Teaching Strategies
The goal of this unit is for students to be able to recognize thematic ideas and then to compare those ideas in the two films. Students will explore the themes and film elements using a variety of strategies. Students will need to study similar topics more than once to internalize the concepts. Students will use the plot mountains after each film to check for understanding of the film’s storyline. This will prepare them for the character analysis of the protagonist in each film and a second major character. Following this, students will complete a gallery walk of scenes from each film to analyze the films’ elements. Lastly, students will compare themes in the film using Venn diagrams and t-charts.
Plot Mountain Diagrams or Freytag’s Pyramid
Plot mountain diagrams, also known as Freytag’s Pyramid, are visual models of a plot development. These diagrams come in a variety of different graphic organizers. First, students will diagram the plot progression of chapters in the memoir. Next, students will take one of their journal entries and fill in the plot on their own plot mountains.
Character Trait Analysis
Students will analyze the protagonists of each movie. The teacher will write the name of the character at the top of the chart. Then students will use stickie notes to write a word that describes the character. Under the word the students write an explanation for the character trait they wrote down. For instance, if a student writes, “spunky” to describe Wadjda, under the word the student can write, “She wears tennis instead of her school shoes” or “She doesn’t follow all of the rules.”
Gallery Walk
I will have screenshots of a few scenes from each movie. Students will have a notetaking sheet where they jot down their ideas or thoughts of the scene. Typically, a question will be posed for them to answer or an element that they will look for in the picture of the scene. Students can work with a partner or individually as they walk around the room filling in their notetaker sheet. The notetaker sheet should have the images and questions making it simple for students to follow. Teachers can set a timer and have students go to the first station for a set time period. Then when the timer alerts them, they switch and go to the next station and fill out their notetaker. Once all of the students have completed the gallery walk, the class will have a discussion about the questions and what their notes.
Some of the scenes from the films for the gallery are listed below:
- Mirabel’s song “Waiting for a Miracle” in Encanto
- Mirabel and Abuela’s fight in Encanto
- Opening shot of shoes in Wadjda
- Wide shot of Wadjda walking with Abdullah in Wadjda
- Wide shot of Wadjda watching her classmates get in trouble in Wadjda
T-Chart
Students will compare various aspects of each movie using t-charts. To use a T-chart, students will need a sheet of paper with a large lowercase “t”. On each side of the vertical line, students write the topics that they will compare. For instance, on one side a student can write, “realism” and the other side “fantasy”. Then under each section students will list the attributes of the topics as they saw from the films. Students can work individually or with a partner. When the students are done with their charts, the class can review the t-charts together. The teacher can copy the answers on to a large t-chart on chart paper to capture and consolidate the most frequent answers.
Another strategy for using t-charts is to put students into groups and have each group work on different t-charts. One group can have “realism” and “fantasy” another group could have “Wadjda” and “Mirabel,” lastly another group could have “feeling like an outsider in family” “feeling like an outsider in society” to compare the perspectives of Mirabel and Wadjda. The purpose of the t-charts is for students to list attributes that they see about the topics.
Venn Diagram
Venn diagrams can also be used the same way as the t-charts. The difference with the Venn diagrams is that the diagrams have a space for students to organizes the topics’ differences and similarities. Good topics to use for the Venn diagrams would consist of the thematic ideas themselves so that students can have a visual notion of which themes in the films overlap. For instance, family, outsider, coming of age, and family roles could be in the center of the Venn diagram. The words, “independence” and “rebellion” could be on Wadjda’s side of the diagram and “redemption” and “forgiveness” could be on the Encanto side.
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