to object to Facebook-themed homework for Y7?

[Maiasaurus]

DS1 is 12 and in Y7. This term they are studying Shakespeare's A Mid-Summer Night's Dream.

This week's homework was to design Oberon's Facebook 'wall'.

First of all, I had to sign up to Facebook (something I have avoided up to now), then we had to find someone with a 'wall' to see what they looked like.

AIBU to have a word with DS's English teacher about the suitability of this homework for 11 and 12 year-olds? Or is my dislike of social networking sites colouring my judgement here?

Or is it just that I hate the way that Shakespeare has to be made to fit in today's world so that teachers can be 'down with the kids'? (Or whatever they say in 21st century freaky, modern slang ).

Ok. It's not crap homework. Sorry. Thanks to your explanations I can see that this sort of exercise could be really interesting and rewarding.

But, DS is 12. He has never shown any interest in Facebook. No-one in this household had a FB account (I do now). None of us knew what a 'wall' looked like.

A pretend wall sheet would have been useful RealEyes, as well as a bit more explanation of what was expected.

I have seen this used in History; I think it's great and really engages the pupils. Agree with realeyes.

Ooh tricky one. I do like things that make Shakespeare (or whatever) accessible... But purely for the age of the students, YANBU. More appropriate for year 9 where everyone is old enough for it.

This educational site might be of interest to teachers and parents tackling this approach - it lets you create fake online Facebook style profiles for historical figures, characters etc. classtools.net/fb/home/page

Yes, that is useful! I usually use a screenshot of a (very boring on FB, as she'd agree) mate's wall as a template...

...that's a handy tool which I'll share with Dept. Thanks!

ariadnestar, thanx so much for that link, i start English PGCE in Sept and think it's an amazing resource!

I agree it's a very good task, which is suitable for a top set because of the potential complexity. I've never actually used it, but can imagine how effective it would be.
FB profiles would show relationships and interactions between characters, in addition to characters' thoughts and feelings - it's a really in-depth exploration of characterisation, and also has scope to use direct quotations from the text.

"Or is it just that I hate the way that Shakespeare has to be made to fit in today's world so that teachers can be 'down with the kids'? "
Shakespeare does fit in with today's world, this is just a slightly more modern approach, but one that still covers all the key skills for English. It's not radically different to a letter or diary entry in essence, is it?

for 11 and 12 year olds it's not good homework at all. I'd write a note to the teacher because unless you tell them how you feel they won't know that ANY parent had an issue with this, and will carry this forward as part of their course.
They should aim it at 13 year olds and above, otherwise what message are they giving - we're constantly told we must support and back up the school's homework, behaviour etc policies, but it has to go both ways. Many parents will be trying hard to keep to the guidelines/rules around internet use so the school need to respect the ages of the kids and not introduce this stuff until they're at least able to get on it 'legally'.

Fine if there's a template, not OK if not. We don't do FB in my household, or didn't until ds was 15 and told me he'd opened an account.

There has to be a template imo as not every child will have internet access/computer access at home.