Lesson Plan: Sophomore English- Love Ethics in Family Life

 Hayden DeRouen

Dr. Jaleesa Harris

ENGL2017

1 May 2025

Lesson Plan: Sophomore English- Love Ethics in Family Life

Early high school years are times of change for many teens and young adults, which is why teachers must guide young minds to develop healthy and productive mindsets. What better philosophy to teach than love ethics? In Sophomore English: Love Ethics in Family Life, students will learn to identify love ethics and lovelessness through various representations of familial love in media. Heavily inspired by the work of author and scholar bell hooks, the definitions of “love ethic” from All About Love: New Visions and “lovelessness” from Salvation act as the foundation for the class: these texts will continuously be referred back to throughout the 8-week course. Each unit covers a facet of familial life (father-child, mother-child, sibling-sibling, and grandchild-grandmother) through grade-level appropriate material. All materials are reviewed in class, followed by in-class discussion and analysis. Students are tasked with writing short essays/journal entries at the end of each unit with the goal of identifying love ethic and/or lovelessness in each piece of covered material. The final essay demands the students to find an example of love ethics or lovelessness in a material (for example, movies, books, or music) that is uncovered by the course. Besides the overall goal to have students recognize and adopt love ethics, this course is also designed to improve media literacy, analytical and research skills, as well as prepare them for discussion-based classes they may take in the future.

Firstly, the class begins with an introduction. Students will be given an introductory PowerPoint to familiarize them with the concepts of love ethics and lovelessness. They will be given excerpts from All About Love: New Visions and Salvation for further elaboration (most likely through PDF format, I am not buying twenty-something copies of two books). I chose to include All About Love, despite being more familiar with Salvation, because I believe the text to explain love ethics in a more concise manner (the book is largely about living by love ethics). However, for students to have a contrast in relationships they may come across that may contrast their understanding of love ethics, I included Salvation. The book explains the aspects of lovelessness, and it allows me to include materials that I believe shows relationships that are not built on love ethics. These excerpts are to be consistently referred back to throughout the semester. I will not tell students whether the relationships we cover in class lean more towards love ethics or lovelessness: it is their responsibility to make their own argument and support it with evidence.

Unit One centers around paternal love. Both the movies The Pursuit of Happyness (2006) and Finding Nemo (2003) are covered in this unit. Despite both fathers in each movie caring for their sons, Chris from The Pursuit of Happyness treats Christopher differently than Marlin from Finding Nemo treats Nemo. For time purposes, only clips of each movie will be shown. These clips center around the father-son relationships. I expect the students may be inclined to point out the love ethic between Chris and Christopher, but not so much so between Marlin and Nemo. This is due to the lack of trust between Marlin and Nemo in the beginning of the movie, compared to the praise Christopher earns from Chris. Then again, I am willing to consider otherwise if provided substantial evidence. I chose these two movies due to the different fathering methods of each character. Bonus points will be given to any student who connects The Pursuit of Happyness to Salvation.

Similarly, Unit Two covers maternal love. For this reason, I chose the book Sula by Toni Morrison and the movie Coraline (2009) for analysis. Initially, I was hesitant to include Sula in a lesson plan for 10th graders, but figured the text would be fine to cover if viewed strictly through the lens of Eva and her children. Both materials have two possible relationships the students can choose from: In Sula, they could focus on either Eva and Hannah or Eva and Plum, and in Coraline, they could focus on either Coraline and her mother or Coraline and her “Other Mother.” Honestly, I believe these texts can provide unique viewpoints on what is considered love ethics and (especially) what is considered lovelessness. Again, as long as students can provide evidence and make a defensible argument, I will be satisfied. Like Unit One, any student who can tie Sula to Salvation will get bonus points.

Switching gears, sibling love is the topic for Unit Three. Interestingly enough, I could not think of any particularly negative examples of sibling relationships (besides Measure for Measure by Shakespeare, which I determined 10th graders should maybe not read). However, it was not my job to determine if relationships consisted of love ethics or lovelessness: it was the student’s task to make those arguments. Besides, just because a relationship is positive does not necessarily mean it follows love ethics in hooks’ terms. Therefore, I chose two sources I knew to have strong sibling connections: The Color Purple by Alice Walker and Episode 19 of Season Two of the animated series Gravity Falls. Students can choose to focus on the relationship between Celie and Nettie in The Color Purple and the relationship between Dipper and Mabel in Gravity Falls. 

The last unit comprises of a relationship type I am seeing a lot more in media recently: the grandparent-grandchild relationship. Specifically, the stern grandmother archetype is present in Coco (2017) and Encanto (2021). Personally, I do not believe Abulita from Coco nor Abuela Alma from Encanto portray love ethics very well, but my mind can be swayed by a well argued essay/journal entry. Both grandmothers are dismissive of each main character (Miguel with his dreams of being a musician and Mirabel with her warnings about the magic). Due to these similarities, I thought a comparison of the two was appropriate. I am comfortable with putting poor examples of love ethics in one unit for the same reason I am comfortable with putting good examples of love ethics in the last: I want to keep my students guessing. If they look for one positive example of love ethics and one negative example of love ethics in every unit, they are missing the point. I want them to think for themselves, not guess what I want from them.

The final essay is meant to test their knowledge of love ethics and lovelessness. They are to cover a piece of media not already covered in class, and state whether a relationship from said media demonstrates love ethics or lovelessness. However, they can use any material from class to compare or support why they chose their answer. The essay has to be MLA or Chicago format (as long as they keep it consistent, I will accept it). The minimum word count is 800 and the maximum word count is 1000. As long as the students make well-formulated arguments, follow the prompt, and provide evidence, they will receive full points.

Below is a mock syllabus I have created to accompany this class:

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