Intercession: Day Four, or the discovery that movies quiet kids like nothing else

We finished reading "A Midsummer Night's Dream" last week, so today's task was to brainstorm ideas for modernizing the play.  The kids' homework over the weekend was to consider ways to bring the play into present day, and I was surprised to find that they all remembered to give it some thought.  I asked the kids to freewrite about it when they came into class (I was met with a snotty "Why do we have to WRITE it?  Why can't we just SAY it?" to which I answered "Because I asked you to."  Classy, Emily, classy).  Some of their ideas were crazily brilliant.  Here's a taste:

-The setting is a school, and the "magic flowers" are cartons of milk

-The "fairies" wear jet packs

-The "magic flowers" that make people fall in love with each other is Axe or Tag or some other cologne/body wash

After we shared our initial ideas, we watched the first scenes from two film versions of "Romeo & Juliet" (the old-timey Zeferelli version and the modernized version with Leonardo DiCaprio).  It turns out we picked the right scenes to show, because the Zeferelli version had a swordfight and the Leo version had a gunfight.  Yay, violence!  Our "trouble" student seemed very disappointed that we were not going to modernize Romeo & Juliet instead.  Either way, the kids were all about the films (why?  Kids watch movies in school all the time...is it really still a novel experience?) and several asked if they could borrow the Leo version.  I sent them to Blockbuster.  I do hope they rent it; we have to get Shakespeare in these kids' heads somehow.

After the films, we broke down our modernization ideas.  I had made big posters to spread out on the floor with "CHARACTERS," "PLOT," "CONFLICT," and "SETTING."  I asked the kids to grab a marker and write their ideas about how they could modernize each aspect.  It turned out to be a good tool, because it was more student-led and active than me writing on the board.  I read the ideas aloud as the students wrote them, and we discussed them.  

We decided that most of the ideas seemed to be based around a change in setting, so we tried to narrow down the suggestions.  This got a little messy, because certain kids were attached to certain ideas.  In the end, the two settings of choice were 1) The streets of NYC and 2) A hospital.  Weird, eh?  No one liked my Mall of America suggestion.  Anyway, so I liked the implication of both suggestions, but clearly we need to hammer out more details tomorrow.  I liked the idea that the doctors could be the fairies, and the drugs/medication could be the magic flower.  Certain kids TOTALLY dominated the idea-sharing process, which was obnoxious.  Not all voices/ideas were heard, so I was glad I asked kids to freewrite before we even started discussing and let them write their own ideas on the power, or certain quiet but creative kids would have been overshadowed.  Tomorrow, I might ask certain kids to take 2 minutes of "Be quiet and listen time."  We'll see.

We ended the class with exit slips and watching a short clip from the film version of "A Midsummer Night's Dream," the one with Michelle Pfeiffer and Stanley Tucci.  Again, movies are like crack.  I hope they liked seeing the visuals of fairy wings.

My goal for tomorrow is to set up some structure for the planning and filming process.  There will be chaos and there will be disagreement, no doubt.  Certain kids are going to be perfectionists, and I will get annoyed with them.  I may decide we're not going to film at all tomorrow, but we're just going to spend time writing and planning.  I want the kids to really think through their ideas before we turn the cameras on.  I also want them to have a fun final product to watch on Friday.