Crime Scene In Your Classroom

I am finishing up my Lord of the Flies unit and just created a super exciting lesson with my fellow 9th-grade teacher.  I figured I would share the wealth and pass on the lesson here to anyone else teaching this classic novel.

The skills we wanted to focus on were examining the text closely and using textual evidence to support your argument.  But we did not want to do another writing assignment...

So, we decided to files some charges in the murders of Simon and Piggy!

Students were asked to close read the definitions the four murder charges.  Then, they needed to define unknown vocabulary.

Finally, students are asked to make a decision on which charges to make for the different deaths and the different characters who partake in the deaths.  This is where they must support answers with textual evidence.

Of course, we couldn't just do a worksheet... We had to create a crime scene! 

I created body outlines on the floor in masking tape and wrangled the art teacher into creating the Law and Order logo on my board.  I added some palms cut out from cardstock and printed other clues like the conch shell and Pigg's glasses.  I also printed out detective badges and handed them to each student as they walked into the room to help get them amped to learn. 

DISCLAIMER: the masking tape outlines took soooooooo long.  In the middle of making them I questioned why I was spending so much time on a display for a lesson that would be two days long at most.  But, the kids were really excited about the lesson and drawn in right away.  So I decided it was worth it.  I will be trying to look for easier ways to make these outlines in the future....


If you want to try out my lesson I have it for FREE right now on my TPT store.  Just download it here!  No need to follow or leave feedback.  I just want to help other teachers out who might be interested!

If you are looking for other activities, check out  my LOTF bundle here

And if you want to see my crime scene, check out the video below.  I also included photos of my set up.  And yes, that is the Law and Order theme song you hear :) 


I would love to know how this lesson works out for you!

p.s ignore my messy classroom, but that's real life!

 

 

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Anyone Here A Doctor?

I recently started teaching the novel Speak with my honors students.  We are focusing a lot this year on finding textual evidence to support ideas and claims.  But honestly, it can get a little tedious to simply ask my students to look up quote after quote after quote.   So, I decided to get a little creative with finding textual evidence and address a serious issue brought up by the novel at the same time! 

The main character in the novel, Melinda, is suffering from depression.  The author makes the conscious choice to characterize her with different signs and symptoms of depression.  I decided to make my students "doctors" for the day and have them prove to me that she could indeed be diagnosed with depression.  

I found a website that listed the signs and symptoms, listed them and made a sheet for my students to write their "observations" of Melinda.   They had to find a quote to correspond with all the symptoms.   They did a great job!  We found textual evidence of all of the signs and symptoms of depression. 

This activity lead us into a discussion about teen depression where we looked at facts and stats about depression in teens.  We talked about who to speak with if you think you need help, and what kinds of things you can do to treat depression.  Find the worksheet here and a link to a site with information about teen depression below.  

I hope this lesson is helpful and enjoyable! 

http://www.helpguide.org/mental/depression_teen.htm

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Take Me To The Movies!

I am a big advocate of using as many visuals as possible to help my students understand ideas and stories in as many ways as they can.  Because of this, I like to show films that have the same themes as the novels we are reading at the end of each unit.  I often have my students compare themes or messages between the novel and the film.  
For To Kill A Mockingbird I like to show The Help and have students discuss if America made any progress in the 30 years between the settings of both stories.  ( the answer is usually  a resounding no) 

For the Great Gatsby, when I was student teaching, I showed GATTACA.  This was a great way to get students to question if Gatsby was really after Daisy, was it a love story, or was he after something more elusive. 

For The Freedom Writers Diary, I have shown the film version, but have also shown Stand and Deliver, as it covers the same type of students and prejudice seen in the novel.  I think it's eye-opening for my students to see the mistreatment of kids their age. 

This year I'm teaching Speak for the first time and can't decide what film I'd like to show with this novel. At first, I was thinking Mean Girls, to add to the discussion of fitting in and cliques.  Also, my students will be reading excerpts from Queen Bees and Wannabes, the novel Mean Girls is based on.  But I was flipping through channels today and came across The Breakfast Club.  I know for a fact most of my students have not seen this movie and it also deals with the same themes as Speak: crazy teachers, group dynamics, teen issues and so on.   I'm so torn!  I can't decide what to do, but I think I'm going to make assignments to go with both movies and see what has the most teaching potential.  If you have any movie suggestions let me know in the comment section! 

Additional movie novel pairings: 

Night - Hotel Rwanda
Night- Schindler's List
The Sun Also Rises- Midnight in Paris 
To Kill A Mockingbird- A Time To Kill - language warning! 
To Kill A Mockingbird- The Secret Life of Bees
The Crucible- X-men 
Speak - Easy A
Speak- The Pregnancy Project 
The Scarlet Letter- Easy A 
Freedom Writers Diary- Sister Act  (Two..I think....) 
Montana 1948- A River Runs Through It

I'll add more as I think of them! Suggestions welcome! 

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Novel Display!

I'm super proud of my new To Kill A Mockingbird board!  I accredit my sorority for making me talented at decorating walls... :) 

I wanted to get students excited to read this novel by linking it to other novels they might have enjoyed.  AND I gave them a cheat sheet right on the wall for themes for this books.  Plus it just looks so darn cute!

The books I listed were: Hunger Games series, The Kite Runner, Monster, The Glass Castle, Night, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian, There Are No Children Here, The Book Thief, The Outsiders, A Time To Kill, The Help, My Forbidden Face, The Secret Life of Bees, The Giver, and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. 

My plan is to try making a display like this for all of the novels we are reading this year.  I want to be sure to include contemporary books that the students are familiar with in order to activate prior knowledge.  Share your favorite novel displays below! I am always looking for new ideas and new crafts. 

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