A Semi-detailed Lesson Plan in English 8

I. OBJECTIVES
At the end of the discussion, the students will be able to:
a. identify reliable sources of information;
b. construct a matrix to classify sources of information; and
c. appreciate Indian marriage culture through opinion sharing activity.

II. SUBJECT MATTER

a. Skill: identifying reliable sources of information
b. Selection: The Old Woman by Manik Bandyopadhyay
c. Reference/s: https://www.scribbr.com/citing-sources/primary-and-secondary-
sources/
d. Materials: laptop, dictionary application, soft copy (handouts), PowerPoint
presentation, and online spin wheel (wheelofnames.com)
e. Values: acceptance and appreciation of one’s culture

III. PROCEDURE
A. Pre-Reading
1. Unlocking of Difficulties
“Wheel of Words Game”
a. The teacher will explain the mechanics of the game “Wheel of Words”.
b. The teacher will spin the wheel and the student’s task is to search for the
definition of the word that shows up on the screen using their dictionary
application. (5 mins)

 triumph  suspicion
 accustomed  cackle
 oblivious  lamenting
 ground-  shrewd
roasted  engrossed
 annas

c. The teacher will have a short recap by presenting the words and its
definitions through a PowerPoint Presentation.
2. Motivation
“4 Pics 1 Word”
a. The teacher will explain the mechanics of the game “4 Pics 1 Word”.
b. The teacher will ask the students to participate in the game.
These are the words that the learners will try to guess.
 groom
 wedding  bride
 India
 reception
 ring
 dowry
 c. The teacher will present the words from the game and ask the students,
“What is the main concept depicted from these pictures and words?” (5
mins)

3. Motive Question
The teacher will tell the students that the lesson involves reading a short story
about Indian marriage. The teacher will raise the question, “What is the very
important day for the old woman in the story?” (20 seconds)

B. During Reading
The teacher will give the students a soft copy of the short story “The Old Woman”
by Manik Bandyopadhyay to read silently. (10 mins)

C. Post Reading
1. Engagement Activity
The teacher will ask the students the following questions:

 What is the very important day for the old woman in the story?
 Is it an important occasion for Nanda and Menaka?
 What qualities should the bride and her family have according to
Nanda’s family? Does Menaka fit their standards?
 Was Menaka able to provide the promised dowry?
 Now that you are familiar with Indian marriage customs, how would
you compare it to our Filipino marriage culture in choosing a partner?
Do we consider the family’s economic conditions? Is there a dowry
requirement? Cite other examples.
 Despite his family’s disapproval, why did you think Nanda marry
Menaka?
 Why did they tell Menaka to leave the house? Who else experienced
the same situation as her in the story? What did that person do?
 Why did the old woman give Menaka such a piece of advice?
 If you were Menaka, would you follow the old woman’s advice? Why
or why not?
 If you were the author of the story, what ending would you give to your
readers? (15 mins)

2. Literary Extender
The teacher will divide the class into 3 groups. Each group will be given
topics to research on about. They will present it in class afterwards.

Group 1 - Indian wedding rites (Hindu)

Group 2 - Filipino wedding rites (Christian)
Group 3 - Wedding symbols and its meaning

3. Skill Development
 a. The teacher will ask the students about where they found the information
on the research activity. The teacher will then present and explain the two
types of sources of information (primary and secondary).
b. The teacher will let the students with their respective groups classify
primary and secondary sources of information they have used in the
previous activity through a matrix.

