Grade 8 English Language Arts
12 units matched to the Alberta Curriculum. Kids see this subject as “Language Arts”.
Organizing ideas
- General Outcome 1: students explore thoughts, ideas, feelings and experiences
- General Outcome 2: students listen, speak, read, write, view and represent to comprehend and respond personally and critically
- General Outcome 3: students manage ideas and information
- General Outcome 4: students enhance the clarity and artistry of communication
- General Outcome 5: students respect, support and collaborate with others
Units
Unit 1
Talking & Working Together
Exploring and sharing thoughts and experiences, listening to other points of view, using inclusive language, working fairly in a group and giving feedback that is specific and kind.
Learning outcome: General Outcomes 1, 5 · sharing ideas and experiences, listening with respect, working in groups and giving helpful feedback
Unit 2
Close Reading
Reading original short passages and answering questions about theme, tone, word choice, inference and the author's purpose, using evidence from the text.
Learning outcome: General Outcome 2 · making inferences and analyzing complex texts
Unit 3
Reading Detective
Making and checking predictions, choosing a strategy when reading gets tricky, drawing local and global inferences from clues, and summarizing the main ideas of complex texts.
Learning outcome: General Outcome 2 · reading strategies for complex texts
Unit 4
Whose Story Is It?
Recognizing third-person limited and omniscient narrators, spotting clues that a narrator is unreliable, and thinking about how a story would change from another character's point of view.
Learning outcome: General Outcome 2 · the narrator and point of view
Unit 5
Literary Devices
Naming devices like simile, metaphor, personification, hyperbole, irony, foreshadowing and symbolism in short excerpts, and identifying a narrator's point of view.
Learning outcome: General Outcome 2 · literary devices such as symbolism and irony
Unit 6
Irony, Satire & Allusion
Telling verbal, situational and dramatic irony apart, spotting how satire uses exaggeration to criticize, and explaining what an allusion to a well-known story adds to a text.
Learning outcome: General Outcome 2 · irony and satire
Unit 7
Forms, Patterns & Visuals
Comparing text forms such as editorials, news articles, poems and graphic novels, spotting text patterns like problem-solution and compare-contrast, and judging how features, images and design add to meaning.
Learning outcome: General Outcomes 2, 3 · text forms and features
Unit 8
Argument & Media
Telling fact from opinion, spotting persuasive appeals (ethos, pathos, logos) and weak reasoning, and judging how reliable a source or media message is.
Learning outcome: General Outcomes 2, 3 · analyzing arguments, media and perspectives
Unit 9
Digital Citizens
Staying safe and respectful online, protecting privacy, spotting misinformation and disinformation, understanding how feeds are curated, and thinking about audience and purpose in digital and media texts.
Learning outcome: General Outcome 3 · finding and judging information in digital texts
Unit 10
Write It Better
Choosing the right form and tone for an audience, using reliable sources and giving credit, building voice, acknowledging other perspectives, and revising, editing and proofreading drafts.
Learning outcome: General Outcomes 3, 4 · planning, drafting and revising writing
Unit 11
Grammar & Style
Active and passive voice, run-ons, parallel structure, commas, apostrophes, semicolons, colons and common usage choices.
Learning outcome: General Outcome 4 · sentence structure, grammar and style
Unit 12
Word Study
Using prefixes, suffixes and Greek and Latin roots to work out unfamiliar words, reading context clues, and noticing how word choice changes feeling.
Learning outcome: General Outcome 4 · word meanings, roots and correct usage
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