NYS Common Core ELA & Literacy Curriculum
9.1.3
DRAFT
Grade 9 • Module 1 • Unit 3 • Lesson 18
Lesson 18
Introduction
In this lesson, students will draw upon the close reading skills that they have developed over the course
of Module 1 as they work carefully through the short excerpt Act 5.3, lines 139–170. In this passage,
Juliet wakes up to find Romeo lying dead next to her in the Capulet tomb. Juliet then kills herself with
Romeo’s dagger.
Students will analyze word choice, figurative language, and the structure of events to explore Juliet’s
final act. As the culminating excerpt of Unit 3, this passage functions as the final point of comparison
for an analysis of Juliet’s character development across the five acts of Shakespeare’s play.
Activities involve reading aloud, group reflection, and discussion work with a set of text-dependent
questions to guide students in their exploration of the lesson’s focusing question: Who or what is
responsible for Juliet’s death? For homework, students will continue to read their Accountable
Independent Reading texts.
Standards
Assessed Standard(s)
RL.9-10.3
Analyze how complex characters (e.g., those with multiple or conflicting motivations)
develop over the course of a text, interact with other characters, and advance the plot
or develop the theme.
RL.9-10.4
Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in the text, including
figurative and connotative meanings; analyze the cumulative impact of specific word
choices on meaning and tone (e.g., how the language evokes a sense of time and place;
how it sets a formal or informal tone).
Addressed Standard(s)
SL.9-10.1
Initiate and participate effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in
groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grades 9–10 topics, texts, and issues,
building on each others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly and persuasively.
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1
NYS Common Core ELA & Literacy Curriculum
DRAFT
Grade 9 • Module 1 • Unit 3 • Lesson 18
Assessment
Assessment(s)
Brief written response to Round Robin Discussion question: Who or what do you think is responsible
for Juliet’s death? Why? Use evidence from the text to support your response.
High Performance Response(s)
Sample student response:
I think bad luck or fate is responsible for Juliet’s death. Romeo doesn’t realize that Juliet is faking her
death, and so he kills himself. Juliet never could have predicted this when she agreed to the friar’s plan.
Then, Juliet wakes up only minutes too late to prevent Romeo from taking his own life. Friar Laurence
says that a “greater power” is responsible for these events. I think this greater power is fate, and fate is
ultimately what is responsible for Juliet’s death.
Vocabulary
Vocabulary to provide directly (will not include extended instruction)







alack (interj.) – an expression of sorrow
sepulchre (n.) – a burial chamber
lamentable (adj.) – regrettable
contagion (n.) – a contagious (communicable by contact) disease
thwarted (v.) – defeated the hopes or aspirations of
churl (n.) – a stingy person
sheath (n.) – a case for a knife
Vocabulary to teach (may include direct word work and/or text-dependent questions)




discoloured (adj.) – being altered or changed in color, especially for the worse
chance (n.) – something that happens unpredictably without discernible human intention or
observable cause
masterless (adj.) – having no lord or master
restorative (adj.) – having the power to restore (to bring something back, or return something to its
former condition)
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2
NYS Common Core ELA & Literacy Curriculum
DRAFT
Grade 9 • Module 1 • Unit 3 • Lesson 18
Lesson Agenda/Overview
Student-Facing Agenda
% of the Lesson