Primary Sources Secondary Sources

c. The teacher will further elaborate on the primary and secondary sources
and give examples. (5 mins)

4. Across the Curriculum

The teacher will ask the student’s opinion about the question: “If you are
Nanda, would you choose to follow your family’s marriage culture or your own
heart’s desire?” (5 mins)

5. Evaluation
The teacher will give a true or false test to the students. (5 mins)
Directions: Read each statement carefully. Write TRUE if the statement is
correct and FALSE if it is wrong.
1. A primary source is anything that gives you direct evidence about the
people, events, or phenomena that you are researching. 
2. Secondary sources provide raw information and first-hand evidence. 
3. Examples of secondary sources include textbooks, articles, and
reference books.
4. Secondary sources can be described as those sources that are
closest to the origin of the information. 
5. The creator of a secondary source usually lived through the historical
event and has first-hand knowledge of it.
6. Primary sources contain a piece of information about a historical event
that was created by an actual participant in the event.
7. Secondary sources often use generalizations, analysis, interpretation,
and synthesis of primary sources.
8. Encyclopedia is an example of primary source.
9. Interview transcripts, newspaper, and social media posts are
secondary sources.
10. An article analyzing a novel is a secondary source.
 IV. ASSIGNMENT
The teacher will tell the students to research the epic Ramayana on the internet and
read it. (3 mins)

Prepared by:

Group 3
CARMELA S. DE LOS REYES
BERNADETTE R. SATUITO
JUICY ANN M. FEDERICO
JENNIFER B. SURBANO
BERNADETH SAMANTHA N. SAZON
MARY FRANCE E. CLORADO
CHARIZE ANNE M. MENDOZA
CLYTIE R. SABDAO
JOCEL C. SALCEDA

Submitted to:

