Niobe Myth ELA Lesson: Hubris, Grief & Close Reading

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Niobe's Tragic Story Mythology Series Lesson for Grades 8-10 ELA

Engage English Language Arts Students (grades 8-12) with the ancient, tragic story of Niobe — the weeping woman of Thebes!

The story of Niobe is tragic and indicative of the human propensity for cruelty. Encourage students to think through the tragic elements of this infamous tale. Track down the allusions and analyze the tropes to this extraordinary sad tale (recorded in Chapter XXIV of Homer’s Iliad and Ovid’s Metamorphoses). Note — this resource contains violence, murder, and accounts of human suffering.

Aligned with Common Core Standards, this individual lesson pack prompts students to discuss the myth, compare it to other works of art, work in groups, learn new vocabulary in context, and complete a writing activity.

This resource is optimized for distance learning. The product includes an editable Google Workspace link. Modify this resource for student use on Google Classroom and other classroom management sites.

Use this Digital Download for a Three-day English Language Arts Lesson

Common Core Standards: This resource aligns well with the reading literature standard: “Analyze the representation of a subject or a key scene in two different artistic mediums, including what is emphasized or absent in each treatment (e.g., Auden’s “Musée des Beaux-Arts” and Breughel’s Landscape with the Fall of Icarus).”

This Resource Includes the Following Features:

1 Teacher Three-day Lesson Calendar
- Pace the lesson with a suggested three-day lesson calendar.
2 Art + Literature Connections (with Visual Aids)
- Compare the text with famous works of art by Stefano Della Bella and Guillaume-Benjamin-Armand Duchenne de Bologne.
1 Archaeology Connection (With Visual Aid)
- An informational text on a recovered Roman copy of a Greek original — a boy’s torso, scholars believe represents one of Niobe’s children (at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City).
1 Key Characters and Places Worksheet
- Orient your learners by identifying the story’s key characters and geographical location.
4 Reading Cards
- Dictionary Entry: Niobe
- Includes Six Ancient Sources of the Myth:
- from Homer’s Iliad
- Pseudo-Apollodorus’s Library of Greek Myths
- Quintus Smyrnaeus’s Fall of Troy
- Pausanias’s Description of Greece
- Ovid’s Metamorphoses
1 Question Bank
- Either use these questions as a quiz for after reading or in a discussion or small group setting.
1 Frayer Model Vocabulary Set (with student sample)
- Frayer models are a way to get kids to think about vocabulary visually in a four-section square —- A square for meaning, one for examples, another for non-examples, and a sketch. It is amazing to see the work they produce. A great way to decorate your classroom to showcase your kids’ vocabulary-in-text understanding. The cards can be filled out to include terms, geography, and challenging words (contextual entries fit the story).
2 Half Sheet 3-2-1 Exit Tickets
- Exit tickets are a way to get data about your students’ understanding of the lesson right before the class is finished. Collect these exit tickets and quickly see what ideas your students picked up about Niobe’s story. I also provide two different tickets to offer academic choices for students.
1 Essay Writing Activity (with visual starter and prompt)
- Cap this three-day lesson with an essay on the theme of human suffering. Students will use evidence from the text to support an insightful thesis statement.
1 Further Reading List
- Don’t disregard this further reading list if you think it is merely a bibliography. Share the list with your students or have them do projects based on the available research. Assign different sources to students and organize presentations.
Answer Keys for all student-facing documents
- Teachers always ask for answer keys for my products, so I ensured I gave you plenty of guidance on what to expect from students in their written and oral responses.
- Includes a standards alignment chart for planning.

I created this resource with seventh or eighth-grade to senior-level secondary school students in mind. It is designed for an English Language Arts Mythology unit —

On characteristics of tragedy
On the Royal House of Thebes
Use this resource as a stand-alone lesson or pair it with a larger unit on Myth, Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief, Robert Graves’s Greek Myths, or Edith Hamilton’s Mythology.