SilverMoon Posted April 30, 2016 Share Posted April 30, 2016 (edited) What are your favorite resources? Extra books? Biographies? Unit study type activities? Spin-offs? Anything really. DD asks, "So Mom, do you think there's enough Shakespeare stuff to last for a WHOLE year of literature? I want to do that." Yeah, about a master's worth, dear. LOL She has enough experience listening to and watching actual plays and devouring retellings to have a good idea of what she's getting herself into. I bought a Matthews set of retellings to compliment her British history for next year; she had it ripped into before we made it out of the store parking lot. The tragedies have all been devoured already, and I can tell when each one ends because of the barrage of questions that immediately follows. DD will be 11yo and 6th/7th grade for this course. Precocious/mature. My first thought was to read portions of the real plays aloud after reading kid friendly retellings, lots of videos, and fill up the rest of her reading with lighter spin-offs. Adding historical context as needed, a good biography, Shakespeare paper dolls for her to design sets and costumes for.. I'd love to hear ideas of what others have done for the middle school years. :001_smile: Edited April 30, 2016 by SilverMoon 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kfamily Posted April 30, 2016 Share Posted April 30, 2016 (edited) Funny, I just posted these yesterday. I saw that you mentioned paper dolls, so I thought I'd just share the link with you. This is from my website...I'm still in the process of moving my links and resource suggestions from my blog to the website, so it is still a work in progress. http://www.amindinthelight.com/#!year-six/x6xmn Also, I have scheduled for one of the poetry selections for Year Three this book: Shakespeare's Seasons by Miriam Weiner. Homeschool Share also has a unit for Shakespeare which includes some nice notebook pages. Here: http://www.homeschoolshare.com/shakespeare_notebook_pages.php ETA: Just wanted to add that my older daughter is a huge Shakespeare fan...they invented a game where they take turns choosing a character from one of his plays, and the other will try to name the play from which he/she comes. My older daughter studied Shakespeare's sonnets quite extensively in 8th grade. She has read all of his sonnets and we studied a number of them together along with the structure of the sonnet. Of course, watching live versions of the plays and movies, as needed, would be fun. You might even consider choosing one play to perform...or perhaps just a couple of acts of a favorite play. Edited May 1, 2016 by Kfamily 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SilverMoon Posted May 2, 2016 Author Share Posted May 2, 2016 (edited) . Edited September 5, 2023 by SilverMoon 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Julie of KY Posted May 3, 2016 Share Posted May 3, 2016 Something that we did that was fun for that age was the Brave Writer family Shakespeare course. It is usually offered in the spring and could be done at the end of your year. Center for Lit is offering a one week discussion class of Macbeth this year. Lots and lots of fun rabbit trails to study with Shakespeare without anyone else's guidance. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jane Elliot Posted May 3, 2016 Share Posted May 3, 2016 (edited) Our favorite retellings are Garfield's ​Shakespeare Stories I & II ​​Favorite plays on dvd: Branagh's ​Much Ado About Nothing ​(fast forward nudity at the very beginning and one window scene in the middle) Branagh's ​Henry V ​ -- Fantastic! My middle schoolers watch these two over and over simply because Branagh reminds them of their 22 yo brother who looks like Branagh and used to memorize and perform some of the speeches. :-) ​Twelfth Night ​(not true to the setting, but very well acted. This play is a family favorite -- very well-received by the younger set, a great play to start with.) The series Shakespeare Uncovered streams on Amazon and gives helpful analysis and background for each play. ​Brush Up Your Shakespeare​! by Macrone is a fun resource with commentary on some of Shakepeare's most famous phrases and a list of common words invented by him. Edited May 3, 2016 by Jane Elliot 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
2_girls_mommy Posted May 3, 2016 Share Posted May 3, 2016 We just started our year with going to see Julius Caesar which she's (my6th grader) had lots of experience with of retellings. Then we read through the play, As You Like It using the Memoria Press book and guide. Its version of the play has definitions alongside the readings. The workbooks had a lot of plain old writing in MP fashion, but good things to discuss. And we did a couple of the activity ideas in it for some chapters. There were several to choose from. I remember one dd making a pretty family tree of one of the families and my dd8th grade writing as a modern T.V. reporter covering the wrestling match. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
laughing lioness Posted May 12, 2016 Share Posted May 12, 2016 Here's a bunch of resources we've used to study Shakespeare. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theelfqueen Posted May 12, 2016 Share Posted May 12, 2016 I just showed my 9th grader the TED Talk about Shakespeare and Hip Hop and it rocked his world... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SilverMoon Posted May 12, 2016 Author Share Posted May 12, 2016 I just showed my 9th grader the TED Talk about Shakespeare and Hip Hop and it rocked his world... That was fun! I had to grab the sonnets off the shelf to follow along. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Milknhoney Posted May 16, 2016 Share Posted May 16, 2016 In the middle of Julius Caesar with my 6th grader. We read through a scene using Oxford School Shakespeare which has useful explanatory notes in the margins, and then listen to Arkangel Shakespeare's audio dramatization of the scene. That's working so far. And I think ds is liking it. He went in with such a bad attitude I don't know if he'll ever admit to it, but he is sure acting like he is into it. Quite coincidentally, WWS had a lesson on using quotations and footnotes, and Julius Caesar just happened to be the subject. So he ended up learning all about Julius Caesar's history just as we were getting started. Couldn't have planned it better if I had tried! 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kathleen. Posted May 17, 2016 Share Posted May 17, 2016 Oxford School Shakespeare books are really nice. There's a dictionary that goes with the books - Oxford Illustrated Shakespeare Dictionary. My kids did a puppet show for A Midsummer Night's Dream. They built a little stage with props and made puppets out of foam and felt for all the characters. They spent a long time putting it together. It really helped to remind them who all the characters were and which events happened when. Also, it helped them to see similarities with Twelfth Night, which they read recently and wish to reuse the puppets for another play. ☺ 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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