Launch a discussion of the creative process with a short video that features the daily ritual of Slobodan Dan Paich, a San Francisco artist. Slobodan models his approach to tea painting and shares his reflections on the...

How do film adaptations differ from their literary counterparts? Scholars watch and analyze the 2011 Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) production of Shakespeare's Macbeth. Pupils complete a Quick Write analyzing how the RSC production...

When will we ever use this? A Pixar movie maker explains to students how math is used in the creation of animated films. The movie maker discusses the importance of coordinate planes, transformations and translations, and...

Scholars meet in a drama circle to discuss what they remember from reading A Midsummer Night's Dream Act III, Scene 1 in the last activity. They then take turns reading the scene aloud, stopping to answer questions as they read. Learners...

Transform your learners into master geometers with an activity that asks them to first complete an assessment task drawing the result after transformation of a given shape in the coordinate plane. They then use cards to...

"Now is the summer of our happiness/Made winter by this sudden, fierce attack!" Luke Skywalker meets Hamlet in a 10-lesson unit based on Ian Doescher's William Shakespeare's Star Wars: Verily, a New Hope. Using Star Wars® as source...

How does an author's choice of artistic medium influence an audience? What about how an author chooses to transform original source material? These are the questions class members grapple with as they compare scenes from episode IV...

Imagine the determination it would take to build a helicopter out of scrap. Now imagine doing it while hindered by the effects of polio. Everything is Incredible, a short film by Tyler Bastian, introduces Agustin who has been...

Writing becomes dynamic in a presentation. Presenters transform a piece of writing they have already composed about the Little Rock Nine into a presentation. The focus is transferring ideas from their writing into short prompts on cards...

Film imitates life; that's what they say. Using performance theory to tie the lesson together, learners attempt to understand memory and daily rituals as seen in art, film, and life. They read two chapters from the book, watch the...

Barrio de Paz is the story of Nelsa Libertad Curbelo, a nun, who works with the gang youth of Guayaquil, Ecuador. The 17-minute documentary focuses on her explanations for the rise of gangs and for how gang culture reflects...

Malcolm X was a complicated man that few in white America understood. After sharing what they know or think they know about this civil rights leader, about nationalism and Black Nationalism, class members view a two-part documentary...

Here's something unusual and thoughtful: have your scholars do some pensive reflection themselves before tackling how such meditative techniques are used in prison rehabilitation programs. They watch the...

To make the point that there are many forms of language, each with its own purpose, class members select 10 lines from Doescher's play, translate these lines first into contemporary English and then into "SMS/Tweet." 

Students engage in the study of "The American" by Henry James. They read the novel and watch the film to create the context for a variety of activities. Students conduct research about the novel and the author using different resources.

Eleventh graders focus on the role of transportation. In this transportation lesson, 11th graders look at the lives of Americans at the turn of the centuries. They compare and contrast 2000 to 1900. 

Track the transformation of Malcolm Little into Malcolm X and then into El Jajj Malik El-Shabazz with the second part of Make it Plain, a documentary on the famous civil rights activist. Viewers consider not only how events shaped and...

Students research the life of an artist to make a comprehensive analysis of works and how they were formed through personal beliefs of the artist. The influence upon culture is the focus of the investigation to be conducted.

Propaganda is an important topic that most high school social studies teachers address. Here, young scholars compare and contrast methods of public persuasion during WWII with those used in the contemporary War on Terror. Research,...

Students examine artwork by Keith Haring, and listen to music popular in the 1980s that influenced him. They develop storyboards, and film music videos for their favorite song.

How do modern adaptations of Shakespearean plays relate to their original source material? Middle and high schoolers focus on Shakespeare's play Othello and its screen adaptation "O" to explore how modern film adaptations of Shakespeare...

Students write reviews of films they have seen over the Christmas holidays. They study what the ingredients of a film review are, and examine the difference between fact and opinion.

After reading Elie Wiesel's Night, watching the movie Life is Beautiful, and researching World War II, class members write a comparison essay on the book and film. This includes a prior knowledge activity, discussion in whole and small...

Students view a video about the experience of boys from West Africa in the American school system. They discover how one's environment can affect them in the classroom. They write about the experience from different points of view.