Passage to Freedom: The Sugihara Storyby Ken Mochizuki
Lesson plans and teaching resources
Author's Note forBaseball Saved Us,Heroes, andPassage to Freedom: The Sugihara Story
Background information from Ken Mochizuki.
Interviews:Passage to Freedom
Author Ken Mochizuki discusses the process of writing the book. "I consider Chiune Sugihara as one of my personal heroes, a man willing to suffer the consequences and risk his life and career to save the lives of others. I've dedicated Passage to Freedom to those who place the welfare of others before themselves. Courageous, unselfish actions need to be applauded and reinforced."
Passage to Freedom: The Sugihara Story
This teacher's guide includes summary and background information, prereading questions, vocabulary, discussion questions, writing activities, strategies for ESL and interdisciplinary connections.
Passage to Freedom
Students note details as they read. Includes text-dependent questions, vocabulary words, a culminating task, and additional learning activities. Word processor required for access.
Passage to Freedom
Scroll down on the page to find a word ladder, leveled reader task cards, key passages ("10 Important Sentences"), vocabulary, more.
Passage to Freedom
This lesson pairsPassage to Freedomwith a nonfiction article, "The Holocaust" (included - access requires creating free account). Students integrate information from the two sources to gain clearer understanding of historical events.
Passage to Freedom
Pre-reading activities, discussion questions, journal topic, vocabulary, cross-curricular activities, related links. 4 pages; Adobe Reader required.
Passage to Freedom
Lesson plan includes summary, vocabulary words, journal topic, several learning activities, editing practice ("Fixit Sentences"), letter to parents, word ladder.
Walk a Quote: A Lesson Based Upon The Sugihara Story
After listening to the story being read aloud, students respond to key quotations from the book.
Other books by by Ken Mochizuki
Baseball Saved Us
This teacher's guide includes summary and background, prereading questions, vocabulary, reader response and other writing prompts, strategies for ESL and interdisciplinary connections.
Be Water, My Friend
Synopsis and background, pre-reading focus questions, during-reading activities and vocabulary, post-reading discussion questions, suggestions for literature circles, reader-response writing prompts, ELL support, and interdisciplinary projects. 10 pages; Adobe Reader required.
Be Water, My Friend
The author discusses the challenges of writing about Bruce Lee. "I hope readers, especially guys, will think about this: if you call your peer who wears glasses a nerd, if you think reading is boring or a waste of time, if you think ballroom dancing is for sissies, if you think you don't have to take school seriously and won't live to regret it remember Bruce Lee, often considered the man of men, the most macho of men, was and did all of these things and much, much more."
Heroes
This teacher's guide includes summary and background, prereading questions, discussion questions, writing activities, vocabulary, strategies for ESL and interdisciplinary connections.