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Pitch-er Perfect
Students investigate music and what causes the pitch of a sound. In this sound properties lesson, students listen to a story about animals and the instinctual pitch they have in their voice and how musicians have that as well. Students...
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Life Sentence
Students investigate a vocabulary word by holding a fake auction. In this word visualization lesson, students are assigned a vocabulary word through a class auction and must illustrate its meaning and find its definition. Students...
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Living History- An Intergenerational Philanthropy
Students gather information from a senior friend to write a biography. In this living history books lesson, students organize information to complete a book about their senior friend. Detailed teacher instructions for completing the book...
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Anon Methought the Umbrellas Began to Move
Students reenact a scene from Macbeth using umbrellas as props.
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Emulating Shakespeare: To Snooze or Not To Snooze
High schoolers reproduce the pattern of one of Shakespeare's soliloquies, but use their own ideas and words to replace the character's. They replace each word with a word of their own that serves the same purpose.They discuss the speaker...
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M.C. Bard: Hip Hop and Shakespeare
Middle schoolers compare lyrics from hip hop songs with monologues from Shakespeare's plays, and perform both for the class.
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Cutting Antony's speeches: "I am meek and gentle with these butchers"
Tenth graders identify Mark Anthony's scheming brilliance in his three major speeches in 3.1. They isolate the main idea by cutting the speech in half and then they perform the speech chorally. Each student also identifies three phrases...
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A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words
Students design and create photo albums that tell the story of the play, Twelfth Night, using pictures they take of themselves recreating various scenes of the play.
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You Can't Go Home Again (or, If It's Not One Thing, It's Your Mother)
Students read a scene from Hamlet, without stage directions. They recreate the scene using their own stage directions as they see fit for the scene.
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THE GOOD AND THE BADDE: ARE STEREOTYPES A PERFECT FIT?
Students examine stereotypes of women from The Good and the Badde in juxtaposition with the female characters in The Taming of the Shrew. Through this exercise, students locate evidence from the text of the play to support or refute...
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WHY IS LEONTES JEALOUS? FINDING A CAUSE IN THE WINTER'S TALE
Learners examine several possible ways of understanding Leontes' jealousy through close reading, a performance activity, and the use of a primary source document. They, in groups, perform a scene.
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Romans in Britain, or Classical Colonialism
Students identify the extent of the Roman Empire on a map of Europe and North Africa. They discuss the reasons behind Roman expansion and occupation. They read Cymbeline and write about the attitudes of 3 characters. Groups stage the scene.
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AND WE ALL SIT DOWN: STATUS IN KING LEAR
High schoolers participate in two simple status games to allow students to explore the relationships between Lear, his three daughters, and his court.
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"Very tragical mirth:" Romeo and Pyramus, Juliet and Thisbe
Students analyze and compare the poetic tools Shakespeare uses in the death scenes of Romeo and Juliet to those of Pyramus and Thisbe in Midsummer Night's Dream.
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Hero vs. Claudio: A Case of Slander
High schoolers research marriage customs of the Renaissance, discuss and debate the issues raised by Claudio repudiating Hero at the altar in the Shakespearean play Much Ado About Nothing, and then stage a mock trial accusing Claudio of...
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Dogberry: The Most Vigilant Lawman Ever
Students analyze the character and find the malapropisms of Dogberry in Much Ado About Nothing
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"I am not what I am"
Learners make connections between their own epithets and those used in Othello.
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Mixing it up with Romeo and Juliet
Students create a soundtrack for Romeo and Juliet choosing one song to represent each scene. They write a paragraph explaining their song choices.
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Crafting a Character - The Making of Shylock
Students, in groups, analyze the characterization of Shakespeare's Shylock from "Merchant of Venice". They examine text, view movies and interpretative drawings and conduct historical research.
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Drama: Julius Caesar Storyboard
Students create storyboards based on Julius Caesar using the device of framing to convey character information. After examining framing techniques in photographs from the Folger Theater, they discuss how they influence character...
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Jewish Heroes Congress
Students explore Jewish heroes throughout history. In this character development and history lesson, students work in groups to research a Jewish hero. A life-size model of the hero is constructed. Students participate in a Jewish Heroes...
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Deception in Twelfth Night
Students examine deception in fiction. In this Shakespearean lesson, students discover mistaken identity and misrepresentation in the play Twelfth Night. Students complete worksheets based on the play.
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Cracking Cassius
Students examine the argument between Cassius and Brutus to define the importance of friendship and study a Shakespearean play. In this Julius Caesar analysis lesson, students list qualities of a best friend and read scenes from the...
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Hark! The Sounds of Murder
Students analyze the Macbeth murder scene through textual analysis and construct the murder scene of Duncan through the use of sound only. In this Macbeth lesson, students work in groups to analyze the murder scene of Duncan from...