Overview

Lesson Procedure

65-75 minutes of class time across 5 phases.

1. Warm-Up10 minutes
2. Direct Instruction20 minutes
3. Guided Practice15-20 minutes
4. Independent Practice15 minutes
5. Closure5-10 minutes

1. Warm-Up10 minutes

   Warm-Up Prompt

   "A car lot advertises a 'pre-owned' car, and a coach whose team lost 40-0 calls the game 'a learning experience.' What is each phrase avoiding saying? Who benefits from saying it that way?"

   Give students two minutes to write, then collect answers: used, a bad loss, a sales pitch, protecting players. Name the figure: a euphemism is a mild or indirect expression used in place of one that seems blunt, painful or embarrassing. Then write bittersweet and deafening silence on the board and ask what is strange about each. An oxymoron joins two words whose meanings seem to cancel each other out, so that the reader has to find the sense in which both are true.

   Finally, ask whether thrifty and stingy mean the same thing. Both have the same basic meaning, spending little: their denotation (dictionary meaning) is similar. But one praises and one blames: their connotations (the feelings and judgments a word carries) differ. That difference is a nuance, the third skill in today's standard.

2. Direct Instruction20 minutes

   A routine for any figure of speech. Post three questions and model them aloud on both texts below:

   • Name it: what kind of figure is this (euphemism, oxymoron, metaphor, idiom, exaggeration)?
   • Translate it: what do the words say literally, and what do they mean in this sentence?
   • Ask why: what role does it play? Does it soften, hide, flatter, amuse, reveal a character or compress a conflict?

   Read the first text aloud. Elizabeth Gaskell's Cranford (1853) describes a small English town run by genteel ladies (women of good family and refined manners) who have little money and will not admit it. The narrator, a younger woman who visits the town, tells the story.

   1I imagine that a few of the gentlefolks of Cranford were poor, and had some difficulty in making both ends meet; but they were like the Spartans, and concealed their smart under a smiling face. We none of us spoke of money, because that subject savoured of commerce and trade, and though some might be poor, we were all aristocratic. [...]

   2There were one or two consequences arising from this general but unacknowledged poverty, and this very much acknowledged gentility, which were not amiss, and which might be introduced into many circles of society to their great improvement. For instance, the inhabitants of Cranford kept early hours, and clattered home in their pattens, under the guidance of a lantern-bearer, about nine o’clock at night; and the whole town was abed and asleep by half-past ten. Moreover, it was considered “vulgar” (a tremendous word in Cranford) to give anything expensive, in the way of eatable or drinkable, at the evening entertainments. Wafer bread-and-butter and sponge-biscuits were all that the Honourable Mrs Jamieson gave; and she was sister-in-law to the late Earl of Glenmire, although she did practise such “elegant economy.”

   3“Elegant economy!” How naturally one falls back into the phraseology of Cranford! There, economy was always “elegant,” and money-spending always “vulgar and ostentatious”; a sort of sour-grapeism which made us very peaceful and satisfied. I never shall forget the dismay felt when a certain Captain Brown came to live at Cranford, and openly spoke about his being poor—not in a whisper to an intimate friend, the doors and windows being previously closed, but in the public street! in a loud military voice! alleging his poverty as a reason for not taking a particular house. The ladies of Cranford were already rather moaning over the invasion of their territories by a man and a gentleman. He was a half-pay captain, and had obtained some situation on a neighbouring railroad, which had been vehemently petitioned against by the little town; and if, in addition to his masculine gender, and his connection with the obnoxious railroad, he was so brazen as to talk of being poor—why, then, indeed, he must be sent to Coventry. Death was as true and as common as poverty; yet people never spoke about that, loud out in the streets. It was a word not to be mentioned to ears polite. We had tacitly agreed to ignore that any with whom we associated on terms of visiting equality could ever be prevented by poverty from doing anything that they wished. If we walked to or from a party, it was because the night was so fine, or the air so refreshing, not because sedan-chairs were expensive. If we wore prints, instead of summer silks, it was because we preferred a washing material; and so on, till we blinded ourselves to the vulgar fact that we were, all of us, people of very moderate means. Of course, then, we did not know what to make of a man who could speak of poverty as if it was not a disgrace. [...]