Standards: RL.9-10.3, RL.9-10.4, SL.9-10.1

Text: Romeo and Juliet, Act 5.3, lines 139–170

Introduction of Lesson Agenda

Homework Accountability

Text-Dependent Questions and Activities

Round Robin Discussion and Brief Written Responses

Closing
Materials
•
None.
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5%
5%
60%
25%
5%
NYS Common Core ELA & Literacy Curriculum
DRAFT
Grade 9 • Module 1 • Unit 3 • Lesson 18
Learning Sequence
Percentage
of Lesson
Teacher Actions
5%
Introduction of Lesson Agenda
Begin by reviewing the agenda and sharing
the standards for this lesson: RL.9-10.3,
RL.9-10.4, SL.9-10.1.
Student Actions
Students look at the agenda.
Explain that today’s excerpt will be
explored in five chunks. There will be a
series of text-dependent questions for each
chunk. Questions will be explored as a
group and then discussed with the class.
Introduce this lesson’s focusing question:
Who or what is responsible for Juliet’s
death?
5%
Homework Accountability
Lead a brief full class discussion asking
students to share their responses to the
previous lesson’s homework: Reread the
Prologue and respond to the following
question: What can you infer about the
way Romeo and Juliet will end? Use
Student responses to the homework may
vary, but may include the following: a
prediction of the death of Juliet (“children’s
end”) or the end of the feud (“bury their
parents’ strife”).
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4
Instructional Notes (extensions,
supports, common
misunderstandings)
NYS Common Core ELA & Literacy Curriculum
Grade 9 • Module 1 • Unit 3 • Lesson 18
DRAFT
evidence from the Prologue and the
understanding you have built from this
lesson’s close reading.
60%
Text-Dependent Questions and Activities
Read Act 5.3, lines 139–170, aloud, or play
an audio recording.
Students follow along, reading silently.
Have students form small, heterogeneous
groups according to established protocols.
Direct student groups to read aloud lines
140–146.
Student responses may include the
following:
Display the following TDQs only. Allow time
for students to discuss in their groups
before sharing with class.
1. Students identify the familiar words color
or colored in discoloured. The prefix dischanges the word colored so that it has a
negative connotation (i.e., something has
been colored wrongly or badly).
1. What familiar word do you see in
discoloured? How does the prefix dischange the meaning of this word?
2. Why are the swords discoloured? Why
are they masterless?
2. The swords are “discoloured” because
they are stained with the red blood of
Romeo and Paris, as is evidenced by the
stage directions before line 140 “Friar
stoops and looks on the blood and
weapons.” They are “masterless” because
their previous owners, Romeo and Paris, are
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5
Additional scaffolding questions for
lines 140–146:

How does Friar Laurence
describe the swords in lines
142–143? Underline the
adjectives in your text.
Students underline the
adjectives masterless, gory, and
discoloured.

How does Friar Laurence
describe the hour? What does
he mean?
Friar Laurence describes the
hour as unkind. Students infer
that the Friar describes the
hour this way because Romeo
and Paris have died very
recently (likely within the last
hour).
NYS Common Core ELA & Literacy Curriculum
DRAFT
Grade 9 • Module 1 • Unit 3 • Lesson 18
both dead.
3. Review the definition of lamentable
provided to you. As a group, develop a
definition of chance. Now reread lines 145–
146. What is Friar Laurence implying about
recent events in this statement?
3. Students review the definition of
lamentable (adj.) – regrettable. Possible
student definitions of chance may include
the following: “something that happens
unpredictably; luck; or something that is
accidental or coincidental.” After unpacking
these two words, students make the
connection that Friar Laurence is implying
that recent tragic events were unpredictable
or coincidental, without discernable human
intention or observable cause.
4. According to Friar Laurence, who/what is
responsible for the deaths of Romeo and
Paris?
4. According to Friar Laurence, the deaths of
Romeo and Paris are due to “lamentable
chance” (line 146). Fate, fortune, or bad
luck is responsible for the deaths of Romeo
and Paris.
Circulate and support group discussions as
needed.
Lead a class discussion of lines 140–146,
calling on groups to offer their answers.
Direct student groups to read aloud lines
148–150.
5. What is Juliet unaware of that both the
audience and Friar Laurence know? What
effect does this create?
5. At this point in the text, Juliet is unaware
that Romeo is dead, she asks the friar
“Where is my Romeo” (line 150). This
creates the added effect of suspense in how
the audience experiences this tragedy.
Lead a class discussion of lines 148–150,
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6
Circulate around the room and
support group discussions as
needed.
Extension questions for lines 148–
150:
 How does Juliet refer to Romeo
in these lines? Underline the
NYS Common Core ELA & Literacy Curriculum
Grade 9 • Module 1 • Unit 3 • Lesson 18
DRAFT
calling on groups to offer their answers.

