Freak the Mighty by Rodman Philbrick is an all-time favorite novel for middle school students. In this module, students will be comparing the written story to its filmed version, analyzing the effects and techniques unique to each medium.
This module is taught in October, near the beginning of our 7th grade year. Students have read the novel Freak the Mighty as a demonstration of the collaborative literature circle format we will be using for the rest of the year. Freak the Mighty has 25 chapters. Students are in literature circles with five roles: Discussion Director, Term Tracker, Successful Summarizer, Vexing Vocabularist, and Creative Connector. They rotate roles every set of five chapters, so that they may get the feel for the literature circle roles and their purposes before we start reading independently in literature circles throughout the year. These literature circle roles also help prepare students for their Media Circle roles they play throughout this module.
This module is taught at the end of the unit, after students have closely read the novel and discussed the it thoroughly through their literature circles. From their literature circles, we then form Media Circles in which students will work collaboratively to closely read and analyze the film The Mighty. Students will be taking their knowledge of the characters, plot, and theme of the novel and comparing the techniques that the author used to develop the novel and comparing and contrasting those to the techniques that are used in the film.
Their ultimate task is to decide if the movie remains faithful to the novel.
During this analysis, students will learn the basic elements of film to help them compare and contrast the storytelling techniques used in film vs. print text.
Media Circle Roles: Director, Screenwriter, Cinematographer, Sound Director, and Casting Director
Students will rotate through each of the five roles, but since reading film is new learning for the majority of students, it is essential to explain each of the roles to the Media Circle groups and to guide students through thinking aloud on the exposition of the movie/first rotation to familiarize them with the duties of each role.
After each day's role, each student will write a CER (Claim/Evidence/Reasoning) reflection comparing the fidelity of the movie to the novel through the lens of the role each student played on that day.
Targeted Focus Standards:
RL.7.7 Compare and contrast a written story to its filmed version, analyzing the effects of techniques unique to each medium.
CCR.R.2 Determine central ideas or themes of a text and analyze their development; summarize the key supporting details and ideas.
CCR.R.3 Analyze how and why individuals, events, and ideas develop and interact over the course of a text.
W.7.1 Write arguments to support claims with clear reasons and relevant evidence.
RL.7.1 Cite several pieces of textual evidence to support what the text says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text.