   • Euphemism: naming poverty without the word

     "we blinded ourselves to the vulgar fact that we were, all of us, people of very moderate means" (paragraph 3). What does people of very moderate means mean, and what is its role?

     Result: Literally, the phrase describes people with a middling amount of money. In context it means poor: the paragraph has just listed the tricks the ladies use to hide what they cannot afford. Even while confessing, the narrator will not say the word, so the euphemism shows the very habit she describes. The effect is gently comic.

   • Euphemism: the polite excuse

     "If we walked to or from a party, it was because the night was so fine, or the air so refreshing, not because sedan-chairs were expensive" (paragraph 3).

     Result: The stated reason (fine weather) stands in for the real one (a hired sedan-chair costs money). Here the euphemism is a whole excuse, not one word. Gaskell puts the cover story and the truth in the same sentence, so the reader sees through the excuse at once. The stressed so shows how hard the speakers work at it.

   Now read the second text. In Tennyson's Lancelot and Elaine (1859), part of his retelling of the King Arthur legends, the young Elaine nurses the wounded knight Sir Lancelot in a hermit's cave. She loves him. Lancelot, however, has long loved Queen Guinevere, the wife of his king, Arthur.

   1Then rose Elaine and glided through the fields,
   And past beneath the weirdly-sculptured gates
   Far up the dim rich city to her kin;
   There bode the night: but woke with dawn, and past
   5Down through the dim rich city to the fields,
   Thence to the cave: so day by day she past
   In either twilight ghost-like to and fro
   Gliding, and every day she tended him,
   And likewise many a night: and Lancelot
   10Would, though he called his wound a little hurt
   Whereof he should be quickly whole, at times
   Brain-feverous in his heat and agony, seem
   Uncourteous, even he: but the meek maid
   Sweetly forbore him ever, being to him
   15Meeker than any child to a rough nurse,
   Milder than any mother to a sick child,
   And never woman yet, since man’s first fall,
   Did kindlier unto man, but her deep love
   Upbore her; till the hermit, skilled in all
   20The simples and the science of that time,
   Told him that her fine care had saved his life.
   And the sick man forgot her simple blush,
   Would call her friend and sister, sweet Elaine,
   Would listen for her coming and regret
   25Her parting step, and held her tenderly,
   And loved her with all love except the love
   Of man and woman when they love their best,
   Closest and sweetest, and had died the death
   In any knightly fashion for her sake.
   30And peradventure had he seen her first
   She might have made this and that other world
   Another world for the sick man; but now
   The shackles of an old love straitened him,
   His honour rooted in dishonour stood,
   35And faith unfaithful kept him falsely true.

   Yet the great knight in his mid-sickness made
   Full many a holy vow and pure resolve.
   These, as but born of sickness, could not live:
   For when the blood ran lustier in him again,
   40Full often the bright image of one face,
   Making a treacherous quiet in his heart,
   Dispersed his resolution like a cloud. [...]

   • Oxymoron: a divided knight

     "His honour rooted in dishonour stood" (line 34). Interpret the oxymoron.

     Result: Honour and dishonour are opposites, yet the line says one grows from the other, like a plant from its root. Lancelot's honor, his fame as the greatest and most courteous knight, stands on a dishonorable secret: his love for his king's wife. The figure packs his whole conflict into six words. A plain statement ("he felt torn") would name the conflict; the oxymoron makes the reader hold both halves at once.

3. Guided Practice15-20 minutes

   Part b of the standard asks students to analyze nuances in words with similar denotations. Hand out the entries below from James C. Fernald's English Synonyms and Antonyms (1896), a school textbook that explains how near-synonyms differ. Walk through Diagram 2 first. Then pairs read each entry and underline the phrase that separates each word from its neighbors.

