Sketch Workshop; Fences

Please get into the following groups and read/comment about each other's original sketches.

Group 1: Linden, Simone, Pia, David, Ariel, Amir, Thalia

Group 2: Harrison, Hannah, Giovanni, Aryonna, Andrew, Kelly, Sarah


Your comments should include:

• Read the scripts OUT LOUD. Practice reading parts and dialogue out loud to hear it come alive! Share parts. The writer should not play his/her own character roles. Choose roles within your groups. Everyone should help read out loud!
• Notice errors in formatting, spelling, or grammar for each script. 
• Comment on the effectiveness of each script--did you think the sketch was funny: why or why not. Aim to give constructive criticism. What could the playwright have done to improve the scene? What did the playwright do that worked?

When both groups have finished reading and discussing the plays that were turned in, we will go to the library to pick up our next play: Fences by August Wilson.

If you missed it last class, or did not do your homework--here it is again:

Please research and take notes in your journal to find information about:

1. August Wilson is a famous playwright. Find out about him at this link.
2. In 1918 when Troy Maxson is your age (about 14), he leaves the South for Pittsburgh. His father was a sharecropper. What is a sharecropper? What was life like for a sharecropper in the South? How did the system of sharecropping entrap people? How could a person escape that life? Read about it here.
3. The Negro League (What was it? What happened to it? Why was it created? etc.)
4. Jackie Robinson & Satchel Paige (who are these ballplayers?)
5. The setting of this play is 1957. Please research and find information about this time period. Some questions to help guide your research are:

• What were the social, economic, political and educational expectations and opportunities for African Americans at this time?
• What advances had been made in civil rights?
• What significant changes will occur in America during the years between 1957 and 1965?

Some links to help prepare you (feel free to take notes on the following):

Images of the civil rights movement
Images of “the children’s crusade" of the civil rights movement
Timeline of the civil rights movement

HOMEWORK: Read the rest of the play. Complete a play analysis for the play. Due Monday, Nov. 26.