So I designed an entire unit around theater. One of the dangerous parts of topical units is we teach a bunch of specialized vocabulary (like greaves?!) that never gets used again. So when I do this, I try to pick vocabulary to focus on that I think is going to be useful universally. When we did magic, we acquired 'sermone secreto' and "pallent superi," each of which phrases was present in the reading, but has been otherwise useful for communicating. In medicine, we learned 'iuvamen vitae' and 'ex consuetudine.' While it's true that we also talked about livers and some random measurements, those have not been the major vocabulary focuses - the culture-specific words have become icing words, more or less.
With those things in mind, I have structured the unit around discussing theater with the end goals of:
a. students being able to discuss culture
b. students having primarily learned useful and higher-frequency vocab with less of a focus on specialized vocab
c. students being able to discuss their own interest and their thoughts on theater and films
d. students understanding some Roman history around theaters
Here's how we're doing so far:
Day 1: we went through the first slide of this PowerPoint.
My target structures were actor, theatrum, gravis.
I told them, and then circled, each of the facts on the slide under mimus. They closed their eyes, and I asked them questions, and they answered. Then, I asked the class to suggest a story that needed to be narrated, and I 'hired' four actors from the class. I stood behind three of them and sotto voce narrated the story (in every class, the class suggested a sory we'd told together, something really well known to them). The 'chorus' sang it together, and the actor 'danced.' Everyone applauded them.
I asked the students to turn to each other, and to say two facts about mimus, and then they shared them back with me.
Then we talked about how comedies were funny, and I asked them for examples of funny movies. I told them that the Greeks wrote many comedies, and that in Rome, Plautus and Terence were notissimi because they wrote comedies.
At the end of the class period, I asked them to each tell me one fact about plays, theaters, etc.
Day 2: My target structures were fabulam edat, dives, pauper, voce canit, instrumentis canit, and the parts of the theater.
I asked the class several true false questions about what we'd discussed the previous day. I called on a few pairs to tell me some facts as a no-pressure refresher, and we circled what they said. I asked specific questions using the target structures from the day before.
We discussed what they saw in each of the parts, what happened there, who sat where, etc. We also discussed the price of theater (nothing). Some good PQA:
who likes to sit where in the theater?
who sings? who plays an instrument? what instrument? do you sing in the shower? Badly, or well?
Some modern culture relation questions - do senators put on plays now? who pays to go to the theater? how do senators get fautores today?
Day 3: We reviewed from the day before. I asked the class who played guitar, who played triangle, and who (in one class, mirabile!) played the didgeridoo! We discussed people who were divites and described pauperes. I asked them some quick review questions about quis fabulam edit, etc.
We did a short reading on Plautus and Terence.
Day 4: We did a micrologue based on the reading on Plautus and Terence. This is a great video of Nancy Llewellyn doing a micrologue with her students.
Day 5: we looked at the last slide in the PowerPoint, which talks about different characters' costume colors, what they wore, etc. We dressed up a student in a toga. We looked at who in the class was wearing what color, and what role they would have played based on what they were wearing.
Day 6: Target structures: satelles, heros, antiheros, iocosus, inimicus, servandus.
I explained major roles in movies: the hero, the antihero, the sidekick, comic relief, villain, damsel in distress, love interest. We gave a number of examples for these, which I wrote on the board. I named some characters and we categorized them.
They divided into groups and each group chose a film. They had to answer three questions:
1. what roles are in that film?
2. what are the names of the characters who play those parts?
3. what is the definition of that part? (what's a hero? what's a sidekick? etc.)
They had ten minutes. Then we came back and together made a list of things that define each of the roles. We gave examples of things that those characters did in films that meant they held those roles. I liked the phrases stare cum and [eum] toto caelo errare censere, so when we do activities like this, I also like to take votes - who agrees with so and so, who thinks they're completely wrong. It allows for a lot of repetition without feeling repetitious.
Day 7: we held debates. I passed out lists of character traits that they'd created the day before, and we went back over them. They got back in their groups from the previous day. An 'on-the-fence' character was assigned to each of two groups - Darth Vader, for example. Is the villain or the antihero? Group A argued villain, Group B argued antihero. They had ten minutes to prep their arguments and write down any necessary notes, and then the groups of four came to the front of the room.
Debaters could tag in and out with their team members, but only one person on each team could talk at a time. They could have notes with them. Listeners had to write down words they didn't understand, and the answer they got from me when they asked what it meant. The debates lasted six minutes each, and there were three of them total.
At the end of each debate, up to four listeners could ask a question of a specific team, and the team could answer.
Most of what they said was fairly basic: "Darth Pater homines necavit."
"Darth Pater homines necat, sed Lucam et Leiam servavit."
On each team, there were stronger and weaker speakers, so the teams balanced each other well. We'd spent, by that point, a few days scaffolding up to discussing free-form what characters do that defines that role, and they had their notes to support them, so it was successful. They each talked, but only to the extent that they were comfortable. They communicated with team members during the debate to keep it low-pressure and low-stress. This was a high-output activity, but on the whole, they really enjoyed it.
Day 8: We divided into eight groups, and they were each given a description of one stock character. The groups read their paragraphs out loud with each other, stopping after each sentence to check comprehension.
