Lesson 3 - How Can I Be Heard?

Drama

1.1 Creating and Presenting: engage actively in drama exploration and role play with a focus on exploring drama structures, key ideas and pivotal moments in their own stories and stories from diverse communities, times and places

Drama

• I can use role play to help me understand how and why characters feel the way they do
• I understand that giving a character a specific time, place and relationship to others helps make the drama believable

Language

1.8 Oral Communication: identify the point of view presented in oral text and ask questions about possible bias

1.5 Reading: make inferences using stated and implied ideas in oral texts

1.1 Media Literacy: identify the purpose and the audience for a variety of media texts

1.5 Reading: make inferences about texts using stated and implied ideas from the texts as evidence

Language

• I know that the characters in our drama have their own opinions and thoughts and biases
• I can listen to characters speak and understand what they are feeling and thinking even though they are not directly saying it
• I understand why we have editorial pages and who they are for
• As I read about KC and his situation, I realize that his version of the story is based on his emotions, his personal situation, background and experiences, and that there might be another version of the story or other points of view to consider

Whole Group > Discussion

Hyperlinks

http://www. edu.gov.on.ca/eng/literacynumeracy/

https://www.tdsb.on.ca/Elementary-School/The-Classroom/Equity-Inclusion

Whole Group > Read Aloud

Show the class BLM #5: Sample Newspaper Editorial, which is an example of an editorial column (with appropriate reading level). Read aloud to the class.

Small Group > Discussion

Invite students to get into small groups and answer the following questions in their journal notebooks.
Prompts:  ^CL Who chooses to write a letter to an editor of a newspaper? Why do people write to the editor? What are they trying to accomplish?

Whole Group > Discussion and Teacher Think-Aloud

Discuss as a whole class once small group discussions are finished. Ask the students if anyone knows what the word 'bias' means.  Invite students to share their understanding and record this information on a mind map. ^CL Together, create a working definition of 'bias' and post this. Copy BLM #5: Sample Newspaper Editorial onto an overhead and project this for all students to see. Have the following questions posted and referenced before the think-a-loud. Prompt: We are going to learn more about this article and try to answer the following questions: What is this editorial about? ^CL Besides some facts, what other information is the editor giving us? ^CL Do you think this editor has his/her own opinion on this subject?  Why or why not? Find words in the text to support your answer.
Through a think aloud, re-read the editorial and circle words and phrases that show bias and are emotionally charged (e.g., "terrified my two year old", "Why can't we all just be happy?", "right to run free", "I have had my fill...", "tired of all this complaining", "messing up everything", etc.).  Through this think-aloud, you will also be modelling how to make inferences about various points of view, (e.g. How does Terror Unleashed feel about dogs and why?)

As a whole class, return to the working definition of bias and ask if the students want to add anything. 

Whole Group > Discussion > Charting "What We Know/Want To Know"

Show students the newspaper page included with KC's second letter (BLM #6: Newspaper Editorial). Tell students you are eager to share this with them as this new piece of evidence will help the class figure out what is going on. Pass around copies for students to read in small groups. Ask the students to write two headings on a page in their journals:^CL What we think we know, and What would we like to know. Ask students to fill in these columns as they are reading. Remind the students that they may also add information they learned from KC's letters. Model for students how to make an inference about what we know of KC by underlining/circling specific pieces of the text. Once students are finished, initiate a whole group discussion and record the collective understanding of what the students know and want to know. Review the items listed in the  What would we like to know column and ask the students to consider how they find answers. Prompts: "How can we find this out? ^CL Who do we need to talk to? 

Tell the students that we can use role play to meet and interview the people who wrote letters to the editor and this will give us some answers. Invite students to form small groups to do a group brainstorm around questions that need to be asked. As a whole class, chart these for reference.

Whole Group > Hot Seating

Tell the students that they are now going to hot seat those people who wrote letters to the editor. Set up a special chair at the front of the classroom (the hot seat). Go over the rules of role play (see teacher's notes). Ask students to tell you what a successful role play should look and sound like (no laughing, only serious answers, making up details that fit with what we know about the character). Explain that you will adopt the role of R.J., Hard worker (author of one of the editorials) and their job is to ask questions to better understand his point of view, or bias.
After modelling hot seating in role as R.J., invite  a student volunteer to become N.P., Student in Need. Hot seat this student as a whole class or alternatively, do the hot seating in pairs. Review  the group generated record of what they know and fill in any new information that they learned from the hot seating activity. 

Individual > Writing in Role

Ask the students to write a letter to the editor in role as KC. Emphasize that their letters must communicate KC's point of view regarding the building of the community centre. 

Whole Group > Sharing Circle

Assemble students in a circle. Explain that they now collectively represent the role of KC. Ask students to select 3-5 lines that clearly reflect KC's point of view or bias, and to read their lines aloud when you tap them on the shoulder. After all students have shared excerpts from their letters to the editor, interview them in role. Sample prompts: What is so special about this place? Can't you find another park KC?

Assessment as Learning (AaL):

Rules of Role Play 

• you may choose to speak in role
• you may choose to listen in role  and not speak
• you may not come out of role (i.e. speak as yourself) 

Set up a signal such as walking in the room and sitting in the special chair to signify that the role playing has begun and establish a "time out" signal to use if there is a need to come out of role and address a class or school issue. 

R.J. Hard worker should be portrayed as a person who needs the work in order to feed his/her family. 

Assessment for/as Learning (AfL/AaL)

Post the class  definition of 'bias', and revisit and revise the definition as their understanding grows.Track individual contributions for assessment purposes by recording  student's initials beside the comment/idea they contributed. 

Critical Literacy Focus ^CL

A critical literacy approach to reading invites students to pay attention to opinion, point of view and bias. Emphasize that texts are never neutral. All texts have bias, point of view, and intention.

Hyperlink

See Think Literacy Cross-Curricular Approaches for suggestions for teaching using text references to make inferences.

Differentiated Instruction (DI)

Provide choice of writing or drawing in role as KC. Consider scribing for struggling writers, and/or provide an alternative option to writing such as recording a phone message that KC made to the newspaper. 

The letter does not have to be too long.  Strong writers may want to write a half page, but a few sentences are fine for struggling writers. 

Individual > Exit Card

Invite students to write their response to the following question on a cue card (you will collect these on their way out of this class). Prompt: In your own words, what does 'bias' mean? 

Assessment for Learning (AfL)

Collect the exit cards and review for understanding of the concept of bias.