SHAKESPEARE LESSON PLAN 1
Objectives: Students will learn about the life and work of William Shakespeare, basic details about Elizabethan theatre, and Shakespeare's contribution to English language as a whole.
Students will be able to identify vocabulary in context and extract meaning from an excerpt of one of Shakespeare's plays.
Students will be able to define an oxymoron and identify oxymorons within a selection of Shakespearean texts.
TIME / ACTIVITY / PURPOSE / NOTES5 mins / Introduction to William Shakespeare. When I say the name William Shakespeare what comes to mind? Powerpoint presentation on the life and work of William Shakespeare. I will provide more information about Elizabethan Theatre as we come to the slides on the King's Men and the Globe Theatre. Why do you think that Shakespeare is so famous and his works are still so popular today? / Raising schema and providing useful background information about Shakespeare, and the type of theatre/audience that these plays were written for.
5 mins / Who knows anything about Romeo and Juliet? Brief discussion of the plot, the genre of tragedy. The famous balcony scene, Juliet's balcony in Verona. Introduce the idea of a prologue, its function in Shakespearean plays in particular. / Again to raise schema and elicit/introduce information that will be useful to them in helping them to understand the written text that follows – the prologue / Relate the conflict between the Montagues and Capulets to similar conflicts between different people groups today.
20mins / Work through the prologue to Romeo and Juliet together, line by line, helping students to identify the meaning of unknown vocabulary words by drawing upon clues about what we have already learnt about the play and clues provided at sentence level. For example: how could you guess that Verona is the name of a place, and the story takes place in Verona? Because of the preposition "in" and the capital letter. Given what you know about the story, what do you think the words "grudge" and "mutiny" might mean?
Provide teaching on puns and oxymorons – "bury" is a pun, and "death-marked love" an oxymoron. / To help students to realize that unfamiliar vocabulary need not be a barrier to understanding, especially when reading Shakespeare.
To learn more about the plot of Romeo and Juliet.
To experience first- hand the symbolic, metaphorical nature of the language used in Shakespeare's plays.
To provide teaching of literary devices.
5 mins / Play exercept from Shakespeare in Love on youtube – the reading of the Prologue to Romeo and Juliet in the Globe Theatre / To introduce the film "Shakespeare in Love" and to enable the students to hear the prologue performed/read aloud within the correct theatrical context / Encourage them to watch the film themselves. Remind them that Shakespeare's plays are exactly that – plays. They are not written texts as such, they are meant to be performed on stage.
10 mins / Worksheet on oxymorons. Students must first identify oxymorons, then create their own and finally compose their own sentence using an oxymoron / To provide further teaching (reinforcement) on the concept of the oxymoron / Stress that oxymorons are a common feature in Shakespeare's plays
5 mins / Time for feedback and concluding thoughts on the lesson. Do they like the language of Shakespeare's plays? Do they find it hard or easier to understand? Was it easier to understand with background information/clues? / Stress that the language here is like art. It isn’t perhaps how we speak every day, but there is a beauty in it.
Two households, both alike in dignity,
In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,
From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,
Where civil[i] blood makes civil hands unclean.
From forth the fatal loins of these two foes[ii]
A pair of star-cross'd lovers take their life;
Whose misadventured piteous overthrows
Do with their death bury[iii] their parents' strife.
The fearful passage of their death-mark'd love,
And the continuance of their parents' rage[iv],
Which, but their children's end, nought could remove,
Is now the two hours' traffic of our stage;
The which if you with patient ears attend,
What here shall miss, our toil shall strive to mend.
Pun = using one word to make the reader/audience think of two different meanings at the same time
Oxymoron = two opposite words used together at the same time, for example: a dark light
[i]אזרחי
[ii]אויבים
[iii]לקבור
[iv]זעם
Pun = using one word to make the reader/audience think of two different meanings at the same time
Oxymoron = two opposite words used together at the same time, for example: a dark light
An oxymoron can be found where two words with opposite meanings are used together to describe something. For example: seriously funny, open secret, darkest light, my hated lover. Shakespeare loved oxymorons. Here are some more examples from his plays:"I must be cruel only to be kind" (Hamlet) "With fearful bravery.." (Julius Caesar)
"Do that good mischief" (The Tempest). "Parting is such sweet sorrow" (Romeo and Juliet)
1) Look at the following text. Underline the words in them that are oxymorons. How many can you find? You can use a dictionary to help you.Pin ItSee all 5 photos
O brawling love! O loving hate!
O anything of nothing first create!
O heavy lightness, serious vanity!
Misshapen chaos of well-seeming forms!
Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick health!
Still-waking sleep, that is not what it is!
This love feel I, that feel no love in this
2) What words do you know that are opposites? Write them here. Then put the two words together to make your own oxymoron.
love / hate / loving hateCan you make a sentence using one of your oxymorons? ______
______
LESSON PLAN 2
Objectives: Students will be able to match extracts from a Shakespeare play with their correct modern day translation/interpretation
Students will practice reading a scene from one of Shakespeare's plays aloud to one another and to the rest of the class
Students will be able to infer meaning and opinion from a written text
TIME / ACTIVITY / PURPOSE / NOTES5 mins / Students will be introduced to a performance of the balcony scene from Romeo and Juliet via youtube. Recap what we learnt about Romeo and Juliet in the previous lesson. / To raise schema,
To see the language within the context of the scene/play itself
To listen to the actors reciting the words as an example of stress, intonation, pronunciation and characterization / Point out that this is an extremely famous scene!
10 mins / In pairs the students will each be given 5 different extracts from the balcony scene. They need to match these extracts to the correct modern day interpretation/translation – obviously 5 corresponding extracts will given, written in simple everyday language. We will review and check answers together. / To encourage students to look carefully at the language and to practice deciphering meaning for themselves / Make sure to clarify that thy= your and thou = you
5/10 mins / Practice reading the different extracts in pairs as a role play (one person is Romeo and one is Juliet, or if two girls are in a pair then the girls read the different extracts from Juliet in turn). Then ask for performances to the rest of the class. / To help the students become accomplished at reading the language aloud, pronouncing the words, experimenting with stress, intonation and understanding the dramatic context of the text.
15 mins / Reading on Juliet's balcony. Have you ever read a review of a tourist attraction in a travel guide before going there? This is what this text is taken from. While reading answer the following questions: Do you think Romeo and Juliet is a true story? What does the writer think about "Juliet's balcony"? Does he think it's a good place to visit?
Why do you think lots of people visit Juliet's balcony every year? / To practice inferring meaning and opinion from a written text
5 mins / Closing discussion – if the writer about a tourist destination presents a negative opinion of it, would it stop you from wanting to go there? Would you like to visit what is called "Juliet's balcony?" Why/why not? General discussion and feedback on Romeo and Juliet / To review what we learnt and to gain feedback on their reactions to it.
JULIET'S BALCONY
The power of storytelling is great. Every year thousands of people go to Verona to see what is known as "Juliet's balcony". Romeo and Juliet is the most famous love story in the world and we all enjoy the romance - though not its tragic ending.
The house in Verona known as Juliet's house was owned by the family dell Capello, a name not too different from Capulet, right? The house was built around the 13th century but the balcony itself was only added in 1936. It has no real connection with Shakespeare's story. Nevertheless, the house is still a major tourist destination. Every year, hundreds of girls visit Verona to stand on the balcony and gaze below, seeking their own Romeo among the many tourists. People bring heart-shaped presents "for Juliet" and love letters, which they put on the walls and doors.
There is a small museum inside which has a few nice paintings, but not a lot more. You do not need to spend more than an hour there - unless, of course you are a lovestruck teenager who dreams of romance…