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50 min
Student Lesson
Lesson 9: Braiding Sweetgrass, “Epiphany in the Beans” and “The Three Sisters,” Explanatory Writing, Part 1
Content
Students will write an explanatory paragraph that assesses the advantages and disadvantages of a video compared to Kimmerer’s text.
Language
Students will use participial phrases to add descriptive detail and improve clarity in their writing.
Foundational Skills
Students will use participial phrases correctly and avoid misplaced or dangling modifiers in analytical writing.
What does it mean to live responsibly within natural systems?
Knowledge-Building:
Students build on earlier reading about abundance, reciprocity, and the Three Sisters by comparing Kimmerer’s written explanation with a video source about land-based food or medicine knowledge.
Enduring Understanding:
This lesson reinforces that reciprocity can be taught through both lived practice and crafted language, but different media reveal different aspects of the idea.
Future Lessons:
In Lesson 10, students will move into Chapter 13 and analyze how basket making becomes an ethical argument about limits, gratitude, and responsibility. In Lesson 11, students will explore the chapter “Mishkos Kenomagwen: The Teachings of Grass.”
Unit Performance Task:
Students practice a key research technique for the reciprocity research task by evaluating what one source medium can show more clearly than another.
| Lesson Flow | Purpose of Learning Experience |
|---|---|
Launch5 Minutes | Students will reflect on their homework by considering how Kimmerer describes the Three Sisters. |
Literacy Lab10 Minutes | Students will learn about participial phrases, with a focus on correct placement and clear noun attachment. |
Learning in Action30 Minutes | Part A: Watch and Compare Mediums (RI.8.7) Students will view a video and evaluate how the video and the anchor text each convey ideas about land as abundance and gift, and about humans’ reciprocal relationship with the natural world. Part B: Comparing Mediums in Writing (RI.8.7, W.8.2.a, W.8.2.b, W.8.4) Students will write an explanatory comparison paragraph that evaluates the effectiveness of each medium and includes a correctly placed participial phrase. |
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Not available for this lesson
Material List
Braiding Sweetgrass for Young Adults by Robin Wall Kimmerer, adapted by Monique Gray Smith, illustrated by Nicole Neidhardt
Unit 3 Lesson 9 Student Edition
Indigenous Peoples Perspective Project: Nature as Food video from Adkins Arboretum
Indigenous Peoples Perspective Project: Nature as Medicine video from Adkins Arboretum
Routines
Think-Pair-Share
Language Study
Quick Write
Say: In the previous lesson, we studied how Kimmerer uses repetition and structure in the Thanksgiving Address to teach gratitude and interdependence. Today, we carry that same lens into her chapter about the Three Sisters and compare her writing with a video that shows how people learn from what the land provides.
Have students take out their Homework Journals and their copies of Braiding Sweetgrass and turn to the notes they took for homework.
Lesson 8 Homework: Students were instructed to read the chapters “Epiphany in the Beans” and “The Three Sisters” in Braiding Sweetgrass (pp. 103–117) and take notes in their Homework Journals on the following: How does Kimmerer describe the relationship of the Three Sisters?
Say these directions: First, quietly reread one place in your homework annotations where Kimmerer describes the Three Sisters growing together. Then turn to your partner. Partner A shares first for 30 seconds, Partner B listens and adds on. Then discuss the following questions.
Display the following questions.
What is the connection among the Three Sisters that Kimmerer describes in the section where she explains how the plants grow together?
Kimmerer explains that the Three Sisters help one another live. Corn gives the beans something to climb; as she says, if the beans didn’t have “the corn’s support,” they “would be an unruly tangle on the ground” (p. 112). Additionally, she says that beans help the soil and “squash reduces weeds,” so the plants create a living system that benefits each other and the earth (p. 112).
How does the relationship among the Three Sisters show how abundance can grow through cooperation?
Their relationship shows abundance because the plants create more together than they would separately. For example, Kimmerer says, “They share the soil by the same techniques that they share the light, leaving enough for everyone” (p. 113). Kimmerer presents the garden as a place where cooperation produces food, balance, and mutual support.
Connection to Today’s Learning
Say: Now that we have discussed the Three Sisters, we are going to delve deeper in this lesson into how Kimmerer presents ideas about abundance.
Say these directions: Today, we are studying a sentence tool that can make your writing more vivid and efficient, but only if you place it carefully. A participial phrase begins with an -ing or -ed verb form, a participle, and acts like an adjective, which means it describes a noun. If the phrase is placed next to the wrong noun, your sentence becomes confusing, awkward, or unintentionally funny.
Target Sentence:
“Planted together, they offer a living example of harmony, balance, and reciprocity.”