   FRUGALITY. [...] Economy is a wise and careful administration of the means at one's disposal; frugality is a withholding of expenditure, or sparing of supplies or provision, to a noticeable and often to a painful degree; parsimony is excessive and unreasonable saving for the sake of saving. Frugality exalted into a virtue to be practised for its own sake, instead of as a means to an end, becomes the vice of parsimony. Miserliness is the denying oneself and others the ordinary comforts or even necessaries of life, for the mere sake of hoarding money. Prudence and providence look far ahead, and sacrifice the present to the future, saving as much as may be necessary for that end. (See PRUDENCE.) Thrift seeks not merely to save, but to earn. Economy manages, frugality saves, providence plans, thrift at once earns and saves, with a view to wholesome and profitable expenditure at a fitting time. See ABSTINENCE.

   [...]

   POVERTY. [...] Poverty denotes strictly lack of property or adequate means of support, but in common use is a relative term denoting any condition below that of easy, comfortable living; privation denotes a condition of painful lack of what is useful or desirable, tho not to the extent of absolute distress; indigence is lack of ordinary means of subsistence; destitution is lack of the comforts, and in part even of the necessaries of life; penury is especially cramping poverty, possibly not so sharp as destitution, but continuous, while that may be temporary; pauperism is such destitution as throws one upon organized public charity for support; beggary and mendicancy denote poverty that appeals for indiscriminate private charity.

   [...]

   PRIDE. [...] Haughtiness thinks highly of itself and poorly of others. Arrogance claims much for itself and concedes little to others. Pride is an absorbing sense of one's own greatness; haughtiness feels one's own superiority to others; disdain sees contemptuously the inferiority of others to oneself. Presumption claims place or privilege above one's right; pride deems nothing too high. Insolence is open and rude expression of contempt and hostility, generally from an inferior to a superior, as from a servant to a master or mistress. In the presence of superiors overweening pride manifests itself in presumption or insolence; in the presence of inferiors, or those supposed to be inferior, pride manifests itself by arrogance, disdain, haughtiness, superciliousness, or in either case often by cold reserve. (See RESERVE under MODESTY.) Pride is too self-satisfied to care for praise; vanity intensely craves admiration and applause. [...]

   • Nuance: why "elegant economy"

     Paragraph 2 of Cranford says Mrs Jamieson practised "elegant economy." Using the FRUGALITY entry, explain why economy is the word Cranford chooses.

     Result: Economy, frugality, parsimony and miserliness all denote spending little. Fernald separates them: economy is "a wise and careful administration of the means at one's disposal," frugality saves "to a noticeable and often to a painful degree," parsimony is "excessive and unreasonable saving," and miserliness hoards money. Only economy is a word of praise, so it lets a lady who cannot afford more sound wise instead of poor, and elegant makes saving sound like good taste.

   • Nuance: degrees of need

     Fernald writes that poverty "in common use is a relative term." Order poverty, privation and destitution from least to most severe, and say which one fits Cranford.

     Result: Poverty covers "any condition below that of easy, comfortable living"; privation is a "painful lack," though "not to the extent of absolute distress"; destitution is lack "of the comforts, and in part even of the necessaries of life." The Cranford ladies still give evening parties, so their condition is relative poverty, which is exactly what "moderate means" softens.

   Nuance organizer for the FRUGALITY entry

   Word	Fernald's key phrase	Praise, neutral or blame?	Would a Cranford lady use it about herself?
   economy
   frugality
   parsimony
   thrift

4. Independent Practice15 minutes

   Students read the notice below, written for this page, in which an invented apartment company delivers bad news as good news. They list every phrase that is a euphemism, an oxymoron or a word chosen for its connotation, and for each one record the plain meaning and who benefits from the wording. Some quiz questions use this notice.

   1Dear Residents,

   2We are delighted to share some exciting news about life at Harbor View. Beginning March 1, monthly rents will undergo a modest rate adjustment of $85. This change allows us to keep delivering the premium experience you deserve.

   3The north elevator is temporarily resting while we explore long-term solutions. In the meantime, the stairs offer a free fitness opportunity for residents of all ages. Our cozy studio units remain popular with young professionals, and the vintage kitchens preserve the original charm of our 1962 building.

   4Please note that the parking lot is now a pay-to-park area. After careful review, we are sure you will agree that this was the only choice. As part of our new cost-saving plan, several longtime staff members are no longer with the company, and we thank them for their years of service. Our new events team promises planned spontaneity at every gathering: each "surprise" party is on the calendar a month ahead.