Direct student groups to read aloud lines
151–159.
6. According to Friar Laurence, who/what is
to blame for the tragic events that have
transpired? What is Friar Laurence
suggesting about the power of individual
choice in this situation?
Circle and support discussion groups as
needed.
Lead class discussion of lines 151–159.
Direct student groups to read aloud lines
6. Friar Laurence says that a “greater power” Additional scaffolding questions for
(line 153) is the cause of these events. Friar
lines 151–159:
Laurence is suggesting that individual choice
doesn’t stand a chance against a greater
 How does Friar Laurence
power when it comes to how events play
describe the scene in front of
out. He explains that despite the individual
him?
decisions that he, Juliet, and Romeo made,
Friar Laurence describes the
this tragic event still came to pass because
scene as a “nest of death,” a
something else was more powerful than all
“contagion,” and “unnatural”
three of them.
(lines 151–152).
 What option is Friar Laurence
offering to Juliet?
Friar Laurence is offering Juliet
the option to join a nunnery.
7. Juliet refuses to accept Friar Laurence’s
help and depart with him. She says, “I will
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part of the text that tells you.
Students underline my lord
(line 148) and my Romeo (line
150).
What might this tell you about
how Juliet understands her
relationship to Romeo?
Juliet understands herself as
simultaneously possessing
Romeo (as indicated by the
possessive my, used twice) and
as his subject or his inferior (he
is her lord).
7
It will probably be necessary here to
discuss what a nunnery is (a
NYS Common Core ELA & Literacy Curriculum
160–167.
7. How does Juliet respond to Friar
Laurence’s counsel? What does she see as
a better alternative? Why? Hint: What do
you know about Juliet that might make a
nunnery a fate worse than death?
8. Why does Juliet describe the poison as a
“restorative”? What does she think it will
restore?
Grade 9 • Module 1 • Unit 3 • Lesson 18
DRAFT
not away.” Juliet thinks that poisoning
herself is a better alternative. Students'
answers will vary. Some might suggest that
Juliet’s passionate nature (as evidenced
most clearly by Juliet’s soliloquy in Act 4)
would make this a difficult transition. Others
might point to the fact that she married
Romeo against her parents’ wishes as
evidence that a life of obedience would be
difficult and even miserable for her. Others
might point to Juliet’s affluent background—
her family throws big parties—as a reason
why a more spartan lifestyle would be
uncomfortable. Still others might say that,
for Juliet, any life without Romeo is not a life
worth living.
convent) and what a nun is required
to renounce (she must take the
three vows: poverty, chastity, and
obedience).
8. Juliet describes the poison as a restorative
because she thinks that it has the power to
bring Romeo back to her, if only in death,
and so return their relationship to what it
previously was.
Additional scaffolding:
Additional scaffolding:



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8
If Juliet accepts Friar Laurence’s
offer, what sort of a future
does she have to look forward
to?
If Juliet accepts this offer, she
has a quiet lifetime of prayer
and abstinence to look forward
to – no more passionate love
affairs.
What familiar word do you see
in restorative? What does this
word mean?
Students identify the familiar
word restore within restorative.
The word restore means “to
return something to its former
condition.”
If students struggle to define
restore, ask them scaffolding
NYS Common Core ELA & Literacy Curriculum
Grade 9 • Module 1 • Unit 3 • Lesson 18
DRAFT

9. What does Juliet realize in line 167? How
does this compound the tragedy of the
scene?
Circulate around the room and support
group discussions as needed.
Lead a class discussion of lines 160–167.
Direct student groups to read aloud lines
168–170.
10. Whose dagger kills Juliet? What might
this symbolize?
Allow students time to discuss in their
groups. Circle the room and support group
discussions as needed.
Lead a class discussion of lines 168–170.
9. In line 167, Juliet realizes that Romeo has
died very recently because his lips have
not yet grown cold, she exclaims “Thy
lips are warm!” (line 167). This
compounds the tragedy of the scene
because if Juliet had woken only
minutes earlier, she might have been
able to stop Romeo from drinking the
poison.
10. Romeo’s dagger kills Juliet. Student
responses concerning the possible symbolic
weight of this scenario will vary widely.
Some students might say that Romeo’s
dagger might symbolize that Juliet has
chosen to die for Romeo—he is the reason
for her death. Others might suggest that the
fact that a Montague dagger killed yet
another Capulet symbolizes that the
Montague–Capulet family feud is ultimately
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questions to guide their
thought process:
What are people doing when
they restore old cars?
They are making old cars work
like new cars again.
So what does it mean to restore
something?
It means “to return something
to the way it used to be.”
9
Additional scaffolding questions for
lines 168–170:
 Why does Juliet kill herself with
the dagger?
Juliet kills herself with the
dagger because the Page and
Watchmen have just walked in,
and the poison has not yet
taken effect. Students might
also respond that there wasn’t
NYS Common Core ELA & Literacy Curriculum
Grade 9 • Module 1 • Unit 3 • Lesson 18
DRAFT
responsible for this tragedy. Still others
might suggest that Romeo’s dagger is
symbolic of the tragic consequences of
Romeo and Juliet’s forbidden love.


