I can’t help but believe today’s students are receiving a far
better education then I did. I never read anything with substance in high
school, except for Romeo and Juliet and it is still one of my favorite plays.
In fact, I have on DVD, the 1966 version and I love every spoken word. I have
personally never read the Crucible,
but I plan to. I am impressed with Sam Fisher using a reality show that is well
known to teens to kick up some interest in the themes presented in the play. I
am happy to read ideas like this because my thinking is not always so creative,
yet I am willing to try a strategy that would engage students (when I get some
of my own). I believe most
instructors look at the theme of the Salem witch trials rather then the angst
in which the main character is experiencing. Hobbs’s notes, “Like The Crucible, it [sic 16 and Pregnant] featured a teen girl
getting a lot of negative attention from family and friends for her behavior.”
This certainly opens the door to facilitate an interesting discussion. My
question is how do you limit the discussion so it doesn’t eat up too much instruction
time?
Lynn
Lynn, this was my question, too. I felt that the conversation might turn to the TV show rather than the text, which is supposed to be the main focal point of the conversation.
ReplyDeleteI suppose you could keep it focused on the conversation/not eat up instruction time by doing a timed popcorn discussion. You could set an amount of time, say...ten minutes, then pose a question. The students can discuss the topic and popcorn around (no raising hands) for the allotted period of time. After that, time's up! On to another part of the lesson. If the students stray away from the conversation too much, you could stop the conversation and pose a new question. You would just have to have a list of questions that you would like to discuss with your class!