What's in a Face?
Strategies
Before Reading-
For the assigned chapters, student groups will receive a packet for their chapter. The packet will consist of multiple strategies for the students to understand their chapters as a team. Each chapter will use the same strategies, but each will be unique for the student groups. So you can get an idea of how the students will understand their chapters, I will demonstrate with Chapter 3: Power and Status of Portraiture written by Shearer West.
Expectation outlines are designed for students to generate their own questions and anticipations for the material ahead. Usually, this is done through chalkboard/overhead projector discussion as students develop their expectations in the form of questions. A few minutes of reading to preview the material can be allowed, and then the teacher asks “What do you think your reading will be about?” After several questions are generated, grouping the questions together and then allowing students to refer to the text to support their answers.
During the first group presentation work day, this student group will be presented with a packet and one of the handouts will ask, “What does Power and Status have to do with Portraiture?” Students will discuss among their group members and think of questions to answer as they read their chapter. Some examples, “Did people pay to get their portraits done?”, “Who were the people that were painted?”, “Why were people with power painted?” and several others.
Vocabulary-
Wordsplash is an assortment of important words that the student groups will read from their assigned materials. The larger word allows students to see the main idea, and the smaller words relate back to the main idea. The goal is for students to understand the relationship between the words in the Wordsplash.
The main idea for Chapter 3: Power and Status could be the word "Class", because the chapter focuses on the different societal groups that portraiture revolved around throughout its history. Surrounding words could be authority, wealth, power, fame, celebrities, rulers, poor, servants, criminals, and etc. Students would then pick three or so words to define and connect to the main idea, “Class”. Click for Wordsplash Handout.
Comprehension-
Directed Reading-Thinking Activity allow students to be actively involved while reading the material assigned. This strategy relies heavily on student predictions and letting students confirm their predictions as the read. The teacher guides the reading by stimulating students’ thinking with open-ended questions.
For this lesson, the teacher will need to examine the chapter and determine the main concept and supporting details. They would address the topic and give examples of objects or pictures that relate to the chapter, so students could make predictions. “What do you think about this title of the chapter?”, “What does the title have to with portraiture?” After the students have read some of the assigned material, “Can you make connections to the title and the material read?” After reading the material, students can reflect on their predictions.
Writing-
Microthemes allow students to critically think about material that has been read, and formulate the information into a brief passage that is about a half page in length. They can be used for several purposes, but for this lesson it will assist in analyzing and synthesizing information from the assigned chapters. Students can jot key ideas and notes to help them with writing their microthemes.
After reading the chapter assigned, students will individually write a microtheme about what they have read and share their passages with their fellow students. This will help them with understanding the text better as a group because they will receive multiple perspectives about what they have read.
After Reading-
Network Trees are similar in concept to other graphic organizers. They allow the relationships between main and supporting concepts to be represented visually. A central idea is considered and then describing information and examples are connected.
After reading the assigned chapter and completing the packet of strategies, students will create a network tree that reinforces, visually, the information that they have thoughtfully analyzed and synthesized. The network tree’s main concept would be “Class”, and supporting categories would be “Upper-class”, “Middle-class”, “Lower-class”, “Celebrities”. Students would fill in additional information for the supporting categories. “Who were these subgroups?”, “Why were they important?”, and examples of artworks that go towards each category. Click for Network Tree Handout.