Twelfth Night for kids

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 45-minute lesson or as shorter segments over three lessons, learners will be introduced to the Shakespeare play Twelfth Night through a short animated video. They will watch the video and complete comprehension activities, and then will be guided to think about and discuss the idea of 'disguise' from the play. Finally learners will develop their creative writing skills by imagining and writing about disguising themselves as someone for the day.

Aims

• Use strategies for watching and understanding a short video based on the Shakespeare play Twelfth Night.
• 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

Aged9–12 years (CEFR B1)

Time

115-125 minutes. This can be done over three shorter segments

Materials

• Lesson plan
• The Twelfth Night video, worksheet and other materials can be accessed here: https://learnenglishkids.britishcouncil.org/short-stories/twelfth-night

Part one (40 minutes)

Warmer (10 minutes)

• Ask your learners if they have seen any characters on TV or in films who wear a disguise, for example a show or film with superheroes or spies. 

Prediction (10 minutes)

• Tell the learners that they are going to watch a video called Twelfth Night, which is a story about a girl who disguises herself as a boy. 
• 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)

• Put learners into pairs
• Now ask them to try to order the sentences (exercise 3). Tell them it doesn’t matter if they can’t remember everything, because they will watch the video again. 
• Play the video again and learners check their answers to exercise 3. Ask them to compare their answers again with their partner, 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.

Part two (35 minutes)

Review (15 minutes)

• Put learners into pairs and ask them to circle true or false (exercise 4) as they watch. Fast finishers can try to correct the false sentences.  
• Elicit the story from learners. If they find this difficult play the video again.
  Note: Repetition can help learners to pick up more information from a listening, as hearing the same information multiple times helps attune learners to the sounds of English.
• Ask learners if they liked the story and why. Did they think it was funny, interesting, happy/sad, etc.? 
  Note: 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.

Discuss ideas from the play (20 minutes)

• One of the ideas in Twelfth Night is ‘disguise’. 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.
• Put learners into discussion groups. Elicit some discussion language. E.g:

Giving opinions

1. I think…
2. In my opinion
3. I believe…

Asking for opinions

1. What do you think?
2. Do you agree?
3. What’s your opinion?
   Agreeing
       I think the same.
       I couldn’t agree more.
       That’s right.

Disagreeing

1. I don’t agree.
2. I don’t think so.
3.  That’s not right
    

• Play the part of the video where Viola says she can’t tell the truth because of her disguise (1.34). 
• Ask your learners to imagine they are Viola’s friend. What advice would they give her at this point? Should she tell the truth or not? They discuss in their groups.
• Ask one person from each group to summarise their discussion (or 3 or 4 groups if you have a large class)
• Now play the part of the video where Sebastian arrives, and Viola takes off her disguise (3.03). If Sebastian hadn’t arrived, do they think Viola would have told the truth or continued wearing her disguise?
• Again learners discuss in their groups and then one spokesperson summarises their discussion to the whole group.
• Ask your learners if they have ever been in a situation where it was hard to tell the truth. What happened? 
  Tip: Creating group roles can help group discussion be more successful. E.g. facilitator; note-taker; spokesperson; English checker; time keeper. 

Part three (40 - 50 minutes)

Brainstorming (10 mins)

• Ask your learners if they have ever dressed up as someone or something, for example for a school performance or a party. What or who did they dress up as? Did people recognise them in their costume or were they disguised?
• Now ask them to imagine they could disguise themselves as anyone for a day! Who would they disguise themselves as? What would they wear? Where would they go and what would they do? Brainstorm some ideas on the board, for example the President, a celebrity or their teacher!

Preparation for writing (10 minutes)

• Ask learners to choose an idea and make notes about their clothes and accessories, the places they would go and the things they would do in their notebooks. Monitor and support as necessary.

Writing (20-30 minutes)

• Learners use their notes to write a paragraph about their disguise. 
• Put learners into pairs. They share their paragraphs and give feedback.
• Nominate a few learners to read out their paragraphs to the whole group.

Differentiated version

• Create a template for all learners to use. Add more scaffolding, such as sentence starters to the templates for learners who need more support. Or you could introduce the RAFT strategy.
• Display learners’ work around the room and ask learners to read each other’s work They say which day sounds like the most fun. 

Further activities and useful links

• Extend your learners’ work with Twelfth Night: https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/shakespeare-extension-activities-kids
• BBC Bitesize English, Twelfth Night: https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/articles/zhw9vwx 
• RAFT strategy: https://www.readwritethink.org/professional-development/strategy-guides/using-raft-writing-strategy