This American Life

I am very fortunate to teach in the same school where my daughters attend. This is a unique opportunity for me. Recently, I have been working on a project with my daughter's 11th grade AP English class. It turned out very well. I was pleased, and the students enjoyed it.

I worked with the teacher at the beginning of the school year to develop this project, and I wrote a grant to allow for the purchase of noise cancelling headset, as well as other items needed for the project. It was very exciting to see it come to fruition.

On NPR there is a weekly radio show from a Chicago station which is marvelous called "This American Life." It features stories of everyday people who relay their stories and reflect on what happened. We modeled our project after this show. We had the students listen to an episode entitled, "Music Lessons."

Our students then wrote essays using other background from a photo journal which they previously create when reading Black Boy by Richard Wright. We discussed Naturalism and all of its elements. Then they transformed their essays into three acts and a prologue which they used to narrate a movie of their stories, or their "Eleventh Grade Life." The stories above are from my daughter. I thought that it turned out well. Because we are very "nature oriented" people, she chose to use "Elements" (Earth, Water and Fire) as her theme to demonstrate her nature, nurture and free will (Naturalism).

If you are interested in teaching materials for this project, just email me.