Display and read aloud the mentor sentence from the section where Kimmerer explains how the Three Sisters grow together.
Chunk | Meaning | Function |
|---|---|---|
Planted together, | growing together in one mound | participial phrase describing how the plants are arranged |
they offer | they create | main clause |
a living example of harmony, balance, and reciprocity. | a community where different living things help one another | explains the kind of living system Kimmerer wants readers to notice |
Say: When I read Kimmerer’s sentence, I notice that the phrase “Planted together” comes right before “they.” That placement matters because the phrase needs to be next to the noun it describes. Here, it clearly describes the plants, so the sentence makes sense. If a participial phrase is placed next to the wrong noun, it creates a misplaced modifier. If there’s no noun for it to describe, it becomes a dangling modifier. A quick fix is to ask, “Who is doing the -ing action?” or “What thing is being described by the -ed phrase?” Then I place that noun right after the phrase.
Display the following sentence:
Drinking in soil water, the bean seed swells and sends a root down into the ground.
Ask: What does “drinking in soil water” modify?
It modifies “the bean seed” because the bean seed is the one taking in the water, and the phrase is placed right next to it.
Display the following sentence:
Drinking in soil water, the soil supports the bean seed as it grows.
Ask: What is wrong with this sentence?
The phrase “drinking in soil water” seems to modify “the soil,” but the soil is not the thing drinking the water—the bean seed is. This is a misplaced modifier, so the meaning gets confusing.
Display the following sentence:
Planted alongside corn, Kimmerer describes how beans create a living system.
Ask: Who or what was planted alongside corn?
The beans were planted alongside corn, not Kimmerer. This is a dangling modifier because the phrase has nothing logical to attach to in the sentence.
Display the corrected version:
Correct Version: Planted alongside corn, the beans create a living system that Kimmerer describes.
Say these directions: Now you will test three more sentences. With your partner, decide whether each participial phrase is correctly placed, misplaced, or dangling. Then revise any sentence that needs fixing.
Observing the Three Sisters, symbiosis becomes clear to the reader.
This is dangling because symbiosis is not doing the observing. A clear revision is “Observing the Three Sisters, the reader can see how symbiosis works.”
Kimmerer explains, harvested with gratitude, how sweetgrass thrives.
This is misplaced because “harvested with gratitude” is stuck next to “explains” instead of the noun it describes. A clear revision is “Kimmerer explains how sweetgrass, harvested with gratitude, thrives.”
Harvested with gratitude, sweetgrass grows back stronger.
This is correct because “harvested with gratitude” describes “sweetgrass,” and the noun comes right after the phrase.
Teacher Tip |
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Remind students of their earlier work with verbals in Unit 8.1. A participial phrase is one kind of verbal phrase; in this lesson, the key move is making sure the phrase clearly attaches to the correct noun. |
Teacher Tip |
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If students need support, remind them to ask, “Who is doing the -ing or -ed action?” and then place that noun immediately after the participial phrase. |
Connection to Today’s Learning
Say: Now that we have a sentence tool for clearer writing, next, you will compare what a video and Kimmerer’s text each make visible about abundance and reciprocity.
Find and display a video introducing how Indigenous tribes see nature as food and medicine, such as Indigenous Peoples Perspective Project: Nature as Food or Indigenous Peoples Perspective Project: Nature as Medicine from Adkins Arboretum.
Say these directions: As you watch the video, take notes on how it shows people using and learning from the land. Then compare those ideas to Kimmerer’s description of the Three Sisters, focusing on how both sources show relationships in the natural world as well as the relationships between human beings and the natural world.
Emphasize that notes should go beyond summary and help students evaluate what the video shows clearly and what the text explains more fully.
After the viewing, give students one minute to complete their notes, then debrief the video briefly. Then ask the following questions in a whole-class discussion.
Ask: What ideas about land as a source of abundance or gift appear in both the video and Kimmerer’s chapters?
Both sources show that the land provides more than isolated resources. They present food or medicine as part of a relationship that depends on knowledge, care, and an understanding of how people live in connection with the earth.
Ask: What is one advantage of having the video as a medium in addition to Kimmerer’s text?
The video has the advantage of showing the process in action. Viewers can immediately see plants, people, and land-based practices, which makes interdependence easier to picture beyond Kimmerer’s text.
Ask: What is one idea Kimmerer’s text explains more fully than the video?
The text allows Kimmerer to explain the deeper meaning of these relationships. She can connect gardening and plant relationships to ideas like gratitude, healing, and reciprocity in a way that a short video may only hint at.
