“Romeo and Juliet”: a post-reading mini-project

To check comprehension of a B1 graded reader based on Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet”, I asked my younger students to choose four key scenes or snapshots from the play and plan a short oral presentation explaining their choices, including:
– a description of each “snapshot”, including the setting, the characters and the action;
– which part of the plot they belong to;
– why they think they are important, providing at least three reasons.

Working in pairs, the students created a paper diorama for each scene which helped them both with the planning process and as a visual aid in the presentation. To make these dioramas, we simply used regular DIN-A4 white paper:

1. Fold the paper to make a square.

2. Fold the paper again so that it is folded on both diagonals.

3. Cut on one of the folds to the centre.

And there you go!

We even tried some stage curtains on each diorama!

stage_curtains.pdfDownload

This type of diorama makes it easy for students to take home before assembling and gluing them together, and for pairs to distribute the amount of work to be done.

The pairs of students finally took turns explaining their choices, followed by several questions from the audience. (And they did really well!)

For other similar post-reading ideas, you may want to check the following:

– “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”: an alphabet book.

– One-pagers: “The House on Mango Street”

– 15 post-reading activities.