Chapter 15

Skills - Personification, Comic Relief, Symbolism
Personification is the granting of lifelike qualities to non-human objects. For example:
I stood watch as dawn blessed the sea and as the moon cut the midnight sky.
What two things are being personified?
How does this help you visualize the scene better than if the author had written, "I stood watch at sunrise and at midnight”?

A humorous scene placed between serious or tragic scenes is called comic relief. This device allows an author to lighten the tone of a novel and to heighten the seriousness of the theme by contrast. Explain the comic relief in the last three paragraphs of Chapter 14.

A symbol is something that represents an idea or a set of ideas. What does the blood bird at the end of Chapter 14 symbolize?

Writing Response to a piece of artwork is used to activate students' schema about ships, storms, and wrecks; the basic setting for the novel. This strategy allows students to explore their prior knowledge as well as to empathize with Charlotte and the rest of the characters, thus promoting self-to-text connections, and prepares them for the events that will occur in chapter fifteen. This activity should be used as an anticipatory set for the class period when students will read chapter fifteen.

Vocabulary to preview - asunder, dispute, flounder, ebbing, equanimity, abated

Students may create a graphic organizer on cause and effect relationships in chapters 9-15.  Print page 10 from the Glencoe Literature Library.  Pages 11 and 12 have study questions, or copy, back-to-back, a printer-friendly version from this link.

Predictions and SOS

Follow-up Discussion Questions:
1. When did the storm hit?
2. How do you think Mr. Hollybrass died? How is it possible for him to have been clutching Charlotte’s handkerchief?
3. What does the hurricane symbolize?
4. What mood is created in this chapter?
5. Zachariah--is he a ghost or real?

Check vocabulary and comprehension after reviewing the underlined passages whole-group. This page has questions about chapters 13, 14, and 15.

Students will select a follow-up activity:

• Students that prefer to work individually and like to write may choose to write a Letter to the Crew
• Students that prefer to work in a group setting may choose to extend their response in a literature group.  You may need to facilitate the groupings depending on the number of students that want to participate in this activity.
• Students that prefer to work with a partner may choose a creative form of expression.