Once each group had understood their paragraph, they got large sheets of colored butcher paper, drew a circle in the middle, and wrote their character in the circle. they wrote a quick bullet-point summary of their character.
Then they chose the most important sentences about their character from the paragraph, and each group 'presented' (using the information from the paragraph) their character. The listening groups created circles for each of the characters they heard about, putting the name and a description in the circle. After each presentation, they drew lines to any other character that person had a relationship with. On the connection line, they explained why.
For example, the miles gloriosus might be connected to the virgo, the leno, the adolescens. On the line between the miles and the virgo, the kids might have written miles virginem emit. eam vult sed non amat.
Day 9: We did a Running Dictation about the parts of theaters, who went to the theater, and stock characters.
Day 10: Each student got a packet with all eight stock characters in it, and they read the packet for ten minutes. While they read, they marked:
1. things they didn't understand
2. things they thought were funny
3. things they found odd/alarming
4. things they related to
We used the Kagan structure stand up hands up pair up to find partners, and then I gave them a sentence frame:
___________ in fabula theatrica Romana sicut __________ in pellicula moderna quod _______________.
Each pair shared their thoughts on three characters.
The students did a timed write after this:
How is Roman theater like American movies? How is Roman theater different from American movies? Describe both of them.
I have an assessment developing, but I'm not 100 percent there yet.
Day 5: we looked at the last slide in the PowerPoint, which talks about different characters' costume colors, what they wore, etc. We dressed up a student in a toga. We looked at who in the class was wearing what color, and what role they would have played based on what they were wearing.
Day 6: Target structures: satelles, heros, antiheros, iocosus, inimicus, servandus.
I explained major roles in movies: the hero, the antihero, the sidekick, comic relief, villain, damsel in distress, love interest. We gave a number of examples for these, which I wrote on the board. I named some characters and we categorized them.
They divided into groups and each group chose a film. They had to answer three questions:
1. what roles are in that film?
2. what are the names of the characters who play those parts?
3. what is the definition of that part? (what's a hero? what's a sidekick? etc.)
They had ten minutes. Then we came back and together made a list of things that define each of the roles. We gave examples of things that those characters did in films that meant they held those roles. I liked the phrases stare cum and [eum] toto caelo errare censere, so when we do activities like this, I also like to take votes - who agrees with so and so, who thinks they're completely wrong. It allows for a lot of repetition without feeling repetitious.
Day 7: we held debates. I passed out lists of character traits that they'd created the day before, and we went back over them. They got back in their groups from the previous day. An 'on-the-fence' character was assigned to each of two groups - Darth Vader, for example. Is the villain or the antihero? Group A argued villain, Group B argued antihero. They had ten minutes to prep their arguments and write down any necessary notes, and then the groups of four came to the front of the room.
Debaters could tag in and out with their team members, but only one person on each team could talk at a time. They could have notes with them. Listeners had to write down words they didn't understand, and the answer they got from me when they asked what it meant. The debates lasted six minutes each, and there were three of them total.
At the end of each debate, up to four listeners could ask a question of a specific team, and the team could answer.
Most of what they said was fairly basic: "Darth Pater homines necavit."
"Darth Pater homines necat, sed Lucam et Leiam servavit."
On each team, there were stronger and weaker speakers, so the teams balanced each other well. We'd spent, by that point, a few days scaffolding up to discussing free-form what characters do that defines that role, and they had their notes to support them, so it was successful. They each talked, but only to the extent that they were comfortable. They communicated with team members during the debate to keep it low-pressure and low-stress. This was a high-output activity, but on the whole, they really enjoyed it.
Day 8: We divided into eight groups, and they were each given a description of one stock character. The groups read their paragraphs out loud with each other, stopping after each sentence to check comprehension.
Once each group had understood their paragraph, they got large sheets of colored butcher paper, drew a circle in the middle, and wrote their character in the circle. they wrote a quick bullet-point summary of their character.
Then they chose the most important sentences about their character from the paragraph, and each group 'presented' (using the information from the paragraph) their character. The listening groups created circles for each of the characters they heard about, putting the name and a description in the circle. After each presentation, they drew lines to any other character that person had a relationship with. On the connection line, they explained why.
For example, the miles gloriosus might be connected to the virgo, the leno, the adolescens. On the line between the miles and the virgo, the kids might have written miles virginem emit. eam vult sed non amat.
Day 9: We did a Running Dictation about the parts of theaters, who went to the theater, and stock characters.
Day 10: Each student got a packet with all eight stock characters in it, and they read the packet for ten minutes. While they read, they marked:
1. things they didn't understand
2. things they thought were funny
3. things they found odd/alarming
4. things they related to
We used the Kagan structure stand up hands up pair up to find partners, and then I gave them a sentence frame:
___________ in fabula theatrica Romana sicut __________ in pellicula moderna quod _______________.
Each pair shared their thoughts on three characters.
The students did a timed write after this:
How is Roman theater like American movies? How is Roman theater different from American movies? Describe both of them.
I have an assessment developing, but I'm not 100 percent there yet.
What an awesome unit! Gratias! What level did you create this for? --Luna
ReplyDeleteThis was for twos! It turned out I didn't actually end the unit there - we're ending it this week. But we did a quick review by doing this QR code scavenger hunt that I posted about today.
DeleteIf you end up doing it, I highly recommend using stronger tape than I did. ;)