Characterization Activities Using Short Film Bundle

The Adventures of Hopscotch: Hopscotch Begins animated short films and characterization activities provide a comprehensive set of engaging, rigorous resources for literacy instruction. The materials don’t just tell Hopscotch’s story through animated short films (the original short film and the short film with a literacy lesson). They use that story to explicitly teach literacy skills. Students eager to learn about Hopscotch’s adventures will receive an instructional lesson about characterization as they view the video, which means they can replay it if they need to see or hear it again. Meanwhile, the story’s design will give students many opportunities to practice characterization. The accompanying activities provide the resources to offer them those chances. They are also supplied in an editable template so that they can be applied to a separate, written core text. Students will be able to engage with them independently or with the teacher and in any instructional model, including in-person or virtual formats. Therefore, the Hopscotch video and characterization activities not only provide a comprehensive set of materials to teach character throughout the year but also will make Hopscotch a welcome member of your class.

The Adventures of Hopscotch – Hopscotch Begins Videos: The film tells the story of Hopscotch, a stuffed panda bear, and how he comes to meet his person. The short films come in three formats: the original short film, another that includes characterization instruction, and the characterization lesson video. The story itself is approximately 5 minutes long and focuses on the literary element of characterization. It was designed to include numerous teachable moments that will allow students to practice and demonstrate their understanding of characterization based on individuals in the story. With those moments embedded and replay of the explicit lesson available, students will have several ways to develop their skills. To access videos, a Dropbox link (free and no sign-up required) will be provided to easily download the videos in two steps. Directions are included.

Characterization Activities: The resource includes 9 different characterization activities at varying levels of difficulty. From character timelines to monologues, conversations, and more, the variety of characterization assignments will allow you to reuse the Hopscotch video and assign different work to students over the course of a unit, semester, or even year. The materials also include a choice board of all the activities if the intended use is for a mini-unit on characterization. Regardless, the variety of activities will allow for flexible implementation and accommodation for all learners.

Characterization Activities Templates: In addition to the activities mentioned above, the resource includes editable templates of ALL the activities. These templates will allow you to create assignments for any short story, novel, or text your students are reading in class or at home. This will allow students to apply and practice characterization to another text. Since students will already be familiar with the templates from having completed the activities with the Hopscotch video, they will be set up to transition to work on other texts, and the templates offer that range of engaging, rigorous activities aligned to standards to ensure student mastery of this essential literary element.

Implementation Notes: The implementation notes offer suggestions to maximize learning based on the video and accompanying activities. This includes an outline of how the materials could be used in various instructional models, such as rotation, centers, pull-out groups, and virtual learning. They also explain how the resources can be applied to other texts or be used as a pairing. After reading the notes, you will have a better understanding of how you might choose to use the resources to keep students engaged and learning.

Answer Key: Due to the open-ended nature of the assignments, the answer key provides an overview of the characters and potential answers for characterization. Individual activity answer keys do not apply. Part of the strength of analysis questions is the room they leave for students to demonstrate their unique thinking and use textual evidence to support their stance.

Digital Links: This resource is also technology friendly! It can be utilized in classrooms where computers or tablets are central to instruction because the resource has been adapted for digital completion. The resource includes links for students to complete the student pages in Google Slides™. For instance, students can work with the documents in Google Drive™ or via Google Classroom. With these links, you can have students complete their work online. There are links for every student work page, making the format friendly not only for technology but also trees.

Looking for more Hopscotch episodes? Check out:

Episode 02: Hopscotch Lands Home

Episode 03: Hopscotch Goes Hiking

Episode 04: Hopscotch Skips a Trip

Episode 05: Hopscotch Meets Henry