   5As always, your feedback matters to us. The management office keeps open hours, by appointment only, on the first Tuesday of each month.

   6Warmly,
   The Harbor View Management Team

5. Closure5-10 minutes

   Exit ticket: (1) Write one euphemism you have heard or read this week, the plain words it replaces, and why the speaker chose it. (2) Using two words from today with similar denotations, write one sentence that explains the difference between denotation and connotation.

   Teacher note on the texts: Cranford is quoted from a 1904 printing and keeps Gaskell's British spelling and her idioms, such as "sent to Coventry"; its gentle mockery of the ladies' manners, and their dislike of a man in the town, belong to its time and place. The Tennyson excerpt alludes to Lancelot's love for Queen Guinevere without describing it; students need only the outline given in Direct Instruction. Fernald's 1896 entries reflect the class assumptions of their day: the PRIDE entry describes insolence as coming "generally from an inferior to a superior, as from a servant to a master or mistress," and the POVERTY entry uses older terms such as pauperism and beggary. Students can discuss how these words and judgments have changed. All three texts are quoted exactly as published, apart from the omissions marked [...].

Differentiation Strategies

Assessment Guidance

1. Question 1 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   In paragraph 1 of the Cranford excerpt, the poor gentlefolk "were like the Spartans, and concealed their smart under a smiling face." What does smart mean here?

   ATheir cleverness, which they hid so as not to seem proud BTheir fashionable clothing, covered by plain coats CTheir stinging pain, the hurt of being poor DTheir quick and witty replies in conversation

2. Question 2 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Paragraph 2 says Mrs Jamieson "was sister-in-law to the late Earl of Glenmire." What does late mean, and what kind of expression is it?

   AIt means the earl often arrived late; it is a plain description of his habits BIt means the earl has died; it is a conventional, polite way to avoid saying "dead" CIt means the earl kept late hours; it contrasts with the early bedtimes of Cranford DIt means the earl was recently made an earl; it is a formal title

3. Question 3 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   "If we wore prints, instead of summer silks, it was because we preferred a washing material" (paragraph 3). What does the stated reason cover up?

   AThat printed cotton was more fashionable than silk that summer BThat silk could not be cleaned, so it was impractical CThat the ladies could not afford summer silks DThat the ladies did not care about clothing at all

4. Question 4 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   The narrator calls the habit of labeling all spending "vulgar and ostentatious" "a sort of sour-grapeism which made us very peaceful and satisfied" (paragraph 3). The phrase alludes to Aesop's fox, who calls the grapes he cannot reach sour. What is its role?

   AIt shows the ladies scorn what they cannot afford, and the narrator mocks this gently BIt shows the ladies disliked serving fruit, such as sour grapes, at their evening entertainments CIt accuses Captain Brown of bitterness about losing his post on the railroad DIt praises the ladies for wisely refusing luxuries that they could easily buy

5. Question 5 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   If Captain Brown talks openly of being poor, the narrator says, "he must be sent to Coventry" (paragraph 3). What does the idiom mean in context?

   AHe must be moved to the nearby town of Coventry BHe must be shunned: no one will speak to him or call on him CHe must be given a better post on the railroad DHe must be sent a formal invitation to the evening parties

6. Question 6 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Which statement best describes the role of euphemism across the whole Cranford excerpt?

   AIt hides the truth from the reader, who never finds out whether the ladies are really poor BIt shows the narrator's anger at a town that has treated her and her friends badly CIt proves that the ladies are secretly wealthy and only pretend to save their money DIt shows a shared, polite pretense about money that the narrator exposes with affection

7. Question 7 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Lancelot's good resolutions fail because "the bright image of one face, / Making a treacherous quiet in his heart, / Dispersed his resolution like a cloud" (lines 40-42). What does treacherous quiet mean?

   AA loud quarrel that breaks out between Lancelot and Elaine BA calm that feels peaceful but betrays him, because it dissolves his resolutions CThe silence of an enemy knight hiding near the cave DThe quiet of Elaine, who has betrayed Lancelot's trust

8. Question 8 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   "And faith unfaithful kept him falsely true" (line 35). Which interpretation fits the passage best?

