A PowerPoint presentation on themes in the novel My Father Sun Sun Johnson by C. Everard Palmer, with focus on chapters 6 - 9

1. THEMES IN MY FATHER SUN-SUN
JOHNSON
Chapters 6 - 9

2. OBJECTIVES:
 Define the term ‘theme’
 Give your own examples of themes
 Watch a video about how to find and talk about
themes
 Accurately identify themes in stories
 Discuss examples of how themes are developed in
the novel
 Write paragraphs on a chosen theme
At the end of this lesson
you should be able to:

3. WHAT IS A THEME?
 A theme is a main idea in a literary text, work of art,
play, film or any form artistic expression.
 It is the message that the writer wants to teach us
about life (life lesson). It tells us some truth about
human experiences.

4. WHAT IS A THEME?
 Themes are ideas that come from topics. These
topics are abstract nouns (nouns that cannot be
touched or easily defined) such as ‘Love’,
‘Honesty’, ‘Friendship’, ‘Family’.
 For example: ‘Love’ is a topic. The theme that
comes from this is ‘Love conquers all.’

5. NOW IT’S YOUR TURN.
Give an
example of a
topic and a
theme.

6. HOW TO FIND A THEME IN A LITERARY
TEXT
INSTRUCTIONS: Watch the video on the next
slide. DO NOT WRITE ANY NOTES WHILE
WATCHING THE VIDEO. Just watch the video to
see what you can learn and respond to the
teacher’s questions on it. Write what you learnt
AFTERWARDS.

7. WATCH THIS VIDEO TO FIND OUT HOW TO FIND
THEMES IN A STORY

8. WHAT DID YOU LEARN?
Write it
down.

9. WATCH THIS VIDEO TO DISCOVER HOW TO
WRITE ABOUT THEMES IN A STORY:

10. WHAT DID YOU LEARN THIS TIME?
Write it
down
again.

11. OTHER PLACES WHERE THE THEME CAN BE
FOUND:
 The title – the title of books/stories/movies or the
tile of the chapter can help to establish what the
main idea is. For example, the chapters “Growing”
and “Building” in My Father Sun-Sun Johnson
shows the topic of Determination. From this we get
the theme “Determination to survive in spite of
struggles”. The writer teaches us the lesson that
even though life gets us down we should get back
up and fight.

12. EXERCISE 1 Take this quiz
to show what
you learnt
about themes.

13. THEME QUIZ
 True or False?
Themes should always
be written as
sentences.
 True
 False

14. THEME QUIZ
1) What is a theme?
a) A word
b) a feeling
c) a story
d) a main
idea/thought
2) What do themes
come from?
a) topics/subjects
b) movies
c) books
d) the reader’s mood

15. THEME QUIZ
3) One place where we
can we find themes in
a story is:
a) On the book cover
b) In the paragraph
about the author
c) In the character’s
words and actions
4) After looking at the
character’s actions
and words we should:
a) think of the
consequences of
these actions
b) justify their actions
c) compare what we
read to other books

16. THEME QUIZ
5) A theme is:
a) the writer’s
emotions at the time
b) the writer’s way of
getting us to see the
bigger picture
c) how we feel
towards the story
d) how the characters
feel at that time in the
story
6) The writer wants us to:
a) make connections to
the wider world/our life
experiences
b) criticize people
c) describe the story
d) tell the story in our
own words

17. THEME QUIZ
7) When writing about
themes we should:
a) retell the whole story
b) give evidence from
the story to support it
c) write only how we
feel about the topic
8) Which of these are
topics/themes?
a) Unhappy
b) Kind
c) Working
d) Courage/Standing
up for one’s rights

19. Tips to remember

20. IMPORTANT!
 Themes are to be
written in sentences.
 Always write
themes/topics using
capital letters. For
example: ‘Love’, ‘Love
Between Men and
Women’
 Always use quotation
marks when writing
themes as sentences:
“Love conquers all.”

