Professional Documents
Culture Documents
LEVEL 2
Summary
The Puritan elders of seventeenth century Boston imprison an unmarried mother, Hester Prynne, and force her to wear a scarlet letter A on her dress to show everybody that she is an adulteress. She is told that she might be allowed to remove the letter if she tells everybody who the father of her child is, but she refuses in order to protect her one true love. Her husband, who had sent her to Boston two years earlier, turns up and discovers that the father is a young minister called Arthur Dimmesdale. He doesnt tell anybody, but uses the power of his knowledge
of 3
Teachers notes
LEVEL 2
Discussion activities
Before reading
1 Discuss: Put students in groups to discuss these questions: Do a lot of women in your country have babies when they arent married? Why does this happen? Do these women get any help? Do they have to give the name of the father to get help? What do people think about these women, the fathers and the children?
Teachers notes
LEVEL 2
After reading
8 Discuss and write: Ask students to think about what happened in Chapter 4 from Pearls point of view. Brainstorm some ideas with the whole class. Now students write a short piece describing what happened at the governors house as if they were Pearl.
After reading
12 Role play: Put students into groups of three. One student is Hester, one is Arthur and one is Pearl. Tell them to act out the scene in the woods. They can write the dialogue first based on what they can remember from Chapter 7 or they can improvise.
After reading
6 Discuss: Put students into groups to discuss this question: Who is the father of Hesters baby? Why do you think that? Elicit ideas but do not confirm or correct at this stage.
Vocabulary activities
For the Word List and vocabulary activities, go to www.penguinreaders.com.