Shannon Smith

Subject, Content Area or Topic

ELA

Strategy instruction: Pantomiming

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RF.3.4
Read with sufficient accuracy and fluency to support comprehension.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RF.3.4.A

Read grade-level text with purpose and understanding.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RF.3.4.B
Read grade-level prose and poetry orally with accuracy, appropriate rate, and expression on
successive readings.

Content Objective

The student will interpret grade-level prose and poetry with accuracy, appropriate rate, and
expression on successive readings through pantomiming.

Language Objective:

Given a story, video, or poem the student will demonstrate their understanding of pantomiming
with accuracy and appropriate rate through expression, action, and meaning.

Student Population

Grade level: 3rd

Heterogeneous- students will be placed in different achievement groups with mixed abilities.

Two students ELL level 1

Two students ELL level 2

First Language- Spanish

● ELL learners- I will provide videos and books to read in their first language and translate
instructions into their first language. I will also provide sentence starters for their writing
activity.
● Learning disability- leveled reading passages, sit in the back to complete work, extra
support when reading questions.
 ● ADHD- repeated directions, close monitoring, helping the teacher out whenever possible
(handing out chromebooks, worksheets, materials, etc.)

Learning Community

Suburban

Greenport UFSD- elementary· ·

Inclusion Classroom

Students sit in groups of 3

Materials/Resources

● Smartboard
● PowerPoint with instructions
● Fluency Strips
● Fluency Self-Evaluation sheet
● Short stories/poems with visuals
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1cHihNjI22KcSbgjamV8MNS3IUS7TRU606O-qZs
d1ruk/edit#
● Mr. Noisy book by Roger Hargreaves
● Computer with internet access to YouTube
● Youtube video https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=5&v=XqZsoesa55w

SIOP STEPS:

Preparation:

I will begin by saying “Good morning class! Today we are going to have a lot of fun! We are
going to practice the skill of fluency and expression. We are going to do this by pantomiming a
story. When I say the word pantomime what comes to your mind?” The student will say “I think
of the word mime but I never heard of that word before.” Very good, In a way we will be acting
like mimes because we will be acting out a story with emotion, expression and character just like
a mime does. I’m going to play a video for us to try out pantomiming and understand what we
will be doing today. After the first minute we will all join in and practice pantomiming just so we
all get the hang of it before we start our activity. After we get the hang of pantomiming we will
start our activity of pantomiming different short stories or poems. I will split you up into groups
and one person will read while the others pantomime the reading. I will be walking around as I
am leading this activity. Then with a partner, you will take what we learned from the story, put
sentence strips in the correct order of events, and then read each sentence strip in the correct
order with expression and fluency. After that we will complete a self-evaluation on how we think
we did today.

Building Background

The strategy used today is called pantomiming. Pantomiming is when you express or represent
something by acting it out with accuracy, appropriate rate, and expression. It’s easy to remember
because of the word “miming”, and mimes act out a story through body motions without the use
of speech. Pantomiming can help students with expression in their reading and writing and
increase their comprehension.
I will ensure that students have multiple ways to respond, including oral and written. I will use
pantomiming and sentence strips to check for student’s understanding, fluency and expression of
the story.

Academic vocabulary: I will use words such as pantomiming, expression and emotion and
students will be able to learn and act out these words.

Comprehensible Input

I am going to read some sentences with expression to show the emotion that is trying to be
portrayed. This will make my readings more interesting and therefore engage the students more.
If it is a sentence that is sad, I will read it with a sad expression. If the sentence is proving
someone to be angry, I will read it in an angry tone and so on. This will show them how easy and
fun it is to show emotion in their readings.
-”Where is my car?” (this shows that I really read it in a question, I can portray this with my face
by looking around)
-”When I got to see my family I was so excited I ran and gave them a hug!” ( Since there is an
exclamation point, I will read this with enthusiasm and excitement. I can act this out by looking
excited by widening my eyes and hugging a classmate who is participating in the pantomime).
-”I was so mad when my sister took my toy from me, I yelled at her “Give that back to me!” as I
stomped my feet” ( I will act this out by stomping my feet and grinning showing the students
how to show the emotion of being mad).