ARNEL M. BONGANAY, LPT

Instructor
Selection
The Old Woman
It is a very important day for the old woman. It is the wedding day of her eldest great-
grandson, her son's son's son, not a small triumph for her. The home, full of family and relatives,
is humming with the busy activities one expects on a wedding day. She is not doing anything,
and they are busily going about without paying much attention to her, the way the busy activities
in a king's palace go about without involving the king. That is how it seems to her.
She thinks she is present, directly or indirectly, in everything that is going on in the house on
this occasion, just as she feels she is present in all the daily activities, the collective life of the
household. For sixty years she has been there, the roots and branches of her existence alive
with other lives so totally accustomed to her presence that they are oblivious to it. She is like the
big old tree on the west side of the big room in the house; its branches are full of birds busily
chirping throughout the day, and it can be heard creaking with the wind in the dead of night.
The old woman sits in her usual corner of the porch with her many torn quilts of rag and the
bundle that she uses as a pillow. The joints are all rusty, the spine is bent forward, the hair
flaxen, the skin loose and wrinkled, the mouth toothless, the cheeks sunken, and the eyes dim
with cataract. Seems so very old. But when she walks slowly with the help of a stick, one can
see, if one looks closely, that there is strength in the skin-covered bones of her hand. When she
shouts, one can tell that there is strength in her lungs. Most of the time, however, she spends
lying down or sitting in her corner, talking to herself. From there sometimes she criticizes, at the
top of her voice, the small lapses in running the household. She puts in her mouth ground-
roasted tobacco leaves. From time to time she breaks into her strange sounding laughter for
reasons nobody knows.
The wives of her sons and of her grandsons’ mutter "There she goes again" when these
strange doings make her presence felt. The younger wives remark in low voices. They do so not
out of respect for her, because she pretends not to hear even when she does and because it
does not matter even if they know that she hears them. They do so for fear of offending their
mothers-in-law and the daughters of the house, who would not like big talk in mouths that
should be modest.
Nanda, the groom, has got. his hair cut specially for the occasion by Nitai the barber. Nitai
has charged eight annas, though he should not have because his son was going with the
groom's party as the little groom and would get gifts. It has given the people in the house reason
to speak ill of Nitai.
The old woman calls the great-grandson to her, "Nanda, come here. Come here, you boy
with the fancy haircut. I've a question for you. Getting ready to get married nicely! But are you
sure the girl is a virgin?"
Nanda's mother hears it and complains to her sister-in-law, "What an awful thing to say even
as a joke!" Then she wonders aloud, "Maybe she has a point. It is a grown-up girl, after all."
"But she belongs to a good family."
"Good families often have bad things inside. Why did they wait for so long that the girl has
grown up?"
 Nanda squats in front of the old woman and jokes back, "If she is not a virgin, then she is old
like you."
She smiles a big toothless smile, "Search the world and see if you can find a virgin like me. I
hardly slept with your great-grandfather. He died on the wedding night. I was so scared to hear
him breathe so hard! I was so scared that I ran out of the room crying. The people in the house
came running to me, asking 'What's the matter? * What's the matter, except with the writing on
my forehead! By that time, he was dead."
She breaks into her cackle. But. her great-grandson does not laugh. His face darkens with a
cloud of doubt and suspicion. "Maybe she is not! One is never sure of it with a grown girl!"
"Hey, you stupid monkey! How can you say such a thing? Didn't you choose her to be your
wife?"
"Yes. 1 chose her, but. . ."
"What a stupid boy! Don't you know that a virgin can never become bad? Look at me. My
husband died on the night of the wedding. As time passed, so many tried to make me become
bad, but I did not. I swear by your father's head that I did not become bad. A girl goes for the
bad thing only after she tastes it, not as long as she's a virgin."
The argument may be strange, but the boy's face brightens up.
"Are you sure what you just said is true?"
"Of course, it is true."
The people in the busy household notice Nanda squatting in front of the old woman and the
two of them talking to each other in low voice; and once in a while they hear a loud cackle and a
youthful laugh break out together.
Menaka has been weeping and lamenting all day, "Where can I go? I've no one to go back
to!"
Nobody in the family liked Nanda's bride. Not only was she a grown girl, but also, because
she had no parents and was married off by her uncle's family, they could not get back at the
shrewd uncle for not giving all of the promised dowry. On top of that, Nanda had chosen her,
married her against the wishes of the family, and after marriage he worshiped her without
bothering about the family's feelings about it. Families never cease to be angry about the son's
disobedience in marriage. Because they couldn't take it out on their earning son, their minds
stayed poisoned against his wife.
On top of all of those faults of hers, Nanda died within a year of his marriage. As soon as the
rainy season was over, even before the mud in the yard started drying, Nanda had started
getting ready to take his wife on a trip. No wife of this family ever went on a trip alone with her
husband!
Who would keep a woman with so many faults and so much ill luck?
They wrote to Menaka's uncle asking him to take her back, but the letter was not even
answered. So, they have decided to take Menaka to the door of her uncle's home, leave her
there, and be done with it.
 Menaka does not want to go. She fears not just the beatings and the burning with hot objects
there, which she is used to, but she knows that her uncle would not let her in.
That is why she sits crying all day, "Where shall I go?"
The old woman calls her to her corner of the porch, "Hey, girl! Come over here. I have
something to tell you."
Menaka goes to her. The old woman scolds her, "Why are you crying like a baby? A strong
young woman like you?"
"Because they are throwing me out," she says sobbing.
"Who is throwing you out? You will go merely because they want to throw you out? This is
your husband's home. How can they throw you out if you refuse to leave?"
Menaka listens. The old woman goes on, "Look at me. Could they throw me out? I spent less
than one night with my husband. After he died on the wedding night, they all said, 'Throw out
that unlucky wife.' They said that
I ate my husband as soon as I got him to myself. 'Out! Out!' they said.
They said everything they could. Did I leave? Could anybody make me leave? I bit the
ground that the home stood on and hung on. And you? You slept with your husband for almost
a whole year; you lived in this house as a wife of the family. You will leave only because they
want you to? Just hang on. Bite the ground this home stands on and hang on."
Menaka's eyes light up. She squats in front of the old woman. The family members notice
Menaka and the old woman engrossed in talking, whispering to each other, about who knows
what!

Reference:
edited, translated, and with an introduction by Kalpana Bardhan. (1990). Of women, outcastes,
peasants, and rebels: a selection of Bengali short stories. (pp. 148-151). Berkeley:
University of California Press