Last week a group of year 7 students were involved in a Literacy Project based on Shakespeare’s The Tempest. The aim of the project was to immerse the students in the plot and themes of the text, to help remove taboos relating to studying Shakespeare and to help them grow in confidence with regards to school and Literacy.
Through a range of creative activities the year 7s explored The Tempest with local artist Glenn Martin, English teacher, Mrs Smith and Librarian, Ms Ryan.
At the beach the students were able to experience the atmosphere of the sea and understand and appreciate its power. They were able to imagine that they too were castaways washed up on the sand and how frightening that might have been. The beach also allowed the students to create some fantastic art works and talk about the language we could use to describe our environment and emotions.
Throughout the week they worked with clay to recreate characters to help further develop their understanding of the text. They depicted key scenes from the text by creating boxes inspired by Joseph Cornell and used reclaimed items found on the beach to produce a sculpture based on the text.
Back at school, students used their beach experience to compose a musical response with Mrs Peckham and performed Act 1 Scene 1 with Mr Lyle to gain further appreciation of the play.
Students ended the week by producing a fantastic exhibition of their work for parents last Friday afternoon. On Thursday 6 October we travelled up to London in the sunshine to watch The Tempest be performed on the South Bank in the world Famous, Shakespeare’s Globe. The students experienced what it was like to watch a play during the Elizabethan Age.
Thanks go to Ms Keogh and Ms Begley for driving the minibus and the Weather Wizard for being on our team.