   ALancelot has lost his religious faith and is lying to Elaine and the hermit about that loss BElaine has been unfaithful to Lancelot, yet he stays true to her and forgives her in secret CHis loyalty to Guinevere betrays Arthur, so he is true to her but false to his king DLancelot pretends to love Elaine so that she will keep nursing him until his wound heals

9. Question 9 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Elaine is "Meeker than any child to a rough nurse, / Milder than any mother to a sick child" (lines 15-16). Which figure of speech is this, and what does it do?

   AAn oxymoron that joins meekness and roughness to show that Elaine is secretly two-sided BA euphemism that hides the fact that Elaine is unhappy CA paradox that proves Elaine is not really gentle DAn exaggerated comparison that sets Elaine's gentleness against Lancelot's rough moods

10. Question 10 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    According to Fernald's POVERTY entry, how does penury differ from destitution?

    APenury is continuous and may be less sharp; destitution may be only temporary BPenury is poverty that appeals to private charity, while destitution does not CPenury is the mildest word in the entry, milder than poverty itself DPenury is a strict legal term for a lack of property, while destitution is informal

11. Question 11 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    A family skips vacations for ten years to save for their children's college costs. Using the FRUGALITY entry, which word best names this far-sighted saving?

    Aparsimony Bmiserliness Cprovidence Deconomy

12. Question 12 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    At a Cranford party, a guest keeps turning her new cap toward the others, hoping someone will compliment it. Using the PRIDE entry, which word fits her best?

    Avanity Bpride Chaughtiness Dself-respect

13. Question 13 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    Which sentence uses disdain in the sense Fernald gives in the PRIDE entry?

    AShe felt disdain for her own mistakes and quickly corrected them. BHe showed disdain by asking everyone to admire his new coat. CThe duchess looked at the shopkeepers with disdain, as if they were beneath her notice. DTheir disdain for the storm kept them indoors all afternoon.

14. Question 14 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    The Harbor View notice says that "several longtime staff members are no longer with the company" (paragraph 4). What does this euphemism most likely hide?

    AThe staff members have been moved to another building owned by the same company BThe staff members are away on a long vacation CThe staff members were promoted to the new events team DThe staff members lost their jobs to save money

15. Question 15 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    Which phrase from the Harbor View notice is an oxymoron?

    A"modest rate adjustment" B"cozy studio units" C"pay-to-park area" D"planned spontaneity"

16. Question 16 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    Why does the notice call the studio units "cozy" rather than "cramped" (paragraph 3)?

    ABoth mean small, but cozy suggests comfort and cramped discomfort, so the size sounds like a benefit BCozy means somewhat larger than cramped, so the writer is reporting the size of the units accurately CCramped is a technical building term that residents would not understand DCozy refers to the heating system, not to the size of the rooms

17. Question 17 of 20 · Short Answer

    Paragraph 2 of Cranford speaks of "this general but unacknowledged poverty, and this very much acknowledged gentility." Explain the contrast in this phrase and what it shows about the town.

    Show model answer

18. Question 18 of 20 · Short Answer

    In lines 22-29 of the Tennyson excerpt, Lancelot "loved her with all love except the love / Of man and woman when they love their best." Explain how this softened way of saying something works, what plain statement it avoids, and why the poem might choose it.

    Show model answer

19. Question 19 of 20 · Short Answer

    Rewrite the sentence "Mrs Jamieson served only wafer bread-and-butter at her party" three times, once each calling her economical, frugal and stingy. Then explain how each word changes the reader's judgment of her, using Fernald's FRUGALITY entry for the first two.

    Show model answer

20. Question 20 of 20 · Short Answer

    Rewrite this sentence from the Harbor View notice in plain words: "The north elevator is temporarily resting while we explore long-term solutions." Then explain what the original hides and whom the wording serves, and comment on the sentence that follows it.

    Show model answer

These standards connect to L.9-10.5: prerequisites to review first, parallel standards at the same level, and next steps that build on it.

Standard text: Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts & Literacy. © Copyright 2010. National Governors Association Center for Best Practices and Council of Chief State School Officers. All rights reserved.