All reading is done in class together. Tap any week to review what you covered.
Unit Complete
Fall term · 15 weeks · All acts read in class
All Weeks
15
The Great Conversation Quilt · Gallery Walk
In class this week · final presentations
In class: Gallery Walk · present your 4×4 quilt square · read your insight sentence aloud · closing discussion of the whole unit
☑ Quilt square complete · ☑ Insight sentence written on back · ☑ Gallery Walk participation
Week 15 Materials
14
In-Class Exam · Capstone Composition
In class this week · four-paragraph composition
In class: write a four-paragraph composition — introduction, one lens paragraph (Augustine or Machiavelli), one Macbeth moment + analysis, conclusion
☑ Bring: Augustine narration · Machiavelli bibliography · annotated copy of Macbeth · weekly handouts · no phones or computers
Weeks 13 & 14 Exam Packet
13
Act V · The Endgame · Exam Prep
In class this week · Act V · exam prep packet
In class: Act V read aloud · "Out damned spot" · "Tomorrow and tomorrow" · Lady Macbeth's collapse · exam prep distributed
☑ Act IV DELIGHT partner check · ☑ Exam prep — review notes and annotated texts · ☑ Quilt: plan and sketch your 4×4 square · ☑ One-page quote organiser
Week 13 Handout
12
Act IV · The Tyrant · DELIGHT Analysis
In class this week · Act IV · Quilt planning
In class: Act IV read aloud · three apparitions · Macduff's family murdered · Quote Match with Machiavelli warm-up · DELIGHT analysis
☑ Act IV DELIGHT Analysis · ☑ Quilt: central idea + symbol chosen · ☑ Using Language Well, Lesson 17
Week 12 Handout
11
Act III, Sc. 4–6 · Machiavelli · Fear & Power
In class this week · the ghost banquet
In class: Act III Sc. 4–6 · Banquo's ghost at the banquet · Lady Macbeth covers · Hecate · Scotland turns · Machiavelli close reading
☑ Machiavelli annotated bibliography · ☑ Commonplace: sketch Banquo's ghost scene · ☑ Using Language Well, Lesson 17
Week 11 Handout
10
Act III, Sc. 1–3 · "O Full of Scorpions"
In class this week · Banquo's murder
In class: Act III Sc. 1–3 · Macbeth's paranoia · Banquo hired for murder · Fleance escapes · Act & Scene Guides assignment
☑ Revise your paragraph — read aloud to a parent or partner · ☑ Commonplace: Act III passage + sketch · ☑ Using Language Well, Lesson 17
Week 10 Handout
9
Act II · The Murder · Augustine Connection
In class this week · "Is this a dagger?"
In class: Act II Sc. 1–4 · dagger vision · Duncan murdered · nature goes wrong · "murdered sleep" · Act & Scene Guides
☑ Commonplace: illustrate the hierarchy of loves · ☑ Share paragraph aloud and revise · ☑ Using Language Well, Lesson 17
Week 9 Handout
8
Act II, Sc. 1–4 · "Is This a Dagger?"
In class this week · the murder night
In class: Act II full reading · the murder · Lady Macbeth calm · Macbeth shattered · Macduff discovers the body · omens in nature
☑ Commonplace: Act II passage + sketch · ☑ Augustine reflective narration draft
Week 8 Handout
7
Act I Review · Memorization
In class this week · Act I review + soliloquy
In class: Act I full review · soliloquy recitation · "Tomorrow and tomorrow" or "Is this a dagger?" chosen for memorization · Act I check
☑ Memorization assignment · ☑ Act I narration · ☑ Commonplace entry
Week 7 Handout
6
Act I, Sc. 4–7 · "Look Like the Innocent Flower"
In class this week · Duncan arrives · Macbeth hesitates
In class: Act I Sc. 4–7 · Duncan names Malcolm heir · Lady Macbeth's invocation · Duncan arrives · Macbeth says "We will proceed no further" · Lady Macbeth overrules
☑ Sentence sketch warm-up · ☑ Using Language Well, Lesson 16 · ☑ Commonplace entry
Week 6 Handout
5
Act I, Sc. 1–3 · The Prophecy
In class this week · the witches · first temptation
In class: Act I Sc. 1–3 · "Fair is foul, and foul is fair" · the prophecies on the heath · Macbeth already imagining murder · Banquo's warning
☑ Act I Sc. 1–3 narration · ☑ Commonplace entry · ☑ Begin image set tracking (D, B, N, A)
Week 5 Handout
4
Plot Preview · Narration Introduction
In class this week · full plot overview · narration begins
In class: full plot preview · why Shakespeare reads this way · narration introduced · first narration practice · reading companion distributed
☑ First narration attempt · ☑ Commonplace journal launched
Week 4 Handout
3
Plot Preview · Character Map
In class this week · who's who in Macbeth
In class: character map completed · relationships between Macbeth, Lady Macbeth, Duncan, Banquo, Malcolm, Macduff · plot arc overview
☑ Character map completed · ☑ Begin Macbeth Reading Companion
Week 3 Handout
2
Introduction · What Is Tragedy?
