HP Components
Unit Name: Beowulf
Short, Descriptive Overview
TEKS :
Week 13
Week 14
The main protagonist, Beowulf, a hero of the Geats, comes to the aid of Hrothgar, the king of the Danes, whose great hall, Heorot, is plagued by the
monster Grendel. Beowulf kills both Grendel and Grendel's mother, the latter with a magical sword.
Later in his life, Beowulf is himself king of the Geats, and finds his realm terrorized by a dragon whose treasure has been stolen from his hoard in a
burial mound. Abandoned by his thanes, he attacks the dragon, but, now aged, is soon in mortal danger. Only Beowulf’s young Swedish relative Wiglaf
dares join him. Beowulf finally slays the dragon, but is mortally wounded. He is buried by the sea.
Listening and Speaking
Reading
Writing
(24) Listening and Speaking/Listening.
(1) Reading/Vocabulary Development. Students understand
(17) Oral and Written
Students will use comprehension skills to listen new vocabulary and use it when reading and writing. Students Conventions/Conventions.
attentively to others in formal and informal
are expected to:
Students understand the function
settings. Students will continue to apply earlier
(B) analyze textual context (within a sentence and in larger of and use the conventions of
standards with greater complexity. Students are sections of text) to draw conclusions about the nuance in word academic language when speaking
expected to:
meanings;
and writing. Students will
(A) listen responsively to a speaker by
(C) use the relationship between words encountered in
continue to apply earlier standards
framing inquiries that reflect an understanding
analogies to determine their meanings (e.g.,
with greater complexity. Students
of the content and by identifying the positions
synonyms/antonyms, connotation/denotation);
are expected to:
taken and the evidence in support of those
(D) analyze and explain how the English language has
(A) use and understand the
positions; and
developed and been influenced by other languages; and
function of different types of
(B) assess the persuasiveness of a
(E) use general and specialized dictionaries, thesauri,
clauses and phrases (e.g.,
presentation based on content, diction,
histories of language, books of quotations, and other related
adjectival, noun, adverbial clauses
rhetorical strategies, and delivery.
references (printed or electronic) as needed.
and phrases); and
(25) Listening and Speaking/Speaking.
(7) Reading/Comprehension of Literary Text/Sensory
(B) use a variety of correctly
Students speak clearly and to the point, using
Language. Students understand, make inferences and draw
structured sentences (e.g.,
the conventions of language. Students will
conclusions about how an author's sensory language creates
compound, complex, compoundcontinue to apply earlier standards with greater imagery in literary text and provide evidence from text to
complex).
complexity. Students are expected to formulate support their understanding. Students are expected to analyze
sound arguments by using elements of classical how the author's patterns of imagery, literary allusions, and
speeches (e.g., introduction, first and second
conceits reveal theme, set tone, and create meaning in
transitions, body, and conclusion), the art of
metaphors, passages, and literary works.
persuasion, rhetorical devices, eye contact,
(8) Reading/Comprehension of Informational Text/Culture
speaking rate (e.g., pauses for effect), volume,
and History. Students analyze, make inferences and draw
enunciation, purposeful gestures, and
conclusions about the author's purpose in cultural, historical,
conventions of language to communicate ideas and contemporary contexts and provide evidence from the text
effectively.
to support their understanding. Students are expected to
(26) Listening and Speaking/Teamwork.
analyze the consistency and clarity of the expression of the
Students work productively with others in
controlling idea and the ways in which the organizational and
teams. Students will continue to apply earlier
rhetorical patterns of text support or confound the author's
standards with greater complexity. Students are meaning or purpose.
expected to participate productively in teams,
offering ideas or judgments that are purposeful
in moving the team towards goals, asking
relevant and insightful questions, tolerating a
range of positions and ambiguity in decisionmaking, and evaluating the work of the group
based on agreed-upon criteria.
Required Fiction
Enrichment Fiction
Required Non-Fiction
Enrichment Non-Fiction
Writing Focus (e.g., Purpose,
Process, and Text Structure)
Viewing/Representing Focus
Speaking/Listening Focus
Generalizations/Enduring
Understandings
Guiding/Essential Questions
Concepts
Topics
Essential Facts
Beowulf: A New Verse Translation. Trans. Seamus Heany. New York: W. W. Norton, 2000.
http://etext.virginia.edu/toc/modeng/public/AnoBeow.html (primary source)
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Creative boast – to imitate style
Art and artifact viewing – to connect art - literature - values
Oral recitations – to recognize style
 Ancestral heritage and individual reputation help to establish identity
 Tensions exist between value systems.
 A culture’s endurance is dependent upon remaining loyal to the values that it espouses.
 What are some of the differences between the poet’s world and that of the characters in the poem? What are the continuities between these
worlds? Is there irony in our vision of this past age? How does the poet create a distance between the characters and himself – and how does he
express their own sense of a distant past?
 Is Beowulf an epic? What sort of social order produces “epic” poetry? What values does the poem promote, and how does it promote them?
