In groups, learners design sets for the play, "Shakespeare Stealer." They sketch a scale model of a set and present it to the teacher, who will choose which group gets to design the entire set. 

Comparing the more modern film Ten Things I Hate About You to The Taming of the Shrew leads to an understanding of how Shakespearean plots can be applied to modern-day situations and characters. As a culminating activity, groups select a...

"I all alone beweep my outcast state." After a discussion of the "Shakespeare in American Life" segment in which Maya Angelou's relates her reaction to Sonnet 29, class groups create and perform a scene about an outcast that includes the...

Looking for ways to implement the words and works of William Shakespeare into your curriculum? This list of activity ideas is a great starting point, as it covers a wide range of grade levels and a wealth of online references to explore.

Young thespians can try their hand at writing a script and acting out a scene, while gaining a deeper understanding of the universal topics presented in Shakespeare's wide array of plays. Begin the lesson plan by conducting a compare and...

Students relate legends of lucky objects such as a rabbit's foot and principles of Feng Shui to fate and free will concepts that are expressed in Shakespeare's play, "Julius Casear". In small groups, they redesign the palace of Casear to...

“All the world’s a stage,” exclaims Jaques in As You Like It, but it is the structure of the Globe stage and how that structure influenced Shakespeare’s plays that is the focus of an on-line research project. Class members visit a series...

Here is an authentic assessment task for Shakespeare's Macbeth. Young literature scholars prepare, perform, and record a news broadcast about the major events in the play. For example, groups may choose to report on the death of Lady...

Few aspects of life make better fodder for a comedic play than politics. A study guide introduces George Bernard's Shaw comedy Arms and the Man. Along with summaries of each scene and brief biographies of the main characters, two lesson...

Students study, interpret, perform, and present various Shakespearean works adapted for middle school Students. They choose a scene from one of the plays covered in this teaching unit to reenact with a group.

Students, after an introduction to Shakespeare's "Othello," compare/contrast the themes in the play to today's society. In addition, they write their own script for the play of "Othello" based on predictions of what they think will...

Students study the work of William Shakespeare. They survey the elements of comedy and tragedy and read plays and poems. They discuss the texts they read and recite poetry. They dramatize poems with movement and sounds and write poetry...

Students create original costumes and make-up for a puppet presentation of a scene from Shakespeare in this week long creative project. Performances of the Shakespeare scenes end this lesson geared towards state and national standards...

Students view a new adaptation of composer Charles Fran¿¿ois Gounod's opera "Romeo and Juliet", based on Shakespeare's 16th-century play. They conduct research on the era in which Shakespeare lived, write and respond to letters from...

Learners explore the language of Shakespeare. In this literature lesson, students examine words invented by Shakespeare as they interpret their meanings in drawings. Learners pantomime the meanings and then write a short story...

Students become playwrights. In this Shakespeare lesson, students paraphrase familiar Shakespearian scenes that they perform for their classmates in 60 seconds.

Students read, act, and write about an act from the play Twelfth Night. In this play analysis lesson, students read a summary of the act and discuss various segments of the play. Students identify literary and vocabulary points and...

Students study the life and works of William Shakespeare. They investigate the art of playwriting and write a play of their own.

Students explore where Shakespeare exists in local community plays. In this Shakespeare lesson plan, students create a documentary to define the existence of Shakespeare in their community drama activities. Students participate in...

Students perform a "dumb show" based on a short passage from either A Midsummer Night's Dream or King Lear. This technique allows students to explain the action taking place on stage and the variety of different ways that action can be...

Learners role-play the position of Lady Macbeth's nurse. They are to create a project or service that can cure her sleepwalking. They create their own commerical to sell their product.

Create a picture dictionary for one of William Shakespeare's most famous plays. After readers finish The Tempest, they assign each letter of the alphabet to a concept or character, and add a description and evidence from...

Partners choose, research, and analyze fictional or historical characters and design character life boxes to represent them. They also compose a rhyme royal, which they understand inductively by deconstructing examples. Based largely on...

Students determine the meaning of a soliloquy and examine the themes in Shakespeare's, Hamlet. In this literature instructional activity, students read Hamlet's soliloquy and watch a Photo Story 3 text model of such. They write a...