Highsmith, Carol M. Back road in Washington State. 1980 to 2006. Photograph. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division. https://www.loc.gov/item/2011630857/.
This source will serve as part of an anticipatory set of texts in which students conduct a quickwrite about where this road will take them in life. Students will identify key features in the image and explain using figurative language how those features will play a part on their journey. Rather than conducting research on the image, students will use it as inspiration for narrative writing.
This kind of setting is often found in remote national parks, rural highways, or scenic byways in places like the Pacific Northwest, the Rockies, or the Appalachians. Roads like this may serve as both literal and symbolic paths— representing escape, adventure, solitude, or even transition.
Source: https://www.loc.gov/item/2011630857/
- How does this photo serve as inspiration for your own journey in life?
- How does this picture motivate you?
- Why might this scene resonate with so many people?
ELA Standard
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.CCRA.W.3
Write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique, well-chosen details and well-structured event sequences.
Social Studies Standard
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.WHST.9-10.1.dEstablish and maintain a formal style and objective tone while attending to the norms and conventions of the discipline in which they are writing.
Students use spoken, written, and visual language to accomplish their own purposes (e.g., for learning, enjoyment, persuasion, and the exchange of information).
- Place this source on the screen at the front of the room. Have students turn and talk about what they see. Write the questions listed in the instructional focus questions section of this lesson on the board and have students discuss each with a partner.
- What does this photo remind you of?
- Share your favorite place to drive to or to visit by car.
- Does this remind you of any movie or book you have seen/read? Why?
- After a few minutes, ask students to share their observations and ideas with the entire class. Tell students that they will be starting a personal narrative about their own journeys and life experiences. This image is to serve as motivation for the start of their drafting.
- Expected student responses may include a road in the middle of a forest or the middle of nowhere; nature or somewhere beautiful; the freedom to leave one place for another; going on an adventure or a journey.
- Students might discuss the perspective of the photo and how when one looks at it, it is as though they could have taken the picture. Next, have students take out paper and pencil and write the prompt on the board.
- You can adjust the prompt based on your narrative writing unit, but as an example: “Imagine the road ahead of you in life. Where do you think it will take you compared to where you hope it will take you? Are there differences? Why do you think there are differences? What are you doing now to make sure your journey continues on a path you choose?”
- Give students a few minutes to discuss with a partner and then have them do a quickwrite for 5–10 minutes. They can write paragraphs, bullets, draw pictures; they just have to keep their pencil moving the entire time.
- A Connecting Read-Write-Think lesson can be found here: Path After High School
Highsmith, Carol M. Country road in rural America. 1980 and 2006. Photograph. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division. https://www.loc.gov/item/2011630198/.