1. Get the book

Online: Read it on line. Here are a few good sites.
Used or Not: SoManyBooks.net (mention SHS for discount), Amazon.com or your favorite bookstore

2. Simulation

Set up a mini-Verona in your home. Assign teams or roles. Make up contests, especially at dinner or during car trips/vacations, with vocabulary, history and reading. The team with the most points after each act or at the end could choose the restaurant with the loser footing the bill. You may come up with other ideas. Make sure you agree to this and write it down. 2003 Class Contest

3. Sequential vocabulary begun: Vocabulary #3-#15

4. History Lecture

Meet Bill, Elizabethan Times, Elizabethan Period History, THE CAMBRIDGE HISTORY OF ENGLISH AND AMERICAN LITERATURE, Elizabethan England, and Life in E.E. Complete "Q-Lecture" coming this summer (2003). Create a timed, open resource test and take for points.

5. See Act I only

Rent or purchase (may be cheaper) both Zeffirelli's 1968 version (keep a file folder handy to cover nudity) and the recent DiCaprio/Danes Baz Luhrmann 1996 version of RJ at your local video store. See it only until Romeo first comes on the screen. Stop at this point.
You are only seeing it this far to get an idea of the setting and a range of possibilities for expression as you read this aloud yourselves. Discuss which version you like so far and why.

6. Act I Presentation

This is a play, not a novel. Sign up for Act I parts and practice reading RJ out loud and then read together at dinner or around popcorn. Questions for Act I: 1. What main idea or theme comes out? 2. What was the main reason for the Viet Nam War? The Gulf War? The Iraq War? WWI? WWII? 3. Do we always remember why they started? 4. What do you think S. thinks of conflicts and wars? What would he think of the one we are in now?

7. Capulet Hoohah!

Special dinner night out with mask presentation. Give points for most beautiful, funniest, most unique, etc., as you chose beforehand. Optional rule: only use materials found in house. Special celebratory option: you may view Zeffirelli's version druing party.

8. Act II Presentation

Practice your parts and then read to each other. Questions for the act: 1. What is the major idea Juliet is expressing? 2. Is it realistically possible to ignore a person's background when it comes to love? 3. What do you look for in a mate? 4. What would you find absolutely unacceptable? 5. What would your parents have found absolutely unacceptable?

9. Act II re-write and perform in contemporary words

Adapt this assignment to your numbers and preferences. The assignment linked is meant for a class with 3 competing teams. Be creative. You don't have to translate each line. Some have translated the entire act into a 3 minute quality presentation. Option: best writing and acting competition points.

 10. Act III Presentation: Practice your parts and then read to each other

Write out 2 main questions to ask your team member(s) in this Act. Include one about theme/main idea of act, another about characterization and another related to contemporary life or current events.

 12. Act IV Presentation: Practice your parts and then read to each other.

What is the major message of this Act?

13. Extemporaneous Challenge

Change Act IV and act out Juliet honestly telling Father why she won't marry Paris. The best done gets points.

 14. Character collage

Depict 1 character (or make a college of the major ones) with magazine pictures, words and letters. Present at a special dinner. Give awards and points as you desire.

 16. Acts V-VI Presentation: Practice your parts and then read to each other

Why were the last two acts so frustrating?
What is the major message of this act?
What are at least 3 things Romeo and Juliet could have done to have had successful lives with each other?
What messages does S. have for us in this entire play?

 18. Questions

What movie version was your preference and why?
What is one message of this play that you feel is already a part of your personal credo?
Why is that belief so important to you?

19. Final Test

Make up a final test for each other. The test should be 20-40 questions long, with each team member making up an equal amount of questions. Make sure you make up a key, too! Put all parts together and take the test any way you'd like. Suggestions: orally (a person not in contest reads answer and first person shouting out answer gets the point), as teams or individually written.

20. Awards: Award given to the winner but handshakes all around. Plan your trip to Verona, Italy