Black Box Shakespeare
Finding quality information about Shakespeare on the internet can be as hard as finding a needle in a haystack. To help guide your search we have created an annotated list of websites that not only contain information on Shakespeare, his life and plays, but also lesson plans, good classroom ideas, puzzles and quizzes. Happy searching!
Teaching Shakespeare
http://www.folger.edu/index.cfm - Folger Shakespeare Library
If you click on the link ‘Discover Shakespeare' there is a basic outline of his life, works and theatre. It's a good place to start for background knowledge. The ‘Teach and Learn' link is a great place for ideas on teaching Shakespeare and making his life and works accessible to students of all ages with ready made lesson plans available to print. With slight adaptations the lessons/activities could be used in a secondary class as well.
http://www.shakespearemag.com – Shakespeare Magazine for Teachers and Enthusiasts
Click on ‘teaching resources' link for lesson plans that coach students to look closely at the plays text, to engage students learning in active, multifaceted ways and that are adaptable to a variety of classroom contexts.
http://www.bardcentral.com – The Poor Yorick Shakespeare Catalogue
Click in link to ‘Shakespeare in Short, the animated tales'. This area provides modern and innovative ideas on how to teach Shakespeare to less able readers. Using film and camera techniques the ideas allow for students to access and critique Shakespeare in a modern way, with activities such as creating storyboards of the plays, fifteen minute Shakespeare and performing student-written abbreviations of the scripts.
http://www.pbs.org/shakespeare/educators/technology/ - Teaching Shakespeare with Technology
Includes links to professional development, lesson plans, resources and how to teach Shakespeare in a technological world. The lesson plans are based upon the following themes:
Background Information
http://ise.uvic.ca/index.html - Internet Shakespeare Editions
Information on Shakespeare's life and times, such as the stage, society, history and politics of the Renaissance period. Provides links to essays on:
Very similar to this information, the site provides a list of sites to visit that have information under each of the above topics.
http://www.stratford.co.uk/shakespeare.asp - William Shakespeare
Information on the life of Shakespeare, where he grew up and some of the basic details on his education, family and marriage. Provides links to the theatre and to some background information on Stratford.
http://shakespeareauthorship.com – The Shakespeare Authorship Page
Dedicated to the proposition that Shakespeare wrote Shakespeare. A funny and intriguing site with an easily accessible collection of essays on Shakespeare, his life, and why it was definitely Shakespeare that wrote Shakespeare. Reading these articles may be a great way to begin a class discussion on who Shakespeare was, and perhaps could be the stimulus for a short debate over whether or not Shakespeare did write Shakespeare.
Compiled by Sarah Peters, Dramaturg - Black Box Shakespeare