Pygmalion and Galatea: Greek and Roman Mythology Series for Middle and High School

Who are Pygmalion and Galatea? Pygmalion was an artist who carved a statue out of marble to look like a real, live woman — whom, oops! — he happened to fall in love with at first sight. His own creation. He named her Galatea, and the goddess Aphrodite (some say Artemis) took notice. Look at the “Further Reading Guide” to supplement this lesson with myth-related books, websites, and articles. I envision this resource being used with any mythology-related unit you share with middle and high school students!

This Resource Includes the Following Features:

• Available as PDF & Google Workspace (Google Slides)
• 1 Teacher Three-day Lesson Calendar (with Teacher’s Notes)
• 1 Key Characters and Places Anchor Chart
  • Orient your learners by identifying the key characters and the geographical location that situates the story of Pygmalion and Galatea on the island of Cyprus. Includes a map activity!
• Reading Cards:
  • Pygmalion and Galatea: Story Version #1
  • Clement of Alexandria, Exhortation to the Greeks: On “Pygmalion and Galatea”
  • Art and Literature Connection: “Pygmalionis effigies eburnea in hominem mutatur”
  • Art and Literature Connection: “Pygmalion and Galatea,” (1593) H. Goltzius
  • Includes a Student-Friendly Reading Protocol.
• 14-Count Question Bank
  • Could you check for understanding with a quick and adaptable question bank?
  • Includes a Custom Note-taking template to ensure student accountability!
• Frayer Model Vocabulary Cards
  • 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 contain terms, geography, challenging words (as well as contextual entries that fit the story).
• 1 Half-Sheet 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 your students have learned.
• Writing Activity
  • The writing activity serves as a summative assessment as it asks students to analyze the character of Pygmalion as either a “creator” or a “misogynist.”
• 1 Further Reading List
  • Consider 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 where learning can go deeper into the story.
• Standards Alignment Chart
• Answer Keys for all student-facing documents
  • Teachers always ask for answer keys for my products, so I gave you plenty of guidance on what to expect from students in their written and oral responses.

I created this resource with high school students in mind. It is designed for an English Language Arts Mythology unit — 

• Encourage students to discuss romantic love, obsession, artistic devotion, gender and women, representation of women in literature and art, and more.
• Use this resource as a stand-alone lesson or pair it with a larger unit on Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief, Robert Graves’s Greek Myths, or Edith Hamilton’s Mythology.
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