The House of the Seven Gables Lesson Plan

Reverse Superstition

Kind of Activity:

Collaborative Writing

Objective:

Students will examine the theme of superstition and the supernatural by following Hawthorne's ideas about perception

Common Core Standards:

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.9-10.3, CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.9-10.2

Structure:

Hawthorne writes about the supernatural elements in the novel in such a way that allows readers to draw their own conclusions about whether any of it might be real, though he errs on the side of always offering a plausible, rational explanation for the apparently supernatural events. The idea of this exercise is to reverse-engineer superstition, and to think of reasons why something totally...