8th Graders Create Movie Trailers to Culminate Style Study

To culminate a recent Style Study unit in English, eighth graders at North Shore Middle School are creating, filming, and editing movie trailers for one of their short stories under the direction of their teachers Ms. Donovan, Mr. Mitchell, and Mr. Willgoos.

English Teacher Brendon Mitchell said, “In our Style Study unit, students read three short stories and worked to identify how authors create mood through the use of figurative language, word choice, and sentence structure.  We discussed the rich figurative language of "The Sniper," the plot-driving dialogue and the symbolic weather of "Ashes," and the verisimilitude of Bradbury's classic, "There Will Come Soft Rains." 

Students are currently conveying the mood and style of one of these stories in an original movie trailer.  Students worked last week in creating storyboards for the trailers and have started filming. To complete their project, the eighth graders will edit their movie trailers and there will be a mini film festival to assess and analyze them. 

Mr. Mitchell concluded by saying, “In addition to the film project, students wrote story extensions in which they worked to capture the tone and mood of an author in their own writing.  Both the movie trailer and the writing emulation projects are based on Common Core and 21st Century Skills standards as students learn to analyze text for style, compare literature and film, and write, write, write!”

Photos by Shelly Newman