Now that I have modeled how to read with expression, I am going to read a story called Mr.
Noisy and act it out through narrative pantomime. As I am reading this book, I will translate the
important words into Spanish as well so the ELL students understand what emotion has to be
acted out.
It is necessary that the reader reads with expression so that the actors can act out the story
properly.
Strategies

-The teacher identifies the student's area of struggle (expression in reading and writing).
-Explain what pantomiming is. “Pantomiming is when you express or represent something by
acting it out with accuracy, appropriate rate, and expression.”
- The teacher models how to use pantomiming and reads a book out loud, reminding students to
notice how I use movement and facial expressions to communicate the story.
-The students and the teacher pantomime a video together as a class.
-The students split into groups and are each given a passage (poem, story, sentence strips) that
one student has to read out loud and the rest will pantomime as the student is reading.The
students will rotate who will be reading the passage and working on their expression.
-The students who read that day will fill out a self-evaluation form on their reading and see how
they did and what they can improve on.

Interactions

In order for students to memorize pantomiming, I will remind them of the word “miming”. I will
show students a video of a mime incase they forget what miming looks like. Students will turn
and talk to a buddy and share what they realize about the mime. Students should say “mimes do
not talk, they act out using movements”. Students will then take turns doing an activity that is
similar to charades. Students will take turns being the “mime” and having to guess what their
partner (the mime) is acting out. They can act out things such as movies, books, songs, people
etc. as long as it is appropriate for school. This is a simple, fun, effective way for students to
memorize pantomiming.

I will then show students a baby shark video on the smartboard. For my ELL students, I will play
the video twice. Once in English, and once in Spanish. All of the students will participate twice
using both videos and will work as a whole class to practice the strategy of pantomiming. The
teacher will say before playing the video “are we ready to try pantomiming all together? Let's
follow along with the video using only movement and facial expression! And most
important..let's have fun!”

Practice/Application

Now that we have practiced so much about pantomiming and reading with expression, it is time
for you to take what you have learned and practice on your own! Let’s review why it is important
to read with expression. In order for students to become more fluent and confident in reading,
you need to learn about reading with expression. This will help students understand and enjoy
the text that they are reading, and will help engage the audience.
I am going to split the class into groups and each assign a group a different passage or poem.
Someone from the group will be chosen to read the story, where the rest of the group will be
acting it out. To make sure that everyone is doing the best that they can, and that students have
clearly grasped the idea of reading with expression, I will be walking around the room to make
sure everyone is on track, and will give corrective feedback when needed.
The goal for these students is to be able to read fluently and with expression.

Independent Practice (1)

Independent Practice (2)

Lesson Delivery

I will begin the lesson by saying “Today we are going to practice reading fluently and with
expression! Does anyone know what expression is?” I will give students some time to turn and
talk to the person next to them and discuss what they think expression is. I will give them about 2
minutes. I will call on groups willing to share. I will then explain that expression typically refers
to the ability to change your voice to show feeling while you are reading. I will ask “why do you
think it is important to read with expression?” I will give students a couple minutes to think
about this question. I will then explain that if we don’t read with expression, our readings can
become very dull, and we want to sound interesting and we want our listeners to enjoy stories
that we tell, so is it important that we learn how to incorporate expression when we read out
loud.