Teacher Tip |
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Discuss the selected video in general terms, and keep questions broad. Avoid asking for highly specific factual recall from the video; the lesson focuses on evaluating how a medium conveys ideas, not memorizing video details. Also, continue to avoid generalizing all Indigenous cultures as one single tradition. |
Instruct students to prepare to write a paragraph response comparing the video and the chapter “The Three Sisters” from Braiding Sweetgrass.
Say these directions: Use your notes from the chapter “The Three Sisters” to write a paragraph comparing the video with Kimmerer’s ideas about how humans live in relation to the natural world. Explain at least one advantage or disadvantage of how the video conveys similar ideas to Kimmerer’s text. Include at least one correctly placed participial phrase.
Say: When I draft a paragraph like this, I start by naming both sources and the shared idea between them. Then I make an evaluative claim, not just a summary, by telling what one medium does especially well or where it falls short. Next, I add evidence from my notes and text annotations so the reader can see where my thinking comes from. I also check my sentence structure for clarity. If I use a participial phrase like “Showing the plants growing side by side,” I make sure the noun right after it is the thing doing that action—in this case, the video. Finally, I reread and ask whether my paragraph really compares the mediums or just retells them.
In Braiding Sweetgrass, Kimmerer presents the Three Sisters as a model of interdependence, showing how each plant supports the others as they grow. However, the selected video has the advantage of making this relationship visible to viewers right away. Showing the plants growing side by side, the video helps the audience see how a living system works in real time. At the same time, the text allows Kimmerer to explain the emotional and ethical meaning of gardening, including how caring for the land can heal relationships as well as bodies. One disadvantage of the video is that it cannot pause and reflect on the deeper meaning as fully as Kimmerer’s writing does.
As you draft, check your work for:
A clear opening sentence that names both the text and the video
One evaluation of medium effectiveness, not just a summary
At least one correctly placed participial phrase
Teacher Tip |
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Circulate and provide real-time feedback on student writing:
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Reflection |
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Reflect on your ability to evaluate the advantages and disadvantages of different mediums using the Reflection routine.
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Lesson 9 Writing Rubric: Explanatory Paragraph — Comparing Mediums
Writing prompt: Write an explanatory comparison paragraph evaluating how a video and the written text (Braiding Sweetgrass) each convey ideas about land as abundance and gift and about humans’ reciprocal relationship with the natural world. Include a correctly placed participial phrase.
Criteria | 1 — Beginning | 2 — Developing | 3 — Proficient |
|---|---|---|---|
Thesis & Topic Sentence (W.8.2.a) Introduce the Comparison | The topic sentence does not introduce a comparison between the two mediums or does not address how each conveys ideas about reciprocity and the natural world. | The topic sentence names both mediums and hints at a comparison, but the evaluative claim is vague or incomplete. | The topic sentence clearly introduces a comparison between the video and Braiding Sweetgrass, stating what each medium conveys about land, gift, and reciprocity and setting up an evaluation of how effectively each does so. |
Evidence & Analysis (W.8.2.b) Compare Mediums with Evidence | Evidence from only one medium is used, or evidence is not connected to how each conveys ideas about reciprocity. The paragraph summarizes rather than evaluates. | Evidence from both mediums is present, but analysis describes what each shows without evaluating how effectively each conveys ideas about abundance, gift, and the human–nature relationship. | Evidence from both the video and Braiding Sweetgrass is accurately integrated and analyzed for how each medium conveys ideas about land as abundance, gift, and reciprocity. The explanation evaluates effectiveness specifically — what the video can show that writing cannot, and vice versa. |
Participial Phrases (L.8.3.a) Participial Phrases for Precision | No participial phrase is used, or a participial phrase is dangling or misplaced, creating an ambiguous or unintentionally humorous sentence. | A participial phrase is included, but its placement is awkward or it does not clearly attach to the noun it modifies. | At least one participial phrase is correctly placed and clearly attached to the noun it modifies, adding precision to a sentence about how one of the mediums conveys its ideas. |
Transition students into reflecting on their learning from the lesson by completing a Quick Write response.
Say these directions: Review the paragraph you wrote today and respond to the prompt below.
Underline one participial phrase you used in your writing today. What noun does it modify? Is it correctly placed next to that noun? If not, revise it.
I underlined “Showing the plants growing together” in my paragraph. It modifies “the video,” and it is correctly placed because the noun comes right after the phrase. If it were not placed correctly, I would revise it to say, “Showing the plants growing together, the video makes reciprocity easier to see.”
Instruct students to complete the following homework before the next lesson.
Read the chapter “Wisgaak Gokpenagen: A Black Ash Basket” in Braiding Sweetgrass (pp. 119–131) and annotate in your Journal for the following:
One moment when Kimmerer describes what she does during basket making
One moment when Kimmerer describes what she is thinking or feeling while making the basket