Description
Bring James Joyce’s classic short story “Araby” to life with this engaging, ready-to-use literary analysis lesson designed to build close reading, critical thinking, and analytical writing skills.
Students explore key themes, symbolism, figurative language, and author’s purpose while tracing the narrator’s emotional journey and disillusionment. Through structured activities before, during, and after reading, students move from prediction and comprehension to deeper literary analysis and reflection.
This lesson includes an anticipation guide to activate background knowledge, vocabulary instruction with a chart and PowerPoint slides, reading check questions to support comprehension, and literary analysis questions that require textual evidence. Students also complete a figurative language worksheet and a reflection assignment to connect the story’s themes to broader ideas about adolescence, desire, and coming of age.
You’ll also receive a suggested lesson procedure, the full text of the story, complete answer keys, and editable student activities, making this resource flexible and easy to adapt for your classroom.
This lesson is an excellent fit for units on modernism, coming-of-age stories, symbolism, and short story analysis, and works well in both middle school and high school ELA settings.