What sorts of conflicts with or resistances to the ideology of epic can be expressed? What sorts are found within the poem itself?
 Look at the religious references in the poem: How do the characters see their relationship to God (or the gods)? Why would a Christian author
write a poem about a pagan hero?
 Does the heroic code expressed in Beowulf conflict with a Christian sensibility?
The Risk of Knowing
Fate; the Epic; Literature as reflection of a culture’s values; Heroism
An Epic is a long poem in a lofty style about the exploits of heroic figures. Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, as well as the Old English poem Beowulf, are
examples of epics.
Epic Conventions are literary practices, rules, or devices that became commonplace in epic poetry. Among the classical conventions Milton used are the
following:
.......(1) The invocation of the muse, in which a writer requests divine help in composing his work.
.......(2) Telling a story with which readers or listeners are already familiar; they know the characters, the plot, and the outcome. Most of the
great writers of the ancient world–as well as many great writers in later times, including Shakespeare–frequently told stories already known to
the public. Thus, in such stories, there were no unexpected plot twists, no surprise endings. If this sounds strange to you, the modern reader and
theatergoer, consider that many of the most popular motion pictures today are about stories already known to the public. Examples are The
Passion of the Christ, Titanic, The Ten Commandments, Troy, Spartacus, Pearl Harbor, and Gettysburg.
.......(3) Beginning the story in the middle, a literary convention known by its Latin term in media res (in the middle of things). Such a
convention allows a writer to begin his story at an exciting part, then flash back to fill the reader in on details leading up to that exciting part.
.......(4) Announcing or introducing a list of characters who play a major role in the story. They may speak at some length about how to resolve
a problem (as the followers of Satan do early in Paradise Lost).
.......(5) Conflict in the celestial realm. Divine beings fight and scheme against one another in the epics of Homer and Vergil, and they do so in
Paradise Lost on a grand scale, with Satan and his forces opposing God and his forces.
.......(6) Use of dramatic irony. Dramatic irony is a figure of speech in which a character in a story fails to see or understand what is obvious to
the audience. Dramatic irony appears frequently in the plays of the ancient Greeks. For example, in Oedipux Rex, by Sophocles, dramatic irony
occurs when Oedipus fails to realize what the audience knows–that he married his own mother. In Paradise Lost, dramatic irony occurs when
Adam and Eve happily go about daily life in the Garden of Eden unaware that they will succumb to the devil's temptation and suffer the loss of
Paradise. Dramatic irony also occurs when Satan and his followers fail to understand that it is impossible ultimately to thwart or circumvent
divine will and justice.
A Kenning is a compound expression, often hyphenated, representing a single noun.
A Caesura is a pause in a line of verse shown in scansion by two vertical lines ( || ).
Process and Thinking Skills
AP Connections
Language of Instruction
Vocabulary
Support Materials
Comitatus is the basic idea that everyone protects the king at all costs even if it means a warrior giving up his own life. If a king is killed, the warriors
must avenge the death of the king or they can no longer serve as warriors for the next king.
Students will:
 Determine how Anglo Saxon values and beliefs are portrayed through the text.
 Compose and perform their own kennings, Anglo Saxon style boasts.
 Imitate the meter of Anglo Saxon poetry.
 Identify the major epic conventions and pagan and Christian elements present in the text.
 Participate in oral readings of the text.
 Collaborate on small group projects that illustrate Anglo Saxon Values and Epic conventions.
 The course includes an intensive study of representative works such as those by authors cited in the AP English Course Description so that by the
time the student completes AP English Literature and Composition she or he will have studied during high school literature from both British
and American writers, as well as works written in several genres from the sixteenth century to contemporary times. The works selected for the
course should require careful, deliberative reading that yields multiple meanings.
 The course teaches students to write an interpretation of a piece of literature that is based on a careful observation of textual details, considering
the work's:
o Structure, style, and themes
o The social and historical values it reflects and embodies
o Such elements as the use of figurative language, imagery, symbolism, and tone
 The course includes frequent opportunities for students to write and rewrite formal, extended analyses and timed, in-class responses. The course
requires:
o Writing to understand: Informal, exploratory writing activities that enable students to discover what they think in the process of writing
about their reading (such assignments could include annotation, freewriting, keeping a reading journal, and response/reaction papers)
o Writing to evaluate: Analytical, argumentative essays in which students draw upon textual details to make and explain judgments about a
work's artistry and quality, and its social and cultural values
 The AP teacher provides instruction and feedback on students' writing assignments, both before and after the students revise their work, that help the
students develop:
o A wide-ranging vocabulary used appropriately and effectively
o An effective use of rhetoric, including controlling tone, establishing and maintaining voice, and achieving appropriate emphasis through
diction and sentence structure
o
Comitatus
Kennings
Epic Hero
Social and Historical Context
Barbaric Culture – Role of Women
Revenge
Oral Tradition
In context
Teacher generated and College Board materials
Passing Away of a Culture
Anglo Saxon Epic
Blank Verse
Foil
War
Fate (Wyrd)
Pagan v. Christian