time keeps revision manageable and goal-oriented.
Gifted & Talented
Students can be invited to explore how different poets writing about similar themes — displacement, identity, or belonging — make distinct craft choices, analyzing how form, line breaks, and figurative language work together to shape meaning across multiple texts. For the lyric poem, students may challenge themselves to experiment with unconventional structures, extended metaphor, or voice in ways that push beyond grade-level expectations. Teachers might also encourage students to research the cultural or historical context behind one of the unit's texts and consider how that context deepens a reader's interpretation of the poet's craft choices.