Shakespeare <3
That's all I gotta say. Billy is probably one of my favorite people in the world. I don't know why I have such an affinity for him. I read Romeo and Juliet for the first time in 9th grade and fell in love. In 10th grade, we read Much Ado About Nothing and I didn't like it. The next year, we read Macbeth and I was back in love. I think I was the only English major excited to take Shakespeare as an entire course.
Anyway, let's get to the point. While I do looooove my Shakespeare, I don't always find it the easiest thing to understand. I struggle, like the majority of the population, to figure out what the heck he means half the time. (Is a "cousin" really a cousin, or just a friend??) Reading the Manga version of Romeo and Juliet was interesting. Manga/anime isn't really my thing, so I was a little hesitant. Similar to when we read American Born Chinese, I found that I comprehended the story much better through pictures. It still included Shakespearean dialogue, but with the pictures included, you can decipher what is going on, which is really helpful.
Since I'm talking about dialogue comprehension so much, I actually picked an article about that. I believe this is Chapter 2 of Teaching Shakespeare, "Teaching Shakespeare's Dramatic Dialogue." The author, Sharon Beehler, actually does a great job at breaking down the process of understanding Shakespearean dialogue. She mentions a small activity she gives to the students to assist them in the communication process. She gives them a slip of paper with two instructions: 1. Arrange the following words into a logical sentence. (movie, I, you, the, to, go, to, want, with) 2. Determine where you would place the stress in the sentence. Students often have trouble deciding where to place the stress. It requires the student to delve into their own background to help them.
By having students practice dialogue through texts, you're helping them with dialogue in their own lives. They will become "more alert to the importance of the same phenomena in their own lives" (17). This essentially means that students will be able to identify subtexts in conversations and question assumptions through dialogue. Beehler also mentions having the students write alternate scenes which can "help them develop new insights about the communication phenomena in the play" (21). I think this is really brilliant and it can also gauge how well the students are doing comprehending the material.
I think the reason I admire Shakespeare so much is because of my high school teachers. They didn't just dump a play on us and expect us to understand what was going on. We spent quite a bit of time in class (and after school) going over the material and breaking down each scene to make sure we comprehended it. We read A Midsummer Night's Dream in 12th grade and we read it out loud in class, with each person assigned to a different character. In my opinion, this helped me and the class a lot. Text sounds different when you read it out loud versus reading it in your head.
All in all, I hope my passion for Shakespeare carries through my teaching career. I don't want my students moaning and groaning the day I announce we'll be reading Hamlet. Obviously this is a HUGE wish, but a girl can dream, can't she? :)
"...breaking down the process of understanding Shakespearean dialogue..."
ReplyDeleteI also like this activity, of arranging the words into a sentence, in a logical manner. As I was thinking of activities and ways to approach Shakespeare I could not get around performance based activities. I really did not even think too much about studying the language, which is weird because it's so obvious that Shakespeare's language is "different"/ difficult.... Anyways, I really like the idea of having students thinking about where the stress lies in the sentence as well.
You should try reading "Much Ado about Nothing" again since you're older, and watch the movie...it is my favorite comedy!
ReplyDeleteI love Shakespeare but I often wonder if there is something better we could teach in order to get through to students.
ReplyDelete" I struggle, like the majority of the population, to figure out what the heck he means half the time."
ReplyDeleteIt's good to admitt this to your students. I Don't think we should come across to them as if you are the master of Shakespeare because I feel like it only makes them feel worse about themselves. Instead we should work with them to understand, and let them know that it's okay to struggle, well all do :)