Lesson 6: Seen and Unseen, Part 2

Have students take out their annotations of “Instructions to Persons of Japanese Ancestry,” the document shown on Seen and Unseen p. 13.

• Lesson 5 homework: Students were to continue reading Seen and Unseen through p. 15 and read the document, "Instructions to All Persons of Japanese Ancestry" on p. 13, annotating anything they may want to use for the Performance Task at the end of the unit.

Turn-and-Talk

Say these Directions: Look at the phrase forced removal and its definition from your reading yesterday, then share your responses with your partner.

• Ask: Does this phrase have a positive or a negative feeling to you? Why?

  • Negative, because it means something dangerous is happening, like a fire or storm.

  • Positive, because it means getting away from danger.

• Ask: Look at the layout of the “Instructions to All Persons of Japanese Ancestry” notice on page 13. It uses numbered steps and official language. How does the design of this document make the phrase forced removal sound routine? What would be different if the same information were written as a personal letter to each family?

With your partner, think back to pages 8–15 of Seen and Unseen and discuss whether the definition of forced removal matches what you read. As you talk, consider the following:

• Ask: Were the Japanese Americans in danger?

  • No, the government claimed that Japanese Americans were themselves dangerous.

• Ask: Were they taken to a place of safety?

  • No, the camps were likely no safer for the people living there than their homes would have been.

• Ask: Does the use of the phrase forced removal match other ways that you have used it?

  • No. Usually, when people are evacuated, it is because of a sudden nearby danger like a wildfire or a flood, not to round them up as prisoners in camps.

Connection to Today’s Learning

• Say: Today, you’ll read the text of a notice telling Japanese Americans to report to camps such as Manzanar. You will examine the language that the U.S. government used to explain this action and will think critically about the point of view and central ideas of the notice. We will consider together how words like forced removal can shape understanding of events.

Morphology & Vocabulary

Say these Directions: Today, we are going to study one word closely: incarceration. We will break it into meaningful parts, make a smart first guess, and then use a glossary or dictionary to verify exactly what the word means in this lesson.

Teach: Morphology of Incarceration

• Say: When I see a long word like incarceration, I do not try to memorize it all at once. I look for parts that carry meaning. I notice the ending -ation, and that ending often tells me the word names an act, process, or result. In the middle, I see carcer, a Latin root connected to prison.

• Ask: What does the suffix -ation tell you about the word incarceration?

  • The suffix -ation shows that the word names an act or process, so incarceration is the process of imprisoning or confining people.

• Ask: Based on the root and suffix, what is your best first guess about the meaning of incarceration?

  • My first guess is that incarceration means putting people into prison or keeping them confined.

Say these Directions: In your Personal Dictionary, write incarceration. Circle in-, underline carcer, and circle -ation. Then write a first-guess definition in your own words.

Say these Directions: Now consult the glossary in the text set or a digital or print dictionary to check the pronunciation, part of speech, and precise meaning of incarceration. Revise your definition if the reference material gives you a more exact meaning.

• Ask: After checking a reference material, how would you define incarceration in this lesson?

  • In this lesson, incarceration means imprisoning Japanese Americans without criminal charges, so it is more specific than just saying they moved or left.

Verify Meaning

Prompt students to use a dictionary, glossary, or other reference material to confirm the meaning they inferred.

Say these Directions: Check your definition using a dictionary, glossary, or other reference material. Does the definition match what we figured out? Revise as needed.

Encode the Word

• Erase/Hide: Stop displaying the word.

Directions: Write the word incarceration from memory in your Personal Dictionary.

• Say: Display the word and check or correct your spelling.

• Say: Circle the prefix, underline the root, and circle the suffix.

• Ask: Which part of the word helped you remember how to spell it?

  • The ending -ation helped me because I know that spelling pattern from other long words, and it reminded me how the word ends.

