This website contains vast resources for almost all subjects. Here is a link for Harry Potter and I've extrapolated the ideas that I feel can be implemented for most texts.
Three ideas I picked out
1. Creating a poster.
Movie adaptations of books are all the rage now and I think that by getting students to create a (movie) poster of the book they're reading, it would allow them to pick out the main characters for the foreground and think about a seminal event in the book for the background. By having them illustrate the characters, it forces them to really analyse the characters and think about their personalities.
2. Making a board game.
The board game would consist of two types of questions: recall and inference questions. By getting students to construct recall questions, they can challenge one another and it helps them to memorise pertinent events and characters. Inference questions, on the other hand, can be mini-essay style questions that need more depth for answers.
3. Writing a script.
Students can be divided into groups and each group come up with a script for different scenes in the book (complete with stage directions). They can then perform in class with props and costumes.
Review
1. Instead of having students write out book reviews and summaries which are predictable and boring, this mode engages students and allows more artistic students to express themselves in another avenue. This would also allow them to reflect on movie adaptations they've seen and compare it with the books to talk about scene modifications. It seems to me that it would be a non-threatening way to ease them into critical thinking. However, creating a poster would be time-consuming and likely to end up as homework. Some students would also resent having to do an art piece.
2. Besides being time-consuming, teachers can't control the types of content questions that students will ask. Also, when they're playing the game, it might result in a lot of confusion with the teacher unable to monitor all the answers effectively, especially for inferential questions. That said, I do think it will engage more students than doing the poster does because the oral medium is more accessible.
3. Students will first have to be taught the conventions of scripts, which might be time-consuming if they haven't done drama yet. But I think it could be a good bridge between novels and dramas. A task like this could be used for formative assessment. I think it's a fun way to assess student knowledge of the content. This is something that the whole class can then discuss, which would also stimulate critical appreciation of a text.
Word count: 239
My secondary school class did, in fact, have to design a board game for an English class on fairytale parodies, but it was a project that lasted a couple of weeks at least, which might be less feasible when dealing with an examinable text.
ReplyDeleteI do, however, very much like the idea of script-writing, because it can be related to the drama genre. So if it comes after they've analysed a play, they should be familiar with the basics of stage directions at least, and having to make those directorial decisions themselves (e.g. props, lighting, movement of characters) might make them more aware of the importance of these decisions in reading plays.
Ahhh Harry Potter! I like the idea of the board game! I think coming up with their own questions is a good way of letting them revise the the novel. This generation doesn't seem to be familiar with Harry Potter though (what a tragedy!), so perhaps we could use something like The Hunger Games instead. Or any other novel, actually.
ReplyDeleteThe website is pretty interesting for interdisciplinary ideas as well!
ReplyDelete