II. High School Level Expectations for College Readiness– Ela
B. High School Classroom Work
II.B1) Literature Project (Beowulf)
Burlington High School
State Scholars Program
Class Assignment (Project)
The following assignment offered students a choice of culminating
projects after reading Beowulf:
Beowulf
Final
Project
Choose one of the options below for your final project for Beowulf:
1) Compose a “modern-day heroic epic” in the style of Beowulf. You
will need to have a hero character and some type of monster for the
hero to overcome. The monster should represent a modern-day
sin. Remember to include vivid imagery and kennings.
2) Create a poster/painting/drawing that captures imagery from
Beowulf. To accompany the project, you will need to write why
you chose the scene that you are depicting.
3) Create a comic book version on Beowulf. Depict the scenes from
Beowulf’s arrival on the shores of Daneland through Beowulf’s
defeat of Grendel. You may take some artistic liberty (for
instance, if you want to include Beowulf’s origin story, that’s OK).
Project is due: ___________________
One student worked on option #2, producing the following exemplary
pencil illustration:
The student’s essay follows, with teacher comments circled:
Excellent use of
textual evidence.
Good reflection.
T.E.
T.E.
I chose to draw this scene from Beowulf because I
thought it had very good imagery. This scene is one
of the very first battles between Beowulf and
Grendel. In this scene Grendel returns to kill the men
who are sleeping in the hall. Beowulf grabs Grendel’s
hand, and with his amazing strength rips off
Grendel’s whole arm. Some of the imagery used is,
“and bit into the bone lock,/drinking the streams of
blood,/ then swallowing huge morsels of flesh.” I felt
that this line gives great description of what’s going
on and really helps you invision it. Another line is,
“The horrible monster endured/ a wound: the bonelock/ of his shoulder gave way,/ and his sinews
sprang out.” This quote is the main reason I chose
this scene. This line really helped me imagine what
was happening in the scene. While reading it, I could
actually hear Grendel’s shoulder pop out, and his
flesh tear apart. This is the reason I chose this scene.
Instead of ending with "This is why I
chose…" next time try talking about
how the imagery engaged multiple
senses (and how it did). You start to go
into it and then simply stop.
For related information, see:
Section IIA. High School Syllabi and Course Outlines II.A1) State Scholars Program - British Literature - Course Syllabus
I wish you had
used color to
portray this!!