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10
enough poison left on Romeo’s
lips to kill Juliet, so she had to
use the dagger instead.
How does Juliet describe the
dagger? Why might she choose
this word?
Juliet describes the dagger as
“happy” (line 169) because she
thinks it will reunite her with
Romeo, or perhaps because it
will end her suffering.
How is Juliet’s death by dagger
different than Romeo’s death
by poison?
Apart from the obvious (i.e.,
Juliet’s death is most likely
bloodier and slower than
Romeo’s), Juliet’s death by
dagger is more of an impulsive
decision than Romeo’s death by
poison. Romeo went out and
bought the poison, which
demonstrates that his decision
was premeditated. Juliet, on
the other hand, has awoken
from a deep sleep to find her
husband dead beside her. Her
death by dagger is a decision
made quickly and in the heat of
the moment.
NYS Common Core ELA & Literacy Curriculum
25%
DRAFT
Grade 9 • Module 1 • Unit 3 • Lesson 18
Round Robin Discussion and Brief Written Responses
Inform students that they will conclude
their exploration of Act 5.3 with a Round
Robin discussion of the lesson’s focusing
question: Who or what is responsible for
Juliet’s death?
Directions for Round Robin:
Instruct students to arrange themselves
into two concentric circles. Each circle
should contain the same number of
students, creating pairs between the two
circles. Student pairs should be facing each
other.
Example 1 minute Round Robin responses:
Student 1 from inner circle (1 min): I think
Juliet is responsible for her own death
because she is the one who decided to take
Romeo’s dagger and stab herself. She could
have decided to go with Friar Laurence, but
she didn’t.
Student 2 from outer circle (1 min): I think
Romeo is responsible for Juliet’s death
because she only kills herself so that she can
be with him. If Romeo had only realized that
Juliet wasn’t dead before he took the
The Round Robin begins with each student poison, he would be alive and so would
in the inner circle discussing their answer to Juliet.
the following prompt for 1 minute: Who or
what do you think is responsible for Juliet’s
death? Why?
Each student’s counterpart on the outer
circle first listens and then responds with
his or her own answer to the focusing
question for 1 minute.
Then, at your direction, students in the
outer circle rotate to the right one spot and
repeat the protocols established with a
new partner. This Round Robin will include
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11
Round Robin rationale: The purpose
of this exercise is for students to
practice how to make a claim and
support it with evidence. This
exercise also has the added benefit
of brainstorming and oral
processing.
NYS Common Core ELA & Literacy Curriculum
DRAFT
Grade 9 • Module 1 • Unit 3 • Lesson 18
three rotations.
Circulate and observe student discussions
and assess comprehension.
Once three rotations have been completed,
direct students to briefly record their
response to the Round Robin discussion
question, using evidence from the text to
support their response. Collect these
written responses to assess for
comprehension as students exit the class.
5%
Closing
For homework, instruct students to
continue their Accountable Independent
Reading through the lens of their focus
standard and prepare for a 3-5 minute
discussion of their text based on that
standard.
Students continue to read their Accountable
Independent Reading text for homework.
Homework
Students should continue to read their Accountable Independent Reading through the lens of their focus standard and prepare for a 3-5 minute
discussion of their text based on that standard.
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12