Pam Henderson, an English IV teacher, has her students engage with and critically analyze Shakespeare's Macbeth through a fascinating lens - cooking!
Ms. Henderson has her students create - and make - literary recipes that represent a character from the text. Ms. Henderson describes the project and the classes' process: "Throughout our reading of the play, students kept track of character traits (direct and indirect) for each of the main characters. When we finished the reading and tracking, they were then asked to choose a character whom they believed they could best represent in an edible manner. (For instance, many worked with Lady Macbeth due to her "spicy" personality, or Duncan because they found him to be "sweet".) After finding class members who had chosen the same character, they set out to decide, as a group, what sort of recipe was most feasible and fun for them. After careful planning, they spent the day in the Foods classroom creating their Edible Macbeth dishes. In a nod to the banquet scene, all projects were shared with the class."
Ms. Henderson integrates the arts throughout her classes, as she has found, "that allowing my students to create art (edible or not) with words/stories/characters frees them, and gets them excited about some of the more 'regular' aspects of the day to day classroom experience. [For this project,]The reminders that they would eventually attempt to turn these characters into an edible creation helped to focus them. In essence, I wanted to take the normal Shakespeare lesson a step further by having my kids interpret these characters, in an outside the box way, after we had closed the book."
This project was a stand-out for both students and Ms. Henderson. Ms. Henderson noted that when students are engaged with the class material and with each other, everyone benefits from an incredibly rich learning environment.
Way to go Ms. Henderson!
Ms. Henderson has her students create - and make - literary recipes that represent a character from the text. Ms. Henderson describes the project and the classes' process: "Throughout our reading of the play, students kept track of character traits (direct and indirect) for each of the main characters. When we finished the reading and tracking, they were then asked to choose a character whom they believed they could best represent in an edible manner. (For instance, many worked with Lady Macbeth due to her "spicy" personality, or Duncan because they found him to be "sweet".) After finding class members who had chosen the same character, they set out to decide, as a group, what sort of recipe was most feasible and fun for them. After careful planning, they spent the day in the Foods classroom creating their Edible Macbeth dishes. In a nod to the banquet scene, all projects were shared with the class."
Ms. Henderson integrates the arts throughout her classes, as she has found, "that allowing my students to create art (edible or not) with words/stories/characters frees them, and gets them excited about some of the more 'regular' aspects of the day to day classroom experience. [For this project,]The reminders that they would eventually attempt to turn these characters into an edible creation helped to focus them. In essence, I wanted to take the normal Shakespeare lesson a step further by having my kids interpret these characters, in an outside the box way, after we had closed the book."
This project was a stand-out for both students and Ms. Henderson. Ms. Henderson noted that when students are engaged with the class material and with each other, everyone benefits from an incredibly rich learning environment.
Way to go Ms. Henderson!