Introduction
The curriculum units written for this H.T.I. seminar on Teaching Shakespeare and Film seem timely as the body of filmic interpretations of Shakespeare takes a quantum leap which enables, arguably for the first time, the resourceful teacher of Shakespeare to undertake the teaching of Shakespearean plays with filmic aids and enrichment at any level from primary through high school. The highly dedicated teachers in our seminar enthusiastically took on the task of writing these projects spanning from the topic of teaching Shakespeare reading readiness in kindergarten and first grade to using film to teach senior advanced placement for college credit courses using film to interpret the possibilities of meaning in a particular Shakespearean play’s scenes. As this has been my first experience as a seminar leader for H.T.I., let me honestly says that I had no idea that I was about to meet such talented, well-educated, creative, hardworking people. Neither was I prepared for the joy I was to get as we sat around a table watching clips of scores of Shakespearean films, television programs, cartoons and silent movies and then analyzing those works as well as working with notions of their potential usefulness in a classroom situation and the teaching goals that might be available to us through these works. My expectations were more than met and I came to understand, as we progressed through the Shakespearean dramatic cannon and the films available to us, that original, important work was going on around our conference table and that the crossing of theory with practice or praxis was occurring on a regular basis. . I am sincerely grateful to have been part of this learning experience. It has informed my teaching and made very real changes in my perspectives on many plays as well as the teaching of those plays. The few words that I am allowed here cannot do justice to the hard work, dedication, and scholarly efforts that the fellows brought to that table night after night after they had taught all day and then again as we met to work on the curriculum units Sunday after Sunday. Suffice it to say that my awe increased as we progressed through the seminar and at the end what remained was a deep gratitude to Dr. David Judkins, the University Of Houston Honors College, and the entire H.T.I. staff for the experience and an abiding respect for the scholarly fellows of the institute.
C. Gardener’s study “Shakespeare and Film: Exploring the World of Shakespeare through Children” is a curriculum unit for teachers of kindergarten to second grade who want to introduce Shakespeare and Shakespeare readiness into their classroom. An actress as well as a teacher, Gardener uses playing techniques such as assigning roles to the individual students and playing games related to “Who am I?” to create Shakespeare familiarity to the very young student. The reader of Ms. Gardner’s fine work will come away with a great respect for Gardener’s creativity in providing age appropriate assignments and films to accomplish the goals of the unit.
Michea Carter, from HISD’s Pin Oak Middle School, writes a curriculum unit entitled “What would Viola Do? Demystifying the Elitism of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night.” Through her work on Viola’s search for protection from dangers without the resources of a powerful family, family protections and funds, Ms. Carter analyzes the situations that lead to Viola’s cross-dressing as a form of hiding from an unsafe situation. Ms. Carter studies Viola’s behaviors as those of an abandoned daughter adapting to her new situation and looks at filmic moments that illustrate that adaptation. Her study includes some interesting analysis of physical threats of abuse in Twelfth Night.
Ané Nyoka Ebie, a veteran of several HTI seminars, a gifted actress and director, creates a curriculum unit which uses putting on a performance of West Side Story to teach Romeo and Juliet to her middle school students. A teacher in an ethnically diverse middle school, Mrs. Ebie has her students analyze the ritual and symbol in West Side Story, the movie, and Romeo and Juliet as they prepare for mounting their own production of West Side Story. Dealing with issues of delinquency, language barriers, the female buldingsroman and gender issues related to immigration, the absence of power and the militarization of urban space, our HTI scholar addresses, in a most effective way, issues that are familiar to her students through Shakespeare.
Erin M. Counihan has bravely created a scholarly unit entitled “What Are You, Chicken? Viewing Trustworthiness and Peer Pressure in Julius Caesar and Macbeth.” Perhaps the unit that aims at the most advance high school students of Shakespeare, Erin’s work uses Shakespearean films of the two plays to attempt to solve the age old problem of engaging students in the study of Julius Caesar. In the introduction to her unit, Mrs. Counihan admits that the unit was inspired by the fact that she had avoided teaching Julius Caesar for several years and, her knowledge that she was not alone in that dread of inspired her to attempt to write this very helpful unit to be used for upper level and even Advanced Placement for college credit students.
