Hi Christine,
I have some things up on my Teachers Pay Teachers page, including this free logic puzzle:
https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Distance-Learning-Critical-Thinking-Mystery-Activity-The-Candy-Thief-PPT-3390118Besides that, I like to do a scary story genre analysis and then have them write their own. I bring in 2-5 scary short stories, tailored to the class on scariness and vocab and complexity. I find creepy urban legends like these
https://www.rd.com/list/scary-halloween-true-events/ work well and are appealing without being too scary! Then we go over the structure of the stories.
1. introduction of the situation, which often involves some elements of isolation or scariness (night, alone, lost, full moon)
2. odd event (often unexplained, sometimes not very scary but a bit strange)
3. escalation (something very scary or weird happens) OR apparent resolution (it was just a cat!)
4. time passes (sleep, pass out, run away and get home)
5. revelation/twist (the explanation for the events is revealed and it's usually even creepier than we thought)
We also discuss a twist and how it works, and students love to give examples from movies or books they've read!
You can do a mini-lecture or give them guided questions and they can read stories in groups and answer the questions.
Then we do vocab-building. What are scary places, animals, sounds, people, smells, sights? This is another place students love to share TV, movies and books they know.
Then students can write their own scary story using the outline and vocab on the board. Have everyone read theirs and vote on the weirdest, funniest, scariest, and so on. Note that you can also do these for subgenres: monster stories, funny scary stories, friendly monster stories, and so on.
Another idea for a twist, is to have students start a scary story, write to a cliffhanger, then give the paper to someone else to finish but the rule is they have to add a twist. A lot of fun ideas come out of that!
Hope that helps! I love Halloween and I love teaching it!
Walton
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Walton Burns
Freelance Writer
Senior Editor, Alphabet Publishing
www.waltonburns.comwww.alphabetpublishingbooks.com------------------------------
Original Message:
Sent: 27-09-2021 03:47 PM
From: Christine Nicodemus
Subject: Holiday Lesson Plans?
Hi All,
Does anyone have any fun or creative ideas/lessons plans related to Halloween or a different October holiday? If so, please brag up on yourself here or consider sharing :).
Christine
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Christine Nicodemus
Department Chair- Humanities, Social Sciences, & Fine Arts, Wayne Community College (USA)
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