Below is the use of flashback in the popular movie, Ratatouille.
During our first quarter, we focused on the use of flashback, foreshadowing and mood in literature. Not only did we look at examples in our recent reading selections, but we also looked at how film directors use these methods in cinematography. Looking at how these methods are used in familiar movies, helps students make connections which leads to further understanding. Below is the use of flashback in the popular movie, Ratatouille. Below is the use of foreshadowing in the popular movie, Jaws. Now, I stopped this clip before the child was attacked. That always results in students loudly protesting and wanting to view more! Below is the use of a positive mood in the Disney classic, Mary Poppins. We only watched the first few minutes of this original movie trailer. Below is the use of negative mood in the Disney classic, Mary Poppins. This recreated movie trailer is an example of how music, lighting, and scene selections can be changed and edited to make what originally viewed as positive to negative. The students always enjoy watching this movie clip.
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Week 1: The first week went by quickly as we went over classroom expectations, procedures and supplies needed. Week 2: We began the week discussing the "tone" for the school year. This year we are focusing our tone around the book, Wonder by R. J. Palacio. I plan to read from the book or choose students to read at least a few times a week until the book is completed. Once it is complete, students will be able to take an AR test and earn points. Below is a link to a site that will give you an overview of the book. http://childrensbooks.about.com/od/productreviews/fr/Wonder-book-review.htm Along with our discussion of tone and the book, Wonder, we began a short narrative unit focused around the hit song, Titanium by David Guetta featuring Sia. The tone of this song greatly resembles the tone author Palacio has for his book, Wonder. Click on the link to the YouTube website to view the video for this wonderful song. Not only is the song powerful, but so is the video. I told the students to imagine that they are at the Danville Village Mall AMC movie cinema when they stumble into the wrong theater. It's obvious the movie has been playing for a while and is about a weird but special boy. They get to watch for a few minutes until an usher quickly pulls them out and directs them to their right theater leaving them wondering what happens to the boy. This is exactly how you feel when you watch the video. After watching, we spent time infering on what the video is about which led to great discussions. Next they were assigned to create a short storyboard telling what happened 3 minutes before the beginning of the video or what happened 3 minutes after the video. Stay tuned for pictures of their creations. Here is a picture of the students watching videos of the song lyrics and a beautifully sung cover by Madilyn Bailey. We viewed these before watching the actual music video so that we could discuss the tone of the song and true meaning.
Vince Luca is pretty much like any teenage boy. He has a best friend who lives vicariously through him, dating, participating in school sports, and driving a car. However, that's about where his normal life stops. You see, Vince's family has a secret which continues to invade the normal life that Vince craves. His father is the mob boss of a very large mafia family with hopes of Vince soon joining in the business. But Vince has other plans which soon involves a girl and just not any girl. Her father just happens to be the FBI agent that is trying to take down Vince's father. Son of the Mob is an exciting novel that we will be reading for the rest of the quarter. Before we began reading from the novel, students were introduced to a brief history of the Mafia. After learning about the mafia, students were asked to form groups to create their own mafia family and to write a manual for new initiates. They had to choose a crime, a front, new terms for the leader names, 10 target language terms, hits, and a structure of command. Each group had to explain each function and write it out for their mafia manuals. Each manual included pictures and all the information was held within a book cover. Here are a few videos the students viewed during our mafia history discussions. Here are the student mafia families with their manuals. I was very impressed with their creativity.
Once we returned from Christmas break, we began our unit on poetry. First students reviewed figurative language terms before we dug into types of poetry. After reading, discussing, and writing poetry, we concluded with an autobiography style poster project. On the posters, students had to display poems that represented things/activities/likes/interests, etc. that represented them. First they had to write their own concrete poem which included several figurative language devices. They were then allowed to use the internet, library books, or their own creations for specific types of poems that I assigned. Along with the poems, their posters had to include pictures as well as words and phrases which represents their personality. This was the first time I assigned this project, and I am very pleased with the results. They did an excellent job!
Currently students are working in groups of four on this mystery project. This collage consists of a team created mystery essay, pictures of the suspects, pictures (or actual item) of the clues, short bios on each suspect, and any other important pictures or information for their mystery. The project is broken up so that each student is responsible for a portion of the plot as well as the other parts of collage. I have distributed a 5'x3' sheet of paper for them to display their information. For bonus points, students are also allowed to bring in any food item to share with the with the class that is associated with their mystery. Tomorrow they will present their collages, and I can't wait to see how these turn out!
Every year, around Halloween, we dive into the wonderful and gory short stories by Edgar Allen Poe. This year we focused on "The Tell-Tale Heart" about a crazy care taker of an older man who decides to murder him because he fears his deformed eye. Throughout the story, he denies that he is crazy as he gives details of his murderous plan. He also takes the readers through the act of murder, and the cover-up of the corpse. He believes his hatred for the eye is over but once the police arrive to investigate a neighbor's concern, he soon learns that his fears and disillusions are not gone.
Once we read and discuss the plot of the story, we end with a newspaper/drawing activity. Students are asked to pretend they are part of a news team reporting on the story. They are to draw their favorite scene from the story and to provide a short paragraph describing the scene as well as a direct quote. Today we had a wonderful visit from award winning author Merrie Haskell. She gave a wonderful and informative presentation on the editing and publishing process of short stories and novels. The students enjoyed learning from her and asked a variety of good questions which led to further discussions. A big thank you to Mrs. Miner and Mrs. Grimm for making this happen! We look forward to more author visits in the future! Here is a link to her website and pictures from her visit: For the past few weeks, we focused on the use of flashback, foreshadowing and mood in literature. Not only did we look at examples in our recent reading selections, but we also looked at how film directors use these methods in cinematography. Looking at how these methods are used in familiar movies, helps students make connections which leads to further understanding. Below is the use of flashback in the popular movie, Ratatouille. Below is the use of foreshadowing in the popular movie, Jaws. Now, I stopped this clip before the child was attacked. That always results in students loudly protesting and wanting to view more! Below is the use of a positive mood in the Disney classic, Mary Poppins. We only watched the first few minutes of this original movie trailer. Below is the use of negative mood in the Disney classic, Mary Poppins. This recreated movie trailer is an example of how music, lighting, and scene selections can be changed and edited to make what originally viewed as positive to negative. The students always enjoy watching this movie clip. The students did an excellent job working on their Titanium storyboards. Here are a few pictures of students working on their final drafts as well examples of the outcome.
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AuthorThis is my 6th year teaching Language Arts at OJHS. Before coming here, I taught Language Arts for 6 years at Rossville-Alvin Junior High School. Archives
August 2017
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