A Midsummer Night's Dream for kids

This lesson introduces learners to Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream with the support of a short animated video.

Author

Rachael Ro

It is one of a series of lesson plans to accompany the short animated videos of six of Shakespeare's plays on LearnEnglish Kids.

Introduction

In this lesson plan, which can be delivered as a 125 minute lesson or as shorter segments over three lessons, learners will be introduced to the Shakespeare play A Midsummer Night's Dream through a short animated video. They will complete comprehension activities and then think about and discuss the ideas of 'dreams' and 'magic' from the play, with the teacher's guidance. Finally learners will develop their creative writing skills by imagining and writing about either a magical dream or a magic potion or spell.

Learning outcomes

Use strategies for watching and understanding a short video based on the Shakespeare play A Midsummer Night's Dream.
Practise comprehension and speaking skills by discussing ideas from the play.
Practise writing skills through a personalised writing activity based on an element from the play.

Age/ Level

Aged 9–12 and 13-17 years

Time

125 minute lesson or three shorter segments

Materials

Lesson plan
The A Midsummer Night's Dream video, worksheet (Print an activity)and other materials can be accessed here: https://learnenglishkids.britishcouncil.org/short-stories/midsummer-nights-dream

Part one (35 minutes)

Lead in (5 minutes)

Ask your learners if they usually remember their dreams or not. Have they ever had a really amazing dream?
Tell the learners that they are going to watch a video called A Midsummer Night’s Dream, but we don’t know if it’s really about a dream or not.

Prediction (10 minutes)

Give learners the video worksheet and ask them to match the words and pictures (exercise 1). Check answers as a class.
Ask learners to make some predictions about the video based on the words.

While watching (10 minutes)

Play the video and ask learners to match the characters and their names as they watch (exercise 2).
Ask them to compare in pairs and then check as a class.

Post watching (10 minutes)

Now ask learners to try to order the sentences (exercise 3). Tell them it doesn’t matter if they can’t remember, because they will watch the video again.
Play the video again and learners check their answers to exercise 3. Ask them to compare in pairs, then go through as a class.
At this stage, you might like to ask learners additional questions to help clarify their understanding or ask them to say which of their earlier predictions were correct.
Ask learners if they liked the story and why. Did they think it was funny, interesting, happy/sad, etc.?
If your learners need more support understanding the video, you might like to adapt the transcript of the video and get learners to act it out.

Part two (40 minutes)

Discuss ideas from the play (10 mins)

Two of the ideas in A Midsummer Night’s Dream are ‘dreams’ and ‘magic’. The depth to which you discuss the ideas and questions in this stage will depend on your learners’ age and maturity, and you may need to provide more or less support.

Ask your learners if they think the ending was a happy ending, and why. Elicit ‘because they were all in love with the right person at the end’ – Hermia and Lysander love each other, and Helena and Demetrius love each other.
But what was the situation at the beginning of the play? Elicit that Hermia and Lysander loved each other, and Helena loved Demetrius, but Demetrius didn’t love Helena.
Now ask your learners why Demetrius loves Helena at the end of the play. Elicit that it is because Oberon uses the magic flower to make him fall in love with her.

Group debate (30 minutes)

Ask learners if it was a dream or did it really happen? If it was a dream, how come Demetrius loves Helena when they wake up?
Tell one side of the class they are ‘dreamers’; tell the other side they are ‘not dreamers’. Break the dreamers and non dreamers into smaller, workable groups.
The dreamers must come up with 5 reasons why the play was a dream.
The non dreamers must come up with five reasons it wasn’t.
Monitor and support
Once all groups have five ideas, elicit the language for debate. E.g.

Expressing Opinions Strongly

I strongly believe that...
There is no doubt that...
It is clear that...
I am convinced that...

Challenging Opposing Arguments

I disagree with the idea that...
That's not necessarily true...
I would argue that..

Summarizing and Concluding

In conclusion,...
To sum up,...
Overall,...
Therefore,...

Other Useful Phrases

Could you clarify that?
I would like to add that...
It's important to remember that...
I'd like to point out that..

Put learners into new groups that are a mixture of ‘dreamers’ and ‘non dreamers. Tell them they must convince their group that their ideas are correct. They should try to make a group decision if it was a dream or not.
Allow 10 minutes for debating, then ask for feedback from each group about what they decided.

Part three (50 minutes)

Introducing topic (10 minutes)

In the play, a magic flower is used to make people fall in love with each other. Ask your learners if they know any other stories where the characters have used magic. How did they make the magic? For example, was it a magic potion or a magic spell?

Visualisation (10 minutes)

Ask learners to imagine they could go to sleep tonight and dream about something magical happening. Ask them to close their eyes and think about the answers to your questions.
What would they like to dream about? Ask: