90 mins
Pre-production: Preparing for Your Life Songs Interview
How do you prepare for a successful and insightful interview?
How to Use This Lesson
Life Songs is an intergenerational media project organized into a four lesson unit plan. Over the course of the unit, students participate in a group singalong, identify and discuss their favorite songs, prepare interview questions about another person’s favorite songs, and conduct and record an interview with an adult who shares how certain songs shaped their life. The unit culminates in students presenting a completed version of their Life Songs Interview. Through Life Songs, students acquire beneficial skills and experience in media production while participating in social and emotional learning activities.
Essential Question
How do you prepare for a successful and insightful interview?
Objectives
Know (knowledge):
- The goals of the Life Songs project
- The media production process
- The concept of pre-production, and what the process entails
- That the way a question is written can greatly influence the length and depth of the answer
- Strategies for writing effective and engaging interview questions
Mastery Objective:
- Students will be able to craft effective and engaging interview questions by working with a partner to draft and review sample questions.
Background
In this lesson, students are introduced to the Life Songs project and practice writing effective interview questions. Once introduced to Life Songs, students determine who they would like to interview for the project. Then, they discover how to write engaging questions by preparing a sample interview question and soliciting feedback from a classroom partner. After receiving feedback, students draft a list of possible interview questions for their Life Songs project.
This lesson focuses on preparing for a Life Songs interview. First, students are introduced to the media production process and the concept of pre-production. Next, they identify a person they would like to interview for the project. Through interactive classroom activities, students discover that the way a question is phrased can elicit different answers. Finally, students work with a partner to draft sample questions for their Life Songs Interview.
This lesson is split into three parts, each of which may require a class period to cover.
Disclaimers
Connected Themes
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