This semester we're reading "The Body" by Stephen King with my Intermediate classs and I can already tell my students are enjoying it much more than "The Tales of Mystery and Imagination" we read last semester. Last week we read 6 chapters filled with many events and to consolidate the narrative I suggested the following activity. It can work well with other stories and readers, especially if they're set in pre-internet era.
1. Ask your students "How would the story be different if it had happened nowadays?" The topic of social media will come up pretty soon.
2. Draw their attention to Twitter, ask if anybody's using it or know about it. "What's so special about this social network?" - the length of the posts is limited to 140 characters.
3. Ask "What is a hashtag?". Elicit possible hashtags for this novella.
4. Now explain that the Ss are going to work in pairs or groups and create twitter accounts and messages for the characters of the book. They don't actually have to create an account electronically, just fill in the template. Variants include
5. Give them around 10-15 minutes (in my class they needed to create just 5 tweets), monitor and help if needed.
6. Display the tweets around the class and ask everyone to read them. Choose the best/ the most creative/ the funniest tweet. I think my Ss had fun writing the tweets and here are some examples:
As an extension you can actually set up a twitter account for one or several characters and ask you students to update it as you move along the book. If you have different accounts for different characters they can interact, comment and share their posts making the experience more authentic and bringing the story to life.
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1. Ask your students "How would the story be different if it had happened nowadays?" The topic of social media will come up pretty soon.
2. Draw their attention to Twitter, ask if anybody's using it or know about it. "What's so special about this social network?" - the length of the posts is limited to 140 characters.
3. Ask "What is a hashtag?". Elicit possible hashtags for this novella.
4. Now explain that the Ss are going to work in pairs or groups and create twitter accounts and messages for the characters of the book. They don't actually have to create an account electronically, just fill in the template. Variants include
- everybody in the class takes one character and composes tweets from his point of view
- everybody has a different character and composes tweets from his point of view
- Ss create twitter news feed that includes messages from different characters of the story.
5. Give them around 10-15 minutes (in my class they needed to create just 5 tweets), monitor and help if needed.
6. Display the tweets around the class and ask everyone to read them. Choose the best/ the most creative/ the funniest tweet. I think my Ss had fun writing the tweets and here are some examples:
Gordie "Just fired a #gun. Still can't believe it #wow"
Milo "Stupid children. Gonna get fired #lovechopper"
Teddy "Just been pushed away. So sad #liketrains"
Gordie "#lol looking for body #amazing #trip"
Gordie "The secret will die with us #bestfriends"
Gordie "I'm an olympic champion in leaping over the fence #athleticGordie"
As an extension you can actually set up a twitter account for one or several characters and ask you students to update it as you move along the book. If you have different accounts for different characters they can interact, comment and share their posts making the experience more authentic and bringing the story to life.
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