Story Telling: Through Your Eyes

  I recently created a rubric for my lesson plan - Story Telling: Through Your Eyes.

The objective of the lesson plan is to allow students to relay their favorite story through the art of storytelling, their way.

            Students are grouped together based on their pre assessments. For example, ELL students would work primarily together, as would gifted students etc.

            They would all complete background work by reading each group member's favorite book (3-4 stories total, 3rd grade level). They would then need to come together and vote on which of the 3-4 stories they would like to narrate in front of the class. After the book has been chosen, the group members will decide how they each wish to contribute to the story telling. For example, one may be comfortable with being the main narrator, solely speaking, while the other may want to act out the characters and scenes, while another may wish to create the graphics. Or, the group may decide as a whole, that they all wish to take turns narrating. The idea is to incorporate differentiated instruction for each student so that they may most comfortably complete, and receive the most out of this assignment. 

            After each student’s preferred method of expression is chosen, they must then work together to create a seamless story telling experience that the entire class can understand. This would include: neat pictures, strong voices, eye contact, and the ability to connect and transition from one scene of the story, to the next. 

             This assignment is infusing the design of the Totally Awesome Teaching Strategies, by including: Visual, Performing Arts, Language Arts, Art Studies, Self-Directed Learner, and Critical Thinker performance indicators. The motivation for this assignment is to have small groups come together to voice their common interests in literacy, and make a responsible, consecutive decision by working together to achieve an outcome. We could incorporate multicultural infusion in this assignment by having students complete the same lesson but having the students use some words in other languages, teaching the class something new. 

             At the end of the story, the presenting group will each ask the class a couple of questions, showing me that that presenters and the audience/class, has comprehended the story through the method of questioning. 

            The rubric is designed to allow each varied learner the opportunity to gain the most points and retain the most information in a way that works the best for them. For example, points are not lost if presenters choose not to speak but to act instead. They would then be graded on eye contact, transitions between scenes/characters, strong voices, memorizing lines etc. If the audience is left knowing very little about the main characters due to lack of description or character knowledge, points would then be lost. 

Examples of how different learners can get the most out of this practice:

·        ELL Students: Visual and animated story telling, through graphics and acting, incorporating some words from their native tongue and using key vocabulary words that they are learning in their ELL groups. Focus on essential ideas and skills and eliminate unnecessary activities or tasks.

·        Gifted Students: Can create a power point presentation by using Adobe Presenter or KidPix3D.

·        Special Needs Students: Can choose which method of expression is most comfortable for them, with an aid helping the group prepare for their presentation.