21. EXAMINING THEMES IN THE NOVEL
What are themes in My Father Sun-Sun Johnson?

22. TOPICS FOUND IN THE NOVEL:
 Courage
 Conflict in Relationships
 Determination
 Love and Family Relationships
 Loyalty
 Survival
 Growth and Development/Maturity/Change
 Forgiveness
 The Importance of Money
 Social Status/Social Mobility

23. NOTES ON SOCIAL MOBILITY/SOCIAL STATUS
AS A TOPIC IN THE NOVEL

24. SOCIAL STATUS/SOCIAL MOBILITY
Important terms:
 Social status is a person’s standing or importance
in relation to others in society.
 Social class is a division in society based on one’s
social and economic status. This means the
amount of money you make, and how people see
you puts you in a different category from others.
 Social mobility is the change of one’s social status
to the from one category to another. One can drop
to a lower social class or move to a higher one.

25. SOCIAL STATUS/SOCIAL MOBILITY
This is seen as a topic in My Father Sun-Sun
Johnson in that we see Sun-Sun (Merton Johnson)
moving from a high social standing at the start of
the novel to a low social standing. However, he
does not stay at the bottom. He works hard to move
up again.

26.  The way persons respected him when he had
money but mocked him when he had to leave
Robin Hill, shows us that social status meant a lot
to people in Merton’s community. It was not until he
started to stand up for himself and make money
from his farming and his shop in River Bottom that
people showed him respect again.

27.  Rami’s experiences are also proof of this main idea
in the novel. He is mocked at school because he
chose to live with his father in River Bottom. People
pity him. His brother and sister even taunt him to
get him to come live with Jake. Rami feels
comfortable only with the Hilcher’s and his best
friend, Collie Rainer.

28.  Another way in which this topic is shown in the text,
is the way in which Debbie, Merton’s wife treated
him. Because she views high social status as more
important than anything else, she divorced her
husband because he had squandered all his money
and married Jake Hibbertson who was now more
successful than he was. It was not until the end of
the novel that she seemed to regret her actions.

29.  Finally, we see this theme in the way Jake
Hibbertson is treated. Though he is unkind to them,
the community people respect Jake because of his
wealth. The women all want to marry him. They
overlook the fact that he is selfish and unfair. This
proves what Merton said in Chapter 6, “Money
Talks”.

30.  We can conclude then, that the writer wants to
share the theme “Social Mobility is so important to
some, that they will ignore important human values
to have it”. The story teaches that though we must
work hard to excel, we must still be kind and
humble; however, we must not let others take
advantage of us. We learn too that money is not
more important than people.

33. EXERCISE 2
Now you tell us how
you see one theme
brought out in My
Father Sun-Sun
Johnson.
Discussion
time

34. EXERCISE 3
For this next activity, you
will have to draw the table
in your notebook or create
it in a word document. Use
it to prove all you know
about any of the themes in
My Father Sun-Sun
Johnson.
One is done for you
as an example.
When you are
finished submit it to
your teacher.

35. EXERCISE 3 – USE CHAPTERS 6 – 9 TO
COMPLETE THIS.
Topic and
theme
First example of
the theme from the
novel
TWO details from the
text to support this
example
Second
example of
the theme
TWO details from
the text to support
this example
Third
example
TWO details from the
text to support this
example
Instructions: Fill
in the blocks in
this diagram with
details of one
theme from the
novel.

36. EXAMPLE FOR EXERCISE 3
Courage: “Be brave
no matter what the
consequences are.”
Merton tried to
regain his status
through hard work.
1. He started farming
and sold his produce
2. He built a shop
He set boundaries
which prevented
people from
abusing his
kindness
1. He stopped giving
credit
2. He no longer
allowed domino
playing
He bravely rescued
his family and even
Jake from a fire.
1. He ran into the
house risking his life to
save them.
2. He forgave Debbie
and showed no grudge
towards Jake

37. NEXT WEEK’S LESSON:
How to write an essay
on themes in a novel

39. QUIZ FEEDBACK

40. Sorry! Try again!
Back to quiz

41. Great
job!
Back to quiz