Story Comprehension

Vocabulary:

Identify – to find/recognize the ‘who’ or ‘what’, to name, to know

Categorize – to put in specific groups

Summarize – to give a short statement of the main idea/s of a story, book, article etc.

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Introduction Activity

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Step 1 – Show students the following 2 dance performances:

Step 2 – Let’s pretend that dancing is their language, and you have to translate what they “said” into English. What do you think they are saying in each dance? How do you know that?

Step 3 – Read the following poem and ask students if they think either of the dances could match/fit this poem

“I Use My Words” by Jaymie Gerard

Goodness, I am ANGRY

It makes me want to SHOUT

And STOMP and WEAR A MEAN FACE

To let the ANGER out

Instead I USE MY WORDS to say

WHAT I AM MAD ABOUT

DANCE

(Be mindful that dance and movement can be difficult for students as they my feel self conscience)

1.Pre select 3-4 instrumental songs that will serve as the rhythm of the student’s dance, or let students explore instrumental music channels on itunes, spotify, pandora etc and choose their own

2.Have students work in groups of 3-4 and have them help each other with

a. selecting background music

b. creating moves for each poem, as a group, they should decide               on 4-5 movements that relate to their poem.

3. Practice the presentation which should consist of One person in the group reading the poem to the background music while the other members perform the dance.

4.Presentation (First perform the dance)

After the presentation of each poem/dance the writer of the poem should ask the rest of the class (not their group members) to answer as many of the following questions:

Who? Is Doing What? When? Where? Why?

Backward Looking

a.Have you done a similar kind of work in the past (earlier grades etc)?

b.Have you made something like this before?

a.What problems did you encounter while you were working on this piece? How did you solve them?

b. What was difficult for you when making _______________?

Inward Looking

a. What was especially satisfying to you about either the process of the finished product?

b. What did you like the most, working on your piece or when it was finished?

a. What did you learn about yourself as you worked on this piece?

b. When working on this project did you like reading, writing, discussing or creating?

Outward Looking

a. What is the one thing you want people to notice when they look at your piece?b. What do think others like the best about your project?

a. In what ways did your piece meet the objectives?

b. Did your piece meet the objective: ____________________________?

Forward Looking

a. What is one thing that you have seen in your classmates’ work or process that you would have liked to try?

b. What do you like about your classmates projects?

a. & b. One thing you would like to improve?