Next I will read out a few sentences from a passage, and I will ask students to tell me their
thoughts of my reading. (I will be reading these sentences in a monotone voice with no
expression). I will engage students by asking them to put a thumbs up if they thought it sounded
good, and a thumbs down if they thought it sounded boring. After I formally assess the students,
I will say “I don’t know about you but to me it sounded really boring and dull, not to mention it
was quite boring to read it that way too.” I will ask the students what was missing as I was
reading. I will let students turn and talk again to discuss to keep them focused and on task.. After
2 minutes I will call on groups to share what I was missing. Then I will say I was missing
expression in my reading and explain that not only do facial expressions add to expression when
reading, but punctuation also helps in determining how we should read. I am going to continue
on by reading a few sentences that involve certain expressions. I will tell the students that I want
them to really notice what I am doing and that you are able to use these techniques as well. Now
that you have heard me read sentences that involve expression, I will now be reading a short
book. I will engage students by having them come up to the class and help me act out the book. It
will be important that as the reader you read with expression so that whoever is acting it out
knows exactly how they should portray the actions. As the students who wanted to come up are
acting out the story, I will explain how I want the rest of the class to pay close attention to how
they use their bodies and facial expressions to act out the words. They are going to be able to tell
the story through their body movements.

Review/Assessment

Students will be instructed to pantomime the youtube video baby shark and follow along with the
words using body motions and facial expressions. Students will do this as a whole class together
standing up right next to their seats. They will respond by active participation and action.

I will be assessing students by noticing how they are comprehending the video and on their
participation and use of expression, emotion, and pantomiming. Students will then write a short
paragraph about the video as if they had to come up with a storyline based on what they saw
about the sharks. This will allow me to see how well they understood the video through
pantomiming and will show me if their expression in their writing is improving or not. Students
may brainstorm ideas and help each other together in groups, but they each have to hand in their
own copy of their own work.
*I will provide instructions in spanish and sentence starters for ELL learners*

Name:____________________________________

Write a paragraph of your own interpretation of the video Baby Shark that you pantomimed. To
guide your thinking, pretend that someone who has never seen this video before has asked you to
write a passage about what it was about.
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Extension/Homework: I will give students a “closing activity” which will be a self evaluation
sheet to have them fill out independently to see what information the students retained and
learned and what they still need to work on.

Section II: Lesson Plan Commentary/Reflection

I chose to do a lesson on the strategy of pantomiming because it can be used to help give
students expression. This will help students be more expressive with reading and writing.
Pantomiming can be used in different settings such as reading short stories, creative writing,
history for re-enactment, and science such as weather. Pantomiming is especially great for ELL
students to learn and be able to express themselves through acting out.

During this lesson, some parts that went well were providing a lot of modeling using
visuals and engaging students the way I did in the lesson. I gave the students many opportunities
to turn and talk with a peer and share their thinking. This kept students engaged in the lesson and
helped them stay on task and continue to follow along. I also made the lesson very student driven
and had students out of their seats, acting out, and having fun while learning. Having students
work in groups heterogeneously was very effective for this lesson. My higher level students were
able to take the lead and help those who were struggling and keep them on task. Another strength
of mine throughout this lesson was monitoring the students throughout the lesson and making
sure they were on the right track. I was formally assessing them throughout by simply having
them give me a thumbs up or down if they were understanding what I was teaching them. If I
saw some half thumbs or thumbs down, I went over the concepts again until I saw mostly thumbs
up. I also used a lot of technology in my lesson that all of the students enjoyed and was able to
differentiate my instruction for all learners. Throughout the lesson, I was very organized and
prepared. This is a strength of mine because being prepared is one of the most essential things
when teaching.

I also had weaknesses throughout my lesson that I can work on and will help me improve
tremendously. The first weakness that stood out to me the most was my time management. I had
a lot in my lesson, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but I need to work on timing my lesson
out better so I can get through everything and not feel rushed or panic. Something I could’ve
done differently was find more cultured texts and poems, or even have students pick out their
own poems of their choice to read and act out. Some students were not as engaged in this part of
the lesson because the poems were not as interesting to them. If they were able to pick out a
poem based on their interest I believe this part of the lesson would have been more effective and
successful. “Student interest in a topic holds so much power. When a topic connects to what
students like to do, engagement deepens as they willingly spend time thinking, dialoging, and
creating ideas in meaningful ways. Making learning contextual to real-world experiences is a key
learning technique for differentiating for student interests.” (Mccarthy, 2014).