Integrated ELD Instruction: Literacy Lab — Vocabulary for Meaning-Making

Connection to Today’s Learning

• Say: Understanding incarceration will help you notice how word choice shapes meaning when you read the government notice. As you read, pay attention to how official language can make imprisonment sound orderly or ordinary.

Part A: Analyzing Perspectives of “Instructions to All Persons of Japanese Ancestry” (RI.7.5.a and RI.7.6) (30 minutes)

Graffiti/Table Talk

Say these Directions: Use the guiding questions to support your annotations and summaries to the following sections:

• Group A will read and summarize the section “. . . Living in the Following Area,”

• Group B will read and summarize “The Following Instructions Must Be Observed.”

After 10–12 minutes, the groups switch passages.

Group A Questions

• Ask: Who is being addressed?

  • The document addresses “persons of Japanese ancestry,” including “alien and non-alien” persons—meaning Japanese immigrants who had not become citizens as well as Japanese American citizens.

• Ask: What geographic areas are included?

  • The document describes a precise area that spans parts of Los Angeles County, including the City of Los Angeles and Santa Monica.

• Ask: Based on this section, who has to follow the instructions?

  • Anyone in that area who had Japanese ancestry, regardless of legal status in the United States, age, gender, or job.

Group B Questions

• Ask: What specific rules were imposed?

  • Japanese Americans had to pack up their personal supplies and report to a station within two days.

• Ask: What restrictions are emphasized?

  • Large furniture and pets were not allowed. People could not take their own cars to the reception center.

• Ask: How do you think this would affect people who had to go to the camps?

  • People had to rapidly store, sell, or otherwise dispose of goods they could not carry. They had to make arrangements very quickly for any businesses they might have owned and for anyone or anything they were responsible for caring for—pets, gardens, relatives outside the designated area.

Teach: Summarize

Use the following questions to help you summarize your section.

• Ask: Who is in charge, and how do you know?

  • The government, by listing an order, by saying what “will” happen; because it is signed by a person with a military title.

• Ask: What does the writer want you to think the government is doing for the people who have to leave?

  • Helping them, giving advice, being clear.

• Ask: Whose perspective is this document from?

  • This is telling the government’s point of view, and it makes the process sound very orderly and organized.

• Ask: What does the writer want readers to think and feel about the order?

  • That it is fair and helpful; that it must be followed.

• Ask: What does the document NOT tell us about the people affected?

  • The document does not tell us about the upheaval the forced removal caused in the lives of Japanese Americans, when they could go home, or what happened to the homes and belongings that they left.

When groups are done with their summaries, have the groups report to the class.

Help students reconnect to the Essential Question:

• Say: What we see in this document is one version of the story. However, it doesn’t show much about the lives of the people who were living in that area, either before or after they had to go to the camps. This is where our Essential Question becomes important: How do we decide whose stories are remembered? How can we learn about the stories that were left out? Today we are beginning to uncover the stories behind the document.

Have students write a brief response analyzing perspective and missing voices using text evidence. Use responses to assess understanding of the point of view and the Essential Question.

Check for Understanding

Say these Directions: Write a brief response explaining whose perspective is shown in the Instructions notice and whose perspective is missing. Use at least two details from the text to support your thinking, and explain how this connects to the Essential Question.

• Ask: Whose perspective is conveyed in the Instructions notice? Give two details that show how you know. Based on what you have read in Seen and Unseen, whose point of view is missing? How does this help us think about our Essential Question?

  • The Army heading and saying what will and won’t “be permitted” shows that this document is from the point of view of the government. The perspective of the Japanese Americans who had to follow the orders is missing. This relates to the Essential Question because if we only had these kinds of documents to learn about World War II, we would miss a big part of what happened.

Instruct students to take notes in their Journal on the following prompt:

• Review what you have read so far in Seen and Unseen. In your Journal, make notes about topics you may want to explore in the next lesson, which is the first writing lesson of the unit. There, you will write a mini-analysis of a primary source related to Japanese American incarceration.