The students quickly demonstrated that they were quite skilled with the structure of a short story and could develop a creative and engaging plot. What they seemed to struggle with was the development of strong and engaging characters in their stories. With some thought, I developed the following activity which I hoped would help students connect attributes of their favourite movie or novel characters, with the characters they were developing in their short stories.
I spent a double lesson brainstorming popular characters with the students and what they liked about them. I used the following table to promote discussion.
To effectively integrate popular culture and digital technology, educators must keep abreast of the latest trends in youth popular culture and digital resources. Williamson (2009) says we must take more notice of the different ways youths consume, interpret and communicate ideas about and through media. To support learning, we must understand the cultural experience of young people in a continually emerging digital media landscape. As the activity above demonstrates, this knowledge can be used to enhance and extend writing, to stimulate discussion in our classrooms. After reading Green & Beavis (2013), I realize that embracing the changing forms of textuality, technology and new media as part of our culture and pedagogy, is a necessary but challenging quest for any educator, but especially a literacy/ English teacher.
References
Green, B. & Beavis, C. (2013). Ch 4: "Literacy Education in the age of New Media." International Handbook of Research on Children's Literacy, Learning and Culture. Eds. Kathy Hall, Teresa Cremin, Barbara Comber & Luis Moll. London: Wiley, pp.42-53.
Hall, L. (2011). How popular culture texts inform and shape students’ discussions of social studies texts. Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy. 55(4), 296-305.
Jenkins, H. et al. (2006) Confronting the challenges of participatory culture: media education for the 21st century. MacArthur Foundation. Retrieved from http://digitallearning.macfound.org/site/c.enJLKQNlFiG/b.2108773/apps/nl/content2.asp?content_id={CD911571-0240-4714-A93B-1D0C07C7B6C1}¬oc=1
O'Sullivan, K. A. (2012). Books and blogs: Promoting reading achievement in digital contexts. In J. Manuel & S. Brindley (Eds.) Teenagers and reading: Literary heritages, cultural contexts and contemporary reading practices (pp. 191-209). South Australia: Wakefield Press/AATE.
Williamson, B. (2009). Games and learning. Benefits and challenges of using computer games in the classroom. Futurelab UK. Retrieved from http://media.futurelab.org.uk/podcasts/becta_talks/games/