In this blog task I am supposed to describe an imaginary teaching project in an English class. There are no restrictions as to time, equipment or the student’s skills.
The idea of my teaching project is to combine “classical” contents of the English classroom with the use of new media. The students are supposed to create a website about Shakespeare. This website has to contain information about the historical background (Early Modern Period) as well as presentations about Shakespeare and his plays. The project is designed for students of the Oberstufe, i.e. 12th or 13th grade.
In a first step the students are divided into groups. The idea is that every group creates a PowerPoint presentation about its topic. One group works on the time Shakespeare lived in, another group prepares a presentation about his life. Three other groups work on Shakespeare’s plays, each group presents one play. Perhaps Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet as well as Hamlet or Othello seem to be the most appropriate plays, since they are the most relevant ones for school. Preparing those presentations already demands lots of efforts and discipline.
In a second step the groups are asked to prepare the website. One group is responsible for the design of the website itself, this group uploads the previously prepared presentations and designs an appealing website as well as a forum where every student is supposed to contribute his thoughts about the project. The other groups are asked to work on Shakespeare’s plays again, which means that they have to try to create little videos. In groups they might act out certain scences and film them or they might also search the internet in order to find different theatre adaptations. All the videos produced or found in the web should be posted on the homepage.
In a last step, every group presents its results in front of the whole class which means that they present their PowerPoint presentations and videos as well as the website itself. The website finally includes presentations about Shakespeare and his time, his major plays, videos of the favourite scenes as well as a forum. Depending on the time a teacher wants to spend on the project, the idea might even be enlarged.
