OEU+1+CD+Intnl+Figures+MENTOR+TEXT

The following resources might serve well as Mentor Texts, in which significant figures use autobiographical narrative to communicate their guiding life philosophies to foster active responses among their audiences.

"I read anything that had words and paragraphs. I read with equal parts joy and desperation. I loved those books, but I also knew that love had only one purpose. I was trying to save my life." Sherman Alexie details how his early experiences with literacy taught him how to lead the life he chooses.

In "Salvation," readers witness the skills with which Langston Hughes created imaginative literature; here, in nonfiction, he both tells the story of an important point in his life and makes his readers think about significant ideas, doing so poetically and with great economy and expressiveness.

In "Ain't I a Woman," Sojourner Truth, an African American woman freed from slavery in New York State in 1827, address the women's rights convention of 1851. This speech was later transcribed and published, and remains a model of short, powerful, extemporaneous speech. The **Letter from Birmingham Jail** or **Letter from Birmingham City Jail**, also known as **The Negro Is Your Brother**, is an [|open letter] written on April 16, 1963, by [|Martin Luther King, Jr.], an [|American] [|civil rights] leader.

In "The Fourth of July," feminist scholar and writer Audre Lorde illustrates the anger that inspired much of her writing, whether about racism, as in this essay, or about sexism or homophobia. Readers can also see the control with which Lorde expresses her ideas and the honesty with which she implicates herself and her family in her writing.

In "Shooting an Elephant," George Orwell tells the story of a moment early in his life when his awareness of injustice in the world first surfaces.

In "Mother Tongue," novelist Amy Tan describes the variety of Englishes she uses. In doing so, she addresses the connections between languages and cultures.

follow-up MENTOR TEXT activity:

Use primary sources of a significant historical/cultural event (for example, initial newspaper articles in response to JFK's assassination) to pick out vivid sensory images. Students then incorporate these exact images into (or as a way to begin) their own fictionalized retellings/reactions of the event from a different perspective present at the event (such as Jackie, etc).