In class this week · genre · Shakespeare's world
In class: what is tragedy · the tragic hero · how to read Shakespeare aloud · iambic pentameter · Sonnet 18 as an entry point into Shakespeare's voice
☑ Sonnet 18 copy work · ☑ Genre notes
Week 2 Handout
1
Course Introduction · The Art of Tragedy
In class this week · welcome to the unit
In class: course overview · how co-op works · introducing the year's theme (Tragedy & Gothic) · what makes a tragedy · Charlotte Mason and living literature
☑ Course overview reviewed · ☑ Reading Companion received
Week 1 Materials
Tap any act to open your reading companion — characters, context, and questions to carry into class.
Act I · The Temptation
Act I, Scenes 1–3
"Fair is foul" · the prophecies · Macbeth's first temptation
Characters
Weird SistersMacbethBanquoDuncan
What's happening
The weird sisters open the play. On the heath they prophecy that Macbeth will be Thane of Cawdor and then King — and that Banquo's heirs will be kings. Macbeth is already imagining the murder he hasn't yet committed. Banquo warns that the instruments of darkness tell us truths to trap us.
Questions to carry in
Macbeth and Banquo hear the same prophecy. What does each one do with it?
Does the prophecy cause what follows — or does it reveal what was already there?
Act I, Scenes 4–7
"Look like the innocent flower" · Duncan arrives · Macbeth hesitates
Characters
MacbethLady MacbethDuncanMalcolm
What's happening
Duncan names Malcolm heir. Lady Macbeth reads the letter and calls on spirits to unsex her. Duncan arrives at Inverness, warmly welcomed. Macbeth says "We will proceed no further." Lady Macbeth overrules his conscience.
Questions to carry in
Macbeth hesitates in Scene 7. What are his actual reasons? Are any of them moral — or are they all practical?
How does Lady Macbeth persuade him? What does she attack — his logic, his love, his manhood?
Act II · The Murder
Act II, Scenes 1–4
"Is this a dagger?" · Duncan murdered · omens in nature
Characters
MacbethLady MacbethMacduffMalcolm
What's happening
Macbeth hallucinates a dagger before the murder. He kills Duncan. Lady Macbeth is calm; he is shattered. Macduff discovers the body. Malcolm and Donalbain flee. Strange omens: horses eating each other, darkness at noon.
Questions to carry in
After the murder, Macbeth says he has "murdered sleep." What does he mean — and why sleep specifically?
What is Shakespeare saying about what murder does to the order of things?
Act III · The Unraveling
Act III, Scenes 1–3
"O full of scorpions is my mind" · Banquo murdered
Characters
MacbethLady MacbethBanquoFleance
What's happening
Macbeth fears Banquo's heirs. He now plans murder without telling Lady Macbeth. Banquo is killed; Fleance escapes. Notice the shift: in Act I he needed Lady Macbeth to push him. Now he acts alone.
Questions to carry in
Macbeth envies Duncan — dead Duncan "sleeps well." What has a man lost when he envies a murdered man?
Connect Macbeth's choices here to Augustine: what is he loving? In what order?
Act III, Scenes 4–6
Banquo's ghost · the banquet · Scotland turns
Characters
MacbethLady MacbethHecateLennox
What's happening
At the banquet, Macbeth sees Banquo's ghost. Lady Macbeth tries to cover his breakdown. Hecate plans to lead Macbeth to ruin through overconfidence. Scotland is turning against him.
Questions to carry in
Only Macbeth sees the ghost. What does that tell you about where his guilt lives?
Hecate says she will lead Macbeth to ruin through overconfidence. Where do you already see that forming?
Act IV · The Tyrant
Act IV, Scenes 1–3
Three apparitions · Macduff's family · rebellion
Characters
MacbethWeird SistersLady MacduffMalcolmMacduff
What's happening
Three apparitions promise Macbeth safety. He orders the murder of Macduff's family — including his wife and children. Malcolm tests Macduff's loyalty. Macduff learns his family is dead.
