Holes and Transactional Writing

This is a unit studying the text Holes and using it as a springboard to produce pieces of transactional writing to develop their skills of rhetoric. Students will explore the themes of the novel, in particular the themes of justice and freedom and use their ideas to produce three different types of texts: a letter, to the Secretary of State arguing for or against Camp Green Lake, a proposal to the Federal Bureau of Prisons suggesting that Camp Green Lake adopts the practices of Scandinavian prisons and the prosecution’s closing statement for the Warden. The unit also examines skills of persuasion and how to use them for effect. While the fiction text itself is not challenging, the content of the unit is.

All lesson slides are provided alongside resources such as writing frames, quizzes and planning sheets.