Fostering Student Creativity

Since I don't have a classroom to test this out on right now, I'm going back in time to think about an activity I used in American Literature five years ago.  Since I'm the drama director, and the only way to read plays in class is to read them aloud, I would "cast" The Crucible.  I gave them choices for parts - they told me if they wanted a big part, a medium part, or a small part.  Everyone read, but some would only have one or two lines throughout the entire play.  I found that the class understood the play and followed along better if one student was John Proctor (or any other character) the entire time - it helped them keep the characters straight.  While some students simply read to get it over with, some really got into it.  And no, not every one of those students was my drama/speech kids.  So that was fun to watch - some really put their creativity into the parts.

Beyond that, one of the projects we did was a Facebook page for a character.  It didn't have to be the character they portrayed (because, frankly, not every character is fleshed out well enough to create a profile ... and I wanted them to choose a character they liked - or hated).  With the Facebook page, they had to find a profile picture, fill in biographical details, post several times to their "wall" about certain events they were dealing with, and comment on a couple posts as other characters.  All of the posts and comments were to be how the character would actually respond, not how the student would respond.  The kids seemed to like it - and it was fun to see how they thought the characters would react to other characters from the play.

Looking ahead to next year, Literature Explorations will be a mix of American Lit, Brit Lit, and World Lit.  I want to teach The Crucible in that class (the play is truly one of the things I have missed teaching the past five years), but Facebook is soooo five years ago.  To make this activity more connected to the students, I'm looking into doing something with SnapChat or Instagram.  I don't know exactly how I'll get the other characters into it yet, but I'm working on it.