Messaging Shakespeare

Ms. Brown has been a ninth grade English teacher for nine years. Recently, she had to teach eleventh grade English. Her eleventh grade students appeared to be unmotivated. That was until she incorporated cell phones in the learning activities. Ms. Brown was beginning her lesson on Shakespeare’s play Richard III. She noticed that many students used text messaging to communicate, and considered how she might use cell phones in summarizing and analyzing text to help her students better understand Richard III.

She created a weblog with the help of a colleague. The weblog consisted of entries that were selected passages from the text of Richard III and her six narrative-framing questions. Ms. Brown’s questions deliberately focused students' attention on key passages. If the students could understand these passages well enough to summarize them, she knew that their comprehension of the play would increase. And it worked. Ms. Brown saw that she could use a technique students had already mastered (text messaging) to teach literature.

I was really impressed by this article. Ms. Brown finding a common ground between her and her students. She made learning Shakespeare fun and exciting, which is not an easy thing to do. Ms. Brown showed that cell phones can be effective educational tools.

To find out more about her Richard III learning project go to this link below: http://www.netc.org/focus/examples/messag.php