In case you missed it, I have moved to a 9th grade classroom after over a decade in middle school. I have been loving the new texts that I get to help students understand but Shakespeare presents an interesting challenge. Besides the fact that it is a completely different English language than what we currently speak, it is also something that will take FOREVER to teach and, well… we have other things that I need to teach, too. If you teach secondary ELA, you already know the tension that I’m talking about here.

There’s so much we’re expected to teach: reading comprehension, writing, research, speaking and listening, critical thinking, and skills that students will actually need in real life. And, somewhere in the middle of all that, we still have to read mandatory texts like Shakespeare. In a moment of “WTH do I do,” I asked my friends on Instagram what I should do and the advice that stuck out to me was that if I don’t teach it, I’m going to be doing my college bound students a huge disservice. 

Ok… I’ll teach it. But Imma do it my way.

So… as a new-to-9th-grade teacher—and someone who specializes in applying Science of Reading research in secondary classrooms—I’m approaching Romeo and Juliet a little differently. Not because Shakespeare doesn’t matter, but because how we teach it matters more than ever.

This unit is my attempt to reconcile three things:

• Secondary students still need explicit instruction in reading, writing, and thinking.
• Shakespeare is part of the canon that students are expected to encounter in high school.
• I’ve got too many standards to cover to spend weeks on Shakespeare without having it overlap with something else.

Instead of asking myself “How do I get through this quickly?” though, I asked myself “What can my students do with this text?” That question led me to frame the unit around a research question that would guide everything that followed.

Framing the Unit With a Research Question

Before we ever open the play, students will begin with research. This is a skill that I have seen my students struggle with over and over again and I need to do a better job. So we’ll be researching this essential question for the unit:

Are teenagers capable of making life-changing decisions?

I like this because it is going to get us into the play but it is also hopefully going to build some social-emotional awareness for my students, too. But instead of asking students to magically apply this question to Shakespeare on day one, we start by building knowledge. Research is one of my favorite ways to build background knowledge for tough texts.

I am scaffolding the research process heavily because, as I said, my students are lacking some really necessary skills AND we don’t have a lot of time (!!!). There are two big struggles that I’m seeing when it comes to research. First, my students cannot navigate online databases. If I’m doing this unit for my college-bound students, I need them to be able to use Ebsco, too. Secondly, and kind of along the same lines, they can’t evaluate sources. They type an entire question into their search bar and take the first thing that pops up at face value.

I’m starting there. I’m providing the sources for our research and we’re going to rank them.

All of the sources focus on the adolescent brain: decision-making, impulse control, emotional regulation, and social influence. Students will read these texts with a clear purpose: evaluating the evidence to help them answer the essential question.

This approach does two things:

1. It builds background knowledge they’ll need to understand the characters’ choices in Romeo and Juliet.
2. It allows students to practice research skills in a supported, realistic way.

Treating the Play as a Text and a Performance

Once students have that research foundation, we’ll shift to Romeo and Juliet but not by immediately reading the play cover to cover.

We are going to start by watching it. My friend Julia from Around the World with Mrs. C convinced me a while ago that plays are meant to be viewed. We can’t appreciate Shakespeare by only reading it.

He wrote plays to be seen and heard, not silently decoded in isolation. Viewing the play first reduces cognitive load and allows students to track the plot, understand the character relationships, notice conflict and… build the background knowledge necessary to understand the completely different language their about to read.

And in this unit, the performance itself becomes a source that students can reference alongside their research.

After watching and ensuring that students understand the story, we’ll move into close reading.

Close Reading With a Purpose (Not Just Because It’s Shakespeare)

When we return to the text, we’ll do so strategically.

I’ll have students closely read selected scenes that:

• Reveal character motivation
• Show moments of high-stakes decision-making
• Have really beautiful language that we can unpack
• Connect directly to the essential question

This is where the traditional literary standards and the strategies that support comprehension will come in. We’ll analyze language, structure, and characters. But now students will have the knowledge base to make sense of what they’re reading.

Instead of asking, “What does this mean?” in a vacuum, I’m hoping that this approach will allow students to ask questions like: Why does this character act this way? and How does this decision align with what we learned about the adolescent brain? Instead of my students saying, “Wow, they’re dumb,” maybe they’ll say, “Oooh, they shoulda done that differently.”

From Reading to Argument: Writing and Debate

So what is on tap for the final assessment, then? I feel like Romeo and Juliet, traditionally taught to freshmen, is usually pretty heavy on the project-type final assessments. I need to fit in more writing in my year so we’re not going to waste our time building a globe or making a mask. We will be writing an argumentative essay and doing a structured debate.

Students must take a position on the essential question and support it using their research on the adolescent brain and evidence from the play (both the performance and the text).

This is where Shakespeare stops being an isolated literary artifact or even just a fun story and becomes a vehicle for argument writing, evidence synthesis, academic discussion and real-world reasoning.

Students aren’t just proving they read the play. They’re demonstrating that they can think.

Why This Approach Matters

This version of a Romeo and Juliet unit isn’t about racing through acts or decoding every metaphor.

It’s about:

• Respecting adolescent development
• Teaching reading as a skill that still needs instruction
• Honoring Shakespeare without sacrificing relevance

For secondary ELA teachers who feel pulled between “what we’re supposed to teach” and “what students actually need,” this approach is my answer.

We don’t have to abandon Shakespeare.

But we can teach it in a way that aligns with how students learn and… you know, everything else that we need to teach, too.

If You’re Teaching Shakespeare and Feeling the Same Tension…

If you’re trying to balance classic texts with real-world literacy skills, you’re not alone.

I’ll be sharing more about this unit—including resources, scaffolds, and classroom-tested materials—through upcoming posts and conversations.

Shakespeare doesn’t have to be the thing that derails your year.

Sometimes, it can be the thing that finally makes your instruction click.