Author(s): Rodica Mihalache, Scoala Gimnaziala ”Constantin Parfene”, Romania
- Age: 13 - 15
- Hours: 1 - 2
Introduction
This activity aims at familiarizing students with the pleasure of reading while guided to understand a literary fragment through different types of activities.
Learning Objectives
- Encouraging and stimulating students' interest in reading;
- Developing the attitude of students' relationship with themselves as well as with others;
- Students` acquiring tools for investigation, analysis and valorization of contents
- Developing language skills such as oral communication by presenting the outcomes;
- Stimulating students` capacity of systematization and synthesis.
Process
1. The teacher asks students to play a game called `Related words`. Students try to make up as many new words as possible using the words from the Spanish proverb ` Family is like a rope whose knots can never be untied.` 2. Reading in tandems: students read the story ”Breaking News”, by Laura Grunberg. 3. The teacher forms groups: the Sensitive, the Engineers, the Collectors and the Critic (the Teacher), each group being assigned different tasks: The Sensitive Group writes about the emotions they experienced while reading the fragment of the story; The Engineers identify the century in which the action takes place, the place where the action takes place, as well as the characters; The Collectors look up the unknown words from the text and with the help of dictionaries explain to the colleagues their meanings, provoke other groups to invent personal and original definitions for certain terms or to give other meanings to common words; The Critic does not believe in the message of the story and asks for clarifications, arguments, advice or advises the other teams whenever necessary. 4. The teacher may also ask: • What do you think will happen to the main character? • What emotions did the parents experience when they heard the news? Explain why. • Choose a suggestive title for the story. • Argue the attitude of the two groups in the text. • What advice would you give to the child's parents? • "What if ……?" Students will compare their predictions with what the author imagined as they read the passages guided by the teacher. 5. Students will have to make a list of the recommendations proposed to the parents in the story, putting a number from 1 (totally unimportant) to 10 (extremely important) next to each recommendation in Appendix 2.