Students use Lord of the Flies to explore communication styles and techniques by writing text messages from one of the novel's characters to an imagined audience off the island.
Texting a Response to Lord of the Flies
A "Brief, Urgent Message": Theme in Slaughterhouse-Five
As a culminating activity for Slaughterhouse-Five, students make a compilation album (a CD with 6-8 tracks) that reflects their analysis, understanding, and reaction to the ideas in the novel Slaughterhouse-Five.
The Feature Story—Fifteen Minutes (and 500 Words) of Fame!
Students learn how to differentiate between a news story and a feature story by writing a profile of a classmate.
Judging a Book by its Cover: The Art and Imagery of The Great Gatsby
Students explore The Great Gatsby's allusion to art and its use of visual imagery and conclude their study by designing their own cover for the novel.
Decoding the Dystopian Characteristics of Macintosh's "1984" Commercial
This lesson uses the "1984" Macintosh Commercial to introduce students to dystopian characteristics. Students analyze techniques used in the commercial and identify the comments that it makes about contemporary society.
Decoding The Matrix Exploring Dystopian Characteristics through Film
This lesson uses clips from The Matrix and other dystopian movies to introduce students to the characteristics found in dystopian works, such as Brave New World, Fahrenheit 451, and 1984.
Outside In: Finding A Character's Heart Through Art
This activity, inspired by the paintings of Edward Hopper and the stories of Raymond Carver, challenges students to get inside contemporary life and characters through the creation of monologues.
The Comic Book Show and Tell
Students craft comic scripts using clear, descriptive, and detailed writing that shows (illustrates) and tells (directs). After peers create an artistic interpretation of the script, students revise their original scripts.
Plot Structure: A Literary Elements Mini-Lesson
Students learn that the plot structure described by Freytag's Pyramid is actually quite familiar as they diagram the plots of a familiar story, a television show, and a narrative poem.
Audio Broadcasts and Podcasts: Oral Storytelling and Dramatization
After exploring Orson Welles' 1938 broadcast of H. G. Wells' War of the Worlds, students create their own audio dramatization of a text they have read.
On a Musical Note: Exploring Reading Strategies by Creating a Soundtrack
Students create a soundtrack for a novel that they have read, as they engage in such traditional reading strategies as predicting, visualizing, and questioning.
You Know the Movie is Coming—Now What?
In this lesson, students read a literary text with the eye of a director, selecting scenes from the text and putting a cinematic spin on them.
Propaganda Techniques in Literature and Online Political Ads
Students analyze propaganda techniques used in pieces of literature and political advertisements. They then look for propaganda in other media, such as print ads and commercials.
Paying Attention to Technology: Exploring a Fictional Technology
Students complete a short survey to establish their beliefs about technology. They compare their opinions to the ideas in a novel that depicts technology (such as 1984 or Fahrenheit 451).
Blending the Past with Today's Technology: Using Prezi to Prepare for Historical Fiction
To prepare for literature circles featuring historical novels, students research the decades of the 1930s to the 1990s and share their information using Prezi, a web application for creating multimedia presentations.
Vote for Me! Making Presidential Commercials Using Avatars
After researching political platforms of past presidents through primary sources and other resources, students create commercials for these presidents using Voki, an online web tool that produces speaking avatars.
Book Report Alternative: Getting Acquainted with Farcebook
In this alternative to the traditional book report, students report on their novel choices using Facebook-like pages.
Book Report Alternative: Glog That Book!
In this alternative book report, students identify the elements of fiction in books they have read by creating glogs, interactive multimedia posters, and then share their glogs.
Storyboarding the Transformation from Dr. Jekyll into Mr. Hyde
Students imagine and storyboard their own vision of the transformation of Dr. Jekyll into Mr. Hyde and then evaluate movie portrayals.
Designing Elements of Story in Little Blue and Little Yellow
In this series of four lessons, students will explore key elements of design in Little Blue and
Little Yellow to learn about setting, character relationships, and plot.