The Art of Biography

Activities

Imagination Tune Ups

To begin with I am going to divide the class in half. One half will remain in the classroom and the other half will go to the hallway. The half in the classroom will be asked to examine a unique or interesting object I have brought in. The students can handle the object and observe everything they can about it. I will ask them to view this item like a reporter – someone who can see something clearly enough to describe it to others in such a way the others think they have actually seen the item.

I will then bring in the students from the hallway and pair each one with a student from the class. Each student from the class will then describe the object to their partner. I will then reveal the object to the whole class and we will compare the descriptions that were given. Part of the conversation will center around our ability notice details.

The next phase of the activity is to practice scene recall. The groups will switch (those who were in the classroom will now be in the hall and vice versa). The group in the classroom will be treated to a scene of another teacher coming to my room and us getting into a confrontation. The rest of the activity above will be repeated.

Lastly, I will guide them towards viewing the Little Rock Nine Picture by Will Counts. I will turn off the lights and close the blinds. I have pillows in the room so I am going to ask them to lie on the pillows and close their eyes while I talk to them about the events leading up to the event in the Little Rock Nine picture. I will encourage them to use all of their senses but sight to imagine the situation. I will then ask them to open their eyes to view the picture. We will then have a popcorn style of format for their reactions. The goal for the students to see the picture through the eyes of the background story.

A Picture Is Worth 1000 Words

To begin with I am going to show the students a picture of an unknown little girl. I will ask them to brainstorm what they literally see and do not see. We will then make predictions about the little girl (i.e. what her life was like and how her life turned out). I will then show them another picture of the little girl except this time with her family. Does the new picture reinforce our predictions about the little girl or refute them? Do we need to amend our predictions based upon this new evidence. I will then tell them who the little girl is and then fill them in on the whole story about the girl in the picture.

Next, I will ask the students to take a picture of someone other than a family member or friend. The students will then use their imagination to write a short biography of the person in the picture. The goal is to practice storytelling.

For the next part of the activity, I will divide the students into small groups of 2-3 students. Each group will be assigned an iconic picture. The students will then use the laptop computers to research their picture. I will guide them on their search. The goal is to find out what is going on in the picture and why it is important. Each group will present their picture and story to the rest of the class.

Lastly, each student will choose their Brotherhood person by researching pictures and begin to conduct their research.

Two Walts

This activity will be part of the 1000 words activity. After looking at the pictures of the little girl, I will show the students a picture of Former President Lyndon B. Johnson during WWII. I am counting on the students not knowing who the picture is of. We will continue our brainstorming and predicting process from the 1000 words activity. I will then tell the students what was happening at the time the picture was taken and what we now know of LBJ. We will then discuss whether the new information changes how we view the picture.

Next, I will divide the students into groups of 4-5. I will hand each group a blank KWL chart. Each group will then brainstorm what they know about Walt Disney and then write a list of questions they want to know. I will then Google pictures of Walt Disney. The students will see that literally hundreds of pictures come up and nearly all of them show Walt Disney in his later years with a big smile on his face. Does this picture confirm or refute what we thought we knew about Walt Disney? Then focus on the picture that Neal Gabler used as the picture on the front cover of his biography of Disney. What is different in this picture? Why do they think Gabler chose this picture?

Using the laptop computers I will then guide the students through the process of using the district's online databases to begin looking up background information on Walt Disney. We will begin with the resource that is the simpliest and progress through each progressive resource in order of difficulty. We will be using the Pyramid Diagram strategy ⁷⁴