Literature Circle Final Project Overview & Guidelines Task
As a team, select one of the options for a final project with your Literature Circle group to complete for the book you read over the last five weeks. All of the components for the project must be completed and turned in by 11:59 pm on Monday 22 January 2018 to your teacher via turnitin.com. You will have 4-6 days in class to work with your team to complete the project.
Audience
Your audience is ninth grade students at Vanden High School who have also participated in Literature Circles. Each team will present their project in class, so the vocabulary, content, and style should be engaging and appropriate for students in your English class.
Purpose
The main purpose of this project is to demonstrate your understanding of the Literature Circle book and its impact on you in a creative way. To achieve this purpose, you will need to collaborate with the people in your Literature Circle team to effectively draw upon each person’s strengths. Another purpose is to entertain other students and convince them to read the book. Some questions to consider are: What is an important theme from this book? What important issues does this book explore that readers should be exposed to? How can the characters help readers? What is engaging and interesting about the writing? What have I learned or how have I changed as a result of reading this book?
Tableaux OR Reader’s Theater:
Tableaux: Create a series of 6-8 frozen scenes that depict key scenes from your book. As students in your group freeze to create the scene, someone will narrate to describe what is happening to the audience. The narration may include dialogue, important passages from the book, or characters’ inner thoughts.
Reader’s Theater: Create a skit of one or more important parts of the novel. The skit may be one long scene or several short scenes. Choose one important scene, several important scenes, or condense the entire plot of the novel. Write a script, assign roles to all team members, and stage the skit with interesting blocking. Be sure to rehearse the skit several times and memorize as many lines as possible.
Required Components:
1. A script of the presentation typed in MLA format:
a. Lines are highlighted and color-coded for each team member
b. Blocking and/or stage directions are present and clear/understandable
2. Individual note cards for each team member to use during the presentation (you should still memorize as much as possible).
Book Talk: Prepare a short talk about your book that will convince other students to read it. Include information about the author, characters, setting, conflicts, and themes without giving away too much or spoiling anything. As a visual aid, create a book poster that has the title, author’s name, creative images, and any other relevant information (think about movie posters). At the end of your talk, read an exciting,
interesting, or important passage, stopping at a “cliff-hanger moment.”
Required Components:
1. Individual note cards for each team member to use during the presentation (you should still memorize as much as possible)
2. A passage from the book typed or copied by hand on a separate sheet of paper
Book Trailer: Create a video about your book that will convince other students to read it. Much like a movie trailer, it should preview the characters, the main conflicts, the setting, and exciting parts, including important quotes or passages without giving away too much or spoiling anything. In the trailer, students in your group should act as the characters, author, or audience members/readers (each team member must appear at least once in the trailer), depicting key scenes and the main idea of the book.
Required Components: Free apps for creating & editing videos:
1. Video of the trailer (uploaded to Youtube) 2. Link to the trailer emailed
to your teacher.
○ Magisto
○ Adobe Spark Video ○ TouchCast
○ Stop Motion Studio ○ RealTimes: Video Maker
○ Animoto Video Slideshow Maker ○ Text on Video FREE
○ Video Mixer
○ Perfect Video-Video Editor & Movie Maker
Graphic Novel OR Children’s Book: Condense and summarize the book in the form of a graphic novel or a children’s book. The book should include detailed, colored pictures depicting the plot, main conflict, how the characters resolve the conflicts, and one or more themes of the book (no stick figures). Members of your group should create the images, not use images from other sources. If you choose to do a graphic novel, you need at least 30 detailed panels depicting key scenes from the book. If you choose to do a children’s book, you need at least 15 detailed, full page images depicting key scenes from the book.
Required Components:
1. An outline summarizing the condensed version of the story typed in MLA format.
2. The final copy of the book. The pages should be bound together with a cover on both sides. The book should be made with sturdy material (construction paper, drawing paper, printer paper, etc. NOT lined notebook paper).
Missing Scene: Is there a part of the book that is still unclear to you? Did you want to know more about a certain part? Write the scene! Write a scene that you think is currently missing from the book. Create a tableaux or skit, film the scene, or write a graphic novel or children’s book depicting your new scene.
Required Components:Same as whichever option you choose. For example, if you do Reader’s Theater, you must have a script and individual note cards.
Requirements for ALL options: ● Every team member must:
○ Contribute to the creation/completion of the required components
○ Speak during the team presentation (for videos, speaking in the recording counts)
○ Be on task and productive during work days (individuals will be docked points for disruptive or off task behavior)
● All projects must:
○ Use textual evidence from the book and incorporate at least TWO of the following literary elements: conflicts, themes, settings (physical, historical, and political), and the protagonist’s journey
○ Demonstrate creativity, neatness/legibility, logical organization, and correct interpretation of the book ○ Be ready to present on Tuesday 1/23/18 (technological problems are NOT an excuse for incomplete
or late projects)
Name _______________________________________________________________ Period _____ Project Planning Form
Directions: In order to prepare for your project, work with your team to fill out the form below. Be sure to write in complete sentences and explain your reasoning.
1. What is the best thing about your Literature Circle book? Characters, plot, writing style, pace, etc.? Why?
2. What types of readers would enjoy reading your Literature Circle book? Why?
3. Go through your book and find at least three quotes that are powerful, interesting, funny, etc. These quotes should appear somewhere in your project.
First Quote:
Second Quote:
Third Quote:
4. Which project option is your team’s first choice (circle one)? Explain why your team wants to choose this option below the list.
Tableau/Reader’s Theater Book Trailer Book Talk
Graphic Novel/Children’s Book Missing Scene Other (MUST BE APPROVED BY YOUR TEACHER)
5. Which project option is your team’s second choice (circle one)? Explain why your team wants to choose this option below the list.
Tableau/Reader’s Theater Book Trailer Book Talk
6. Responsibilities: Decide as a team what each person will be responsible for. Make sure to divide the work equally among all team members and decide when each component needs to be completed.
Team Member Tasks/Responsibilities Due Date
Literary Element (theme, symbol, protagonist’s journey, conflict, or setting)
