Telling the Story of Style

Author: Mary Stroud

Activity brief description: This exercise is designed to help students think about style through enacting certain aspects of style in a storytelling mode. Revisiting course readings from the beginning of the quarter, students analyze passages for stylistic content while also teaching a specific aspect of style to the rest of the class. Hence, the activity aims to bridge objective analysis with direct applications of style.

Class: PWR 1/PWR 2

Schedule: Weeks 8, 9, or 10 as students are addressing their final revisions on their RBAs and thinking more about style.

Activity length: Approx. 60 min.

Activity goals: This activity has three goals:

1. First, it allows students to analyze one aspect of style more closely by revisiting readings from the first part of class;
2. Second, it creates an opportunity for students to enact a certain aspect of style through creating a story about that stylistic element; and
3. Third it allows students to gain a deeper understanding of how style works through teaching it to other students.

Activity details: Please see the handout. 

Additional notes:

This activity was originally published in fall 2014 as an Activity of the Week.