A creative lesson plan

The lesson is done with my Secondary 2 Language Arts class. The focus of the lesson is on character study of some of the key figures in Animal Farm—Old Major, Mr. Jones, Napoleon, Squealer, Snowball and Boxer. As this lesson is conducted during the school’s theme on popular culture, I have decided to ask the students to work in groups to create a found poem based on the character allocated to them.

What they are supposed to do is to select appropriate words and phrases from the first 3 chapters of Animal Farm that will help them create a found poem that illustrates the character traits of the particular character. In their found poems, they should include descriptions of the character as well as the key events that are related to the character. They can also play around with the color and fonts used, as well as the structure of the poem. However, they will need to explain why they have chosen to present their found poem in a certain way.

After the groups are done with the found poem, one representative from each group will have to write down the main discussion points on the whiteboard. This enables the students to learn about other characters aside from the one they are working on. In a single period lesson, the students have learnt about the 6 characters although they have been working only on one for their found poem. Selected students are to present on the group’s found poem.