Is this normal for secondary (year 7)?

[Cathycomehome]

My son's homework over half term has included making a sock puppet of a character from "Hamlet", and building a "shoe box solar system" - both of which he did at primary school, in year 5 for the solar system, and year 2 for the sock puppet, except the sock puppet was a character from a book they were reading.

I cannot see the educational value in this, and when I asked him if he knew why he had to make the dratted sock puppet, he replied "Yes - we are going to use them to act out a scene from the play, and I have one line, which is, (something like), "Ohhh Nooo!!!", said dramatically".

"How much of the play have you read", I ask. "Hardly any - we have just learnt a bit about the story", he replies.

A previous homework, last week or the week before, was to retell the story of Hamlet in a cartoon strip form. Which, again, I think is a really childish activity, rendered pretty meaningless also, considering they haven't read much, or possibly any, of the play.

Is this normal? Because I expected far more from the vast majority of my kids when I taught Year 6, and this year with my 3/4 class, I still wouldn't set this kind of homework for literacy.

Sockpuppets are ace! That's homework sorted for my year seven class this week.

Here's the Playmobil Tempest. These kids have clearly loved studying the play and have got loads out of this activity. Do you think it was homework?

It is all the rage at the moment among us English teachers. Several at my school are doing Playmobil Macbeth. I am doing a wooden Macbeth as I couldn't afford to get PLaymobil but got a cracking wooden castle and figures second hand.

I like this too

You'd have to be a pretty miserable sort of person not to see that the value of this sort of activity in getting kids engaged in the text and having fun with it.

But I repeat at some point they will actually have to look at the text itself or part of it.

I don't think any of my son's friends did think making the sock puppet was fun! "Have you done that bloody sock puppet thing?" was one comment I overheard when my son's mates were over in the holidays - response from another one "I'm trying to get my mum to do it" .

They maybe had fun acting it out, I guess.

PS - one bit of my son's comic strip did make me laugh - he had Hamlet in the picture box looking mad, and the speech bubble said "Words, words, words". In the caption underneath, he had written "Hamlet was a thoughtful man and becoming very disturbed". In the next box, the caption read "Hamlet's friends Rosencrantz and Guildenstern were watching him" - Picture box was a picture of stick men R and G plus stick man Hamlet waving arms around, and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern had a joint speech bubble, which read "Yup - definitely quite mad".

Would you be complaining if the teacher set 'boring' homework.

No, definitely not.

I teach Hamlet to Year 7 students and they seem to really enjoy it. The sorts of activities we do are:
-watching 'The Animated Tale' to grasp the plot,
-reading Hamlet's soliloquies in Act 1 and writing two extracts from his diary (one before he sees his father's ghost and one after),
-acting out certain scenes such as the last scene or the Mousetrap,
-watching film versions of the opening scenes and comparing them,
-studying the design of the Globe theatre and imagining a visit to the Globe to see Hamlet,
-designing and making a model set for the last scene and using it for a puppet show of the last scene. No sock puppets though!

Although I agree with a previous poster that Year 7 students can't grasp some of the more complex emotional and philosophical aspects of the play, they respond enthusiastically to the plot and characters. There is often a lot of discussion of Gertrude and what she knew.

I think it sounds like a good approach to enjoying Shakespeare to me. Yes, the making of the puppet could be annoying and time consuming (but it shouldn't bother you, make your son do it himself!) but using them in class will be fun and will aid their understanding of the play. I do use comic strips with all the ages I teach (Y5-Y8)

I'd love to do something similar with my English classes but we're a private school so there is no homework - prep is strictly limited to an hour (shared between two subject) and takes place in school. So my innate childishness is effectively curbed :(

When I was in Y7 I remember having to make a model contour mountain thingy and a model globe for geography and a model castle for history. At A Level I had to make model plant and animal cells for Biology. I think I quite enjoyed it.

I teach A level English and most of my groups have done some cutting and sticking recently (mostly to match key terminology with definitions or theories with theorists).

To a man (and woman) they've absolutely loved it.

His cartoon sounds fab. I would be delighted with any teacher who got my child to engage with Hamlet in this way at Year 7.

And 'Words, words, words' is a direct quotation!!

This thread has reminded me of my friend's daughter who had to make a model of a cell in yr 7 - she and her best friend were to be seen walking down the road to school with vast sperm cells, which they'd made by paper machier-ing over balloons and adding tails I think!!