summary

Lesson of the Week: Drama and Reading

Marly Parker Integration, Lesson of the Week ,

Narrative Elements

Choose a poem that has clear narrative elements in it. I used The Creature in the Classroom by Jack Prelutsky.

Read the poem, act it out, then name the elements. This is a simple way to integrate drama.

  • Drama focus is on gestures and voice.

Teach the students how gestures are used with their bodies to help express feelings and events. Model some examples like shrugging shoulders, pointing fingers, etc. Then explain how the rise and fall in your voice sends a message to the listener. Practice reading one sentence using different kinds of voices (angry, happy, bored, etc.)

  • Reading focus is on identifying narrative elements.

 

Narrative Elements with a Poem from Marly Parker on Vimeo.

Extended Activities:

Have the students write what could happen next then act it out.

Have the students write their own poem to be acted out.

creature

 

Lesson of the Week: Dance and Reading

Marly Parker Integration, Lesson of the Week , , ,

Story Summary

This lesson integrates dance with reading. First the students listen to a book read aloud to them. The teacher has parts of the story written on sticky notes before it is read. After the book is read, the sticky notes are placed in order onto a chart. The students then pick a part of the story to use to come up with three 8 counts of a short dance that depicts the part of the story that is on their sticky note. After that, the students perform this in front of each other having the audience guess what part of the story they are performing. You can add to the game by having the audience also have to say where that part happened: beginning, middle or end. Finally, (this was not done in the below video) you can put all of the movements together to create one big dance that shows the entire summary of the story.

This can be used for the Arts Fair. For the art form, the students learned how to use their bodies to create movement that explains a part of a story. For the subject, the students learned parts of a story, sequence of events, and creating a summary.

 

DANCE MSA from Marly Parker on Vimeo.