Questions to carry in
Killing Macduff's family serves no strategic purpose. What has Macbeth become by Act IV?
Malcolm says "dispute it like a man." Macduff says "I must also feel it as a man." What is the difference?
Act V · The Endgame
Act V, Scenes 1–5
"Out damned spot" · "Tomorrow and tomorrow" · Lady Macbeth dies
Characters
Lady MacbethMacbethDoctorMalcolm
What's happening
Lady Macbeth sleepwalks — guilt breaking through her armor. Macbeth learns she has died and delivers "Tomorrow and tomorrow" — nihilism in the face of moral collapse. Birnam Wood begins to move.
Questions to carry in
What does "Tomorrow and tomorrow" reveal about what Macbeth now believes life means?
The body speaks what the will suppresses. Where else in the play have you seen this?
Act V, Scenes 6–8
Birnam Wood moves · "Untimely ripped" · the restoration
Characters
MacbethMacduffMalcolm
What's happening
Malcolm's army carries branches from Birnam Wood — the prophecy turns. Macbeth discovers Macduff was "untimely ripped." He dies. Malcolm is crowned and order is restored.
Questions to carry in
The witches' words were technically true but deliberately misleading. What does Shakespeare want us to understand about equivocation?
Is the restoration at the end satisfying — or is something lost that cannot be recovered?
Shakespeare wrote Macbeth as a tragedy — and a very specific kind. Understanding the form helps you see what he's doing with it.
Tragedy
A tragedy follows a figure of stature who falls — not by accident but through a fatal flaw or a fatal choice. The fall should feel both inevitable and avoidable. Macbeth is not destroyed by the witches — he is destroyed by what the witches unlocked in him. The tragedy is that he chose.
Soliloquy
A speech a character delivers alone onstage — their innermost thoughts, unfiltered. Shakespeare's soliloquies are where characters cannot lie. Macbeth's dagger speech, "O full of scorpions," and "Tomorrow and tomorrow" are all moments where he shows us exactly what he is becoming.
Paradox & Equivocation
"Fair is foul, and foul is fair." The witches deal in equivocation: statements that are technically true but designed to deceive. Macbeth hears what he wants to hear.
The Four Image Sets
Track these four recurring image clusters as you read:
D
Darkness
Hiding, covering, absence of light
B
Blood
Violence, guilt, stain that won't wash away
N
Nature Dislocated
Storms, horses eating each other, world out of order
A
Animals & Birds
Ravens, owls, serpents — creatures behaving unnaturally
Iambic Pentameter
Ten syllables per line, alternating unstressed and stressed: da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM. When Shakespeare breaks it, you feel it. "Out, damned spot! out, I say!" shatters the meter. That's not an accident.
Each theme is named here — but the play teaches it to you. The coaching note tells you what to watch for.
Appearance vs. Reality
"Fair is foul, and foul is fair." From the first line, nothing is what it seems.
How to see it
Track the word "look" — how often characters tell each other what to look like. "Look like the innocent flower." "False face must hide what the false heart doth know." Who is most deceived by themselves?
Ambition & Its Cost
Macbeth is not a bad man who does bad things. He is a good man who chooses ambition over everything he knows to be right.
How to see it
Watch Macbeth before and after each murder. Notice how his language changes — from richly poetic in Act I to hollow and nihilistic by Act V.
Fate vs. Choice
The witches prophesy — but they do not cause. Macbeth always had the choice to hear the prophecy and do nothing.
How to see it
Compare Banquo and Macbeth — they hear the same prophecy. What does Banquo understand that Macbeth doesn't?
Disordered Love
Augustine's lens fits Macbeth precisely. He loves power, safety, and self above what is good and true.
How to see it
Track what Macbeth loves in Act I and what he loves by Act V. What happened to his ordered affections?
Guilt & Conscience
Macbeth cannot outrun what he knows. The dagger, the ghost, the sleepwalking — conscience returns in bodies when it cannot be spoken.
How to see it
Notice Macbeth and Lady Macbeth take turns breaking down. Which is more frightening — guilt that breaks you or guilt you can no longer feel?
Persuasion & Identity
"The mask we wear to persuade others eventually persuades us."
How to see it
Read Lady Macbeth's persuasion speech in Act I Scene 7 closely. When does Macbeth stop needing her to persuade him?
The full cast — with the whole play behind you.
