Big Ideas are…

Ø …core concepts and themes.

Ø …about ongoing debates and issues.

Ø …about the overarching principle or principles.

Ø …insightful perspectives and inferences.

Ø …enduring understandings, that which we take away from the study of a piece of literature or other topic.

v An enduring understanding is what stays with a person long after the details have faded.

Examples of Big Ideas and Enduring Understandings from

Tim O’Brien’s “How to Tell a True War Story”

1. To convey the truth of intense emotional and psychological experiences, authors (storytellers, screenwriters, songwriters, et. al.) go beyond the mere facts, the reality of experience, to engender the effect within the “reader.”

2. Truths exist within the fictions we create – whether in parables, novels, poems, films, songs and more; the truth of a story does not exist in its facts, but in whether or not the reader, listener, or viewer feels, at least partly, its emotional content.

3. War and other traumatic experiences undermine and distort absolutes (right/wrong, good/evil, truth/lies) and certainties compelling one to question morality and purpose.

Examples of Big Ideas and Enduring Understandings from

Mark Twain’s “The War Prayer”

1. Without realizing it, asking for divine intervention for personal benefit may also be asking divine beings to harm others.

2. Victory in battle will inevitably lead to suffering among the vanquished which often creates lasting cultural resentments and a future generation of enemies.

3. When anyone, even a “messenger from God,” confronts people with ideas and perspectives that challenge their long held beliefs, the people consider the messenger “a lunatic” to be disregarded without considering the message at all.

Essential Questions…

Ø …are arguable and important to argue about.

Ø …are “at the heart” of the matter.

Ø …recur and should recur throughout life.

Ø …raise more questions.

Ø …may not have final, clear, or definite answers.

Ø …are evaluative questions because they can apply to many texts or situations in life.

Examples of essential (evaluative) questions arising from “And So We Meet Again,” Sam Slaven’s story of dealing with his PTSD broadcast on This American Life

1. What are some of the sources of bigotry and prejudice? How do those feelings harm both the person holding prejudicial views as well as the people subject to that hatred?  

2. How can we recognize and control our own prejudices instead of letting them control us?

3. Why do many people never deal with their uncontrollable feelings of hostility, and what can be done to help them?

Interpretive Questions address a specific text or texts and have more than a single plausible answer.

Examples of interpretive questions from “Backlash Against Afghan Civilian Deaths”

1. How does the Taliban cause or contribute to the deaths of innocents and then successfully use those deaths as propaganda against the U.S.?

2. Why do the Afghan people believe that U.S. soldiers intentionally kill civilians?

Factual Questions have correct, verifiable answers; they are not open to interpretation.

Examples of factual questions about Frankenstein.

1. Who is Mary Shelley? 2. What two genres did Frankenstein create? 3. Who is Elizabeth?

4. Who is Henry Clerval? 5. Who is William? 6. What happens to the creature when it wanders in to town? 7. How does the creature learn to speak and read? 8. How do Eva and the old man react to the creature? 9. Why does the creature weep in the cottagers home? 10. How did Felix react when he saw “the creature”? 11. Who is Justine?