Noelle Wauer

The Rats of NIMH Unit

May 2, 2005

Educ. 316

I chose to do this unit as my final project because after learning that Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH had two sequels I really wanted read them and I thought it would be interesting to design a unit around them. I have always enjoyed reading different series of books so I thought this would be a neat way to introduce the idea to students and to get them thinking about all three of the books as a continuous process. I wanted to create final projects that students could choose from after the whole class had read all of the books. The final projects consist of a lot of different ways to compare and contrast the three books. There is also one project that students can choose from where they can compare and contrast the writing styles of Robert C. O'Brien and his daughter Leslie Conly, who wrote the two sequels.

The first final project that students can choose from consists of them predicting which rats died during the explosion in the first book and then writing a reaction about how they felt when they found out who actually died. The ending of the first book, when the rats die in the explosion, leaves the reader wanting to read the second book to find out who died. This is the main reason that I wanted to read the sequels to find out what happened and I'm pretty sure that students will be pretty curious about it as well. I'm sure that the students will be shocked by who was actually killed and pleased that it was not who they had predicted. This project could evoke a lot of emotion because readers become so drawn into the characters. I chose this as a project because I am curious about how involved the students will have become with some of the characters, especially a few in particular. This also presents a way for students to make predictions about their readings and then reflect back on those predictions.

Another project that students could choose from involves the students creating a timeline across all three of the books. This would most likely need to be done during the actual reading of the books; it would be too hard to try to go back through all of the books after reading them and pick out important events. I chose to include this project because I think it is important for students to write out their visualizations of the story timeline. A lot of times readers can get confused about the plot of a story but this would help make that more concrete. It would also be great for students to share their timelines with each other and compare the events that each person saw as important and justify their reason for choosing those events.

Students can also choose to write a compare and contrast paper about the different types of roles humans play throughout all three of the books. Humans play a variety of roles throughout the series; the most noticeable difference is between the first and the third book. Humans in the first book are not looked upon as being very friendly and are generally disliked by the rats and the mice; this completely turns around in the third book. In the third book the rats take care of two lost children and become very attached to them, especially one rat named Christopher. It would be interesting for students to write a paper about the differences in the roles they play but then also write about why they believe the authors chose those roles for them (what was their purpose in doing so).

Another project that students can choose to do consists of writing a paper about the way two or three of the characters change over the course of the three books. Some rats/mice that students may want to choose that really changed a lot were: Timothy, Racso, and Christopher. If the students choose to write about Racso or Christopher, they will only be able to write about their change over the last two books because they were not included in the first book. I chose this project because I thought it would be interesting for students to think about how the characters had changed and also why the author chose to develop them the way that they did. For example: Racso became a much more courageous and responsible rat than he was in the first book, students may want to address the question of why the author chose to develop him this way instead of leaving him as an irresponsible, immature rat.

Students can also choose to research the two authors' lives and either create a timeline of their lives with short descriptions at each major event or write a paper about their lives. I chose to include this project in my unit because I thought it would be interesting for the students to find out about the authors' lives, especially since they are related. I also thought it would be interesting if students researched how much influence Robert C. O'Brien had on his daughter's writing style. It would also be fascinating if students could find out whether or not Leslie was able to talk to her father about writing the books before he died and whether he had any say in what she wrote. I am particularly curious about whether she knew which rats he was thinking died in the explosion.

The last project I included in this unit for students to pick from is writing a paper that compares the different difficulties the rats face throughout all three of the books. I thought that students could choose two or three difficulties that the rats face in any of the books (especially using different books) and then write about how they are the same or different. I also want students to try and think about why the author chose those particular difficulties for the rats to face: did they enhance the plot, were they well planned out or were they arbitrary to the story? I chose this project because I wanted to give students a way to really think about why authors choose to include certain things in stories and the difficulties that the rats face in the books are key elements to the stories.

I really wanted to create a unit (or the start of one) that allows students to think about all of the books as a whole but also gives them a chance to think about the differences between them. I also wanted to have quite a few options so students are really interested in whatever project they choose, even if this creates more work for me in the end. I am also going to tell students that they can present different ideas to me if they think of something that they would rather do as long as it fits the requirements. I had a great time reading all of these books and while I think the first one was definitely the best, I was pleasantly surprised by the sequels.