M
Macbeth
Thane of Glamis → Cawdor → King · tragic hero
A brave and loyal soldier who becomes a tyrant. His tragedy is not that he is evil but that he knows better — and chooses wrong anyway.
L
Lady Macbeth
Macbeth's wife · the engine of ambition
Calls on spirits to unsex her — she wants to strip out her conscience. What she suppresses by will returns through the body in Act V.
D
King Duncan
King of Scotland · embodiment of order
Generous, trusting, gracious — and fatally wrong about Macbeth. His murder is the original sin from which all disorder flows.
B
Banquo
Macbeth's companion · moral foil
Hears the same prophecy, makes the opposite choice. His ghost is what Macbeth cannot escape.
Md
Macduff
Thane of Fife · instrument of justice
"He has no children." Born untimely ripped — outside the witches' protection. His grief is the most human moment in the play.
Ml
Malcolm
Duncan's heir · future king
Tests Macduff's loyalty in England with a remarkable scene of self-accusation. Restoration begins with him.
W
The Weird Sisters
The witches · agents of equivocation
They do not cause Macbeth's fall — they reveal what is already in him. Their prophecies are true in the way a funhouse mirror is true.
These are the lenses chosen for this unit. Each illuminates something the others miss.
Augustine of Hippo · 354–430 AD
Ordo Amoris — Ordered Love
"Living a just and holy life requires loving things in the right order." — On Christian Doctrine I.27
Augustine defined virtue as rightly ordered love. Macbeth loves power, safety, and self above loyalty, gratitude, and goodness. His downfall is not ambition — it is disordered love.
Read: Confessions Book I (Gutenberg)Niccolò Machiavelli · 1469–1527
Fear, Love & the Prince
"It is much safer to be feared than loved, when, of the two, either must be dispensed with." — The Prince, XVII
Machiavelli argued that a ruler must manage appearances and may need to rule through fear. Macbeth attempts this — but Machiavelli would call him a failure. He provokes hatred, not fear. Would Machiavelli have predicted his downfall?
Read: The Prince, Ch. XVII (Gutenberg)Aristotle · 384–322 BC
Ethos, Pathos, Logos
Lady Macbeth's persuasion of Macbeth in Act I Scene 7 is pure pathos — she attacks his identity, his courage, his love for her. Macbeth's ethos — his reputation as a loyal soldier — is precisely what makes his betrayal so devastating.
Shakespeare himself
The Play as Argument
Shakespeare's answer is precise: when a man chooses ambition over order, everything breaks — his language, his relationships, his sleep. The play does not moralize. It shows.
Key passages — and why Shakespeare chose these words.
Act I, Scene 1 · The Weird Sisters
"Fair is foul, and foul is fair: / Hover through the fog and filthy air."
The opening lines — the whole play in miniature
Read Act IAct I, Scene 5 · Lady Macbeth
"Come, thick night, / And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell, / That my keen knife see not the wound it makes."
Her invocation — suppressing conscience by force of will
Read Act I, Scene 5Act V, Scene 5 · Macbeth
"Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow / Creeps in this petty pace from day to day, / To the last syllable of recorded time."
After Lady Macbeth's death — nihilism as the end of disordered love
Read Act V, Scene 5Vocabulary · Author's Craft
Equivocation
noun · deliberately ambiguous language designed to misleadThe witches' prophecies are technically true but structured to deceive. "None of woman born shall harm Macbeth" — true, and a trap.
Why Shakespeare chose this word
Equivocation was a hot political topic in 1606 — Jesuit priests had been accused of it under oath. By making it the witches' primary weapon, Shakespeare connects Macbeth's downfall to a contemporary moral crisis.
Pall
verb · to cover with a dark cloth; to make dark and heavy"Pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell." Lady Macbeth asks night to drape itself in darkness — to become a burial shroud.
Why Shakespeare chose this word
Pall carries death — it is the cloth draped over a coffin. Lady Macbeth is not just asking for darkness. She is asking for the atmosphere of death itself, before the murder.
Untimely
adverb · not at the natural time; prematurely"Untimely ripped" — Macduff was delivered by caesarean, outside the natural birth process.
Why Shakespeare chose this word
The entire play is about the violation of natural order. "Untimely" carries the whole theme in one word — and closes the circle.
Your Turn · Word Hunting
Find a word Shakespeare chose carefully.
Look back at a passage. Find one word that surprised you — heavier, stranger, or more specific than a simpler word would have been. Write it below and say why he chose it.