We now have four characters in this story, but who are they? By now our discussion in class must have brought out a certain image that the students understand and respond to. We will now refine it further and give it life.
What’s My Line Exercise
: To develop characters
Procedure: Students will be divided into a panel, like in the t.v. program, and they will be questioned as to who they are, what is their occupation, age, where they live. One student will play the grandfather, another the grandmother, and so forth. To allow for maximum participation, I will assign two people to each character, so they will counsel and decide on an answer together. From this question and answer exercise we will further delineate the characteristics of our cast. Again, one student would act as recorder, listing the characteristics on the board for all to see and remember. We now have the plot and the characters.
Written assignment
: Now that the characters have been brought to life in the student’s minds, they will each be assigned one role to develop at home, dialogue style. Procedure: Divide students into three groups, assigning the beginning, middle, and end of the story to each group. This ia how the story looks so far:
Beginning
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Middle
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End
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Cast: Granddaughter
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Delia thinks about
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Delia
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and grandparents
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problem-could discuss
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solves
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it with a friend?
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problem with help from her brother
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Setting: home,
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School, street
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Home
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in the kitchen.
State of mind:
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Worry, puzzlement
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Happy with
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anger, frustration
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solution
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Within the above limits, the students will create a dialogue that incorporates all the ideas discussed, and accepted, by the teacher and students. As the students present to the class their assigned dialogue, the play will come together as a puzzle. Class discussion will limit the situations and dialogue. With several options now available, the students make final choices as to plot development and final resolution of the conflict.
Reading of the parts as a group and individually will further the characterizations. We are now on our way to assigning roles.
At the end of component III, my students would have:
1. Delineated the characters (by means of oral exercises).
2. Completed written assignment on dialogue.
3. Read the dialogue as a group and individually.