Mildred M. Espree, another longtime veteran teacher in the H.T. I program, offers this year to study the nature of evil from a philosophic and ethical perspective in her unit “Shakespeare in the Movies: Superstition, Revenge and the Nature of Evil in Macbeth and Hamlet.” The head of the Dept. of English at Houston’s prestigious Michael E. DeBakey High School for Health Professions, Mildred uses Polanski’s postmodern Macbeth as well as other filmic productions to study the intersection of superstition, crime, and evil in the play. Her unit introduces the advanced high school student of Shakespearean tragedy to postmodern critical theory related to Shakespeare’s plays in general and the cinematic history of those plays in particular. Who doubts that this venture into the study of ethics will be useful to her future medical professionals?
Jurline T. Franklin teaches sixth grade at Ortiz Middle School in H.I.S.D. Her very useful unit seems particularly appropriate and perhaps even timely as she introduces her special education students to Shakespearean late romance and The Tempest in particular. Using an extremely well thought out sequencing of assignments, Ms. Franklin provides her students with access to Shakespeare through accessible recent productions available to young students and written scripts of those programs which Ms. Franklin was able to obtain. This very well planned curriculum unit is helpful as well as resourceful.
Michael D. Harrison teaches English at Hogg Middle School in central Houston. His unit, entitled “Spitin’ One’s Love Like The Bard or Baller: Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, Jay-Z’s Bonnie and Clyde” and Usher’s “My Boo” uses sophisticated critical theory as it intersects with post-Dewey educational theory to create a brilliant unit on teaching Romeo and Juliet in the inner city. A highly readable, amazingly useful unit, this work illustrates Mr. Harrison’s sophistic ated grounding in the realities of teaching and the application possibilities of critical and educational theory. This is Mr. Harrison’s first seminar with H.T.I.
Kathryn Janes, a veteran of H.T.I. seminars and an Advanced Placement History Teacher at Jane Long Middle School. Ms. Janes is also a lawyer. Her cross-training informs her teaching unit using Henry V and Richard III to give her students practice in critical reading of texts that can be closely analyzed as propaganda. Using films as well as resources available to her students on the Internet, this unit explores the historical background of the history plays as Tudor propaganda and ends with the setting up of a Shakespearean mock trial.
Gretchen Kay Lutz is a graduate of Rice University’s Ph.D. program in English Literature and a veteran H.T.I. fellow. Dr. Lutz’s unit, “Shakespeare and Film: How Hamlet Speaks to Teenagers” focuses on the question of how students attempt to live up to their parents’ expectations. Concentrating on the Ghost’s controlling revenge command, Gretchen develops a unit that would make any high school student want to think about Shakespeare’s Hamlet. Her study of the parent-child relationship in Hamlet as well as the step-parent child relationship is both useful and timely.
Jessica Stockel’s unit “Not So Tame: The Taming of the Shrew” deals with serious issues of physical abuse and the law in Renaissance England and modern America using Ten Things I Hate About You and other modern adaptations of Shakespeare’s play. Through her study of the Renaissance notion of The Tamer Tamed Jessica analyzes alternative interpretations available through the filmic history of the play with goals including the analysis of Kate’s self-assured assertiveness, role -playing, and confidence. Ms. Stockel creates a very usable curriculum plan for high school students studying Shakespearean comedy through film.
Saundra Kelley is a teacher and director of dramatic productions at Welch Middle School. An early colleague of Laurence Fishburne, Ms. Kelley has many years experience as an actress in New York City and Houston and brought to the seminar her great understanding of Shakespearean thematic interpretation on stage. Her unit, “Focusing on The Outsider in Shakespeare and in Our Own Society: Coalescing Character Education, Film and Filmmaking” is an ambitious, useful study of the Outsider in Romeo and Juliet and the Merchant of Venice. Thoroughly grounded in her understanding of her audience, Ms. Kelley writes a unit that is on target in terms of the commonalities between her students and the characters in the Shakespearean plays studied through filmic interpretation.
Monica Arellano-Espitia is a native of Spain and has been teaching at Sugar Grove elementary for three years. Her brilliant, useful “Harry Potter: The Hamlet of the 21st.Century” is meant as a curriculum unit for her Fall E.S.L. class as it moves into a spring bilingual class. Using not only cartoon adaptations of Hamlet, but also the Harry Potter books and films, Ms. Arellano-Espitia proposes a curricular plan for 3rd. and 4th. Grade E.S.L. classes to intellectually motivated students who, like Harry Potter, are at a new school, removed from the environment that they knew, and beset by dangers. Using Shakespearean animated films in both English and Spanish, Ms. Arellano-Espitia creates a very usable curriculum unit.