Thirty Second News Broadcast
Mon, 08/12/2013 - 11:50 — Nancy Johnson
Strategy Category:
Instructional activities
Meeting diverse student needs
Grade Level:
High School
Content Area:
English
Materials or Resources:
The text or piece of literature; encourage students to write brief notes to help them prepare
Preparation:
Review text briefly, small groups of 3-4
Activity Length:
15minutes
Activity or Strategy Description:
I use this as a review/summarizing tool at the high school level. It works particularly well for texts such as Shakespeare's plays, Chaucer, or other difficult texts. After reading a significant portion of text, break students into groups of 3-4. Assign each group a section of text, for example, group 1, Act 1.1; group 2, Act 1.2; group 3 act 1.3. Each group is responsible for preparing a 30-second presentation to summarize their assigned piece of text. This should take no longer than 5 minutes to prepare. Then each group will present, but use only 3 seconds. Do not allow students to simply read a paragraph summary. Ideas for presentations are a dramatic portrayal--they should make the scent really fast and exciting and touch on the key events, a news broadcast, reporting as a news tam, a commercial, a poem, a song, etc.