Audio broadcasts and podcasts: Oral storytelling and dramatization
http://www.readwritethink.org/lessons/lesson_view.asp?id=901
A lesson plan for Grade 12 English IV
About this resource
- Appropriate grades
- 12
- Subjects
- English language arts (listening comprehension, literature), thinking skills (critical literacy), diverse learners (multiple intelligences), education technology (digital video and multimedia)
- Provider
- IRA/NCTE
Legal
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After exploring the historical information surrounding Welles’ famous broadcast, War of the Worlds, students create criteria for effective audio dramatizations and then compose their own production of a group-selected scene from a recent reading. After engaging students in a conversation about the qualities that make stories more vivid, students create a working checklist of the criteria for a good story based on their responses. Then, students either work individually or in small groups to explore the web resources about the Mercury Theatre production of A.G. Wells' broadcast from October 30, 1938 and complete a travelogue guide. Once students have read the script, they compare the readings with the list they composed for interesting characteristics of a story. As students listen to the audio broadcast, they follow along in the script, noting any features of the recording that surprises or interests them. After they have heard the recording, students compare the characteristics of the story with the class checklist. Then, using excerpts from short stories or novels they have read, students plan how they will create a podcast of the piece of literature. The teacher guides students through pre-production, production, and post-production steps of the project. Halfway through the project, students and teacher evaluate their progress using a rubric to guide the revisions they make. Finally, students record their dramatizations using free sound recording programs suggested by the lesson. When students have completed their recording and editing of the literary piece, they share their work with the class. Readwritethink provides helpful rubrics, project guidelines, and links to online interactive tools. This lesson also suggests several extension activities and provides links to helpful web resources.
North Carolina Curriculum Alignment
English Language Arts (2004)
Grade 12 — English IV
- Goal 1: The learner will express reflections and reactions to print and non-print text as well as to personal experience.
- Objective 1.02: Respond to texts so that the audience will:
- empathize with the voice of the text.
- make connections between the learner's life and the text.
- reflect on how cultural or historical perspectives may have influenced these responses.
- examine the learner's own response in light of peers' responses.
-recognize features of the author's use of language and how the learner relates these features to his/her own writing.
- Objective 1.02: Respond to texts so that the audience will:
- Goal 2: The learner will inform an audience by exploring general principles at work in life and literature.
- Objective 2.02: Analyze general principles at work in life and literature by:
- discovering and defining principles at work in personal experience and in literature.
-predicting what is likely to happen in the future on the basis of those principles. - Objective 2.03: Compose texts (in print and non-print media) that help the audience understand a principle or theory by:
- researching experience for relevant principles that relate to themes in literature and life.
- presenting a thesis, supporting it, and considering alternative perspectives on the topic.
-adjusting the diction, tone, language, and method of presentation to the audience.
- Objective 2.02: Analyze general principles at work in life and literature by:
- Goal 4: The learner will analyze and critique texts from various perspectives and approaches.
- Objective 4.02: Develop critiques that give an audience:
- an appreciation of how themes relate among texts.
-an understanding of how authors' assumptions, cultural backgrounds, and social values affect texts.
-an understanding of how more than one critical approach affects interpretation.
- Objective 4.02: Develop critiques that give an audience:
- Goal 5: The learner will deepen understanding of British literature through exploration and extended engagement.
- Objective 5.01: Explore British literature by:
- recognizing common themes that run through works, using evidence from the texts to substantiate ideas.
- relating the cultural and historical contexts to the literature and identifying perceived ambiguities, prejudices, and complexities.
- making associations between historical and current viewpoints.
-understanding how literary movements influence writers. - Objective 5.02: Extend engagement with selected works of British literature by:
- observing how the imaginative experience of literature broadens and enriches real life.
- relating style, meaning, and genre (including fiction, non-fiction, drama, and poetry).
- applying literary, grammatical, and rhetorical terms of literature.
- demonstrating in various print and non-print media the significance of works.
-discerning the effect of interpreting literature from various critical perspectives.
- Objective 5.01: Explore British literature by:
