The Great Gatsby
- Classroom 012
- 6 lut
- 3 minut(y) czytania
Zaktualizowano: 6 lut
Recently, my students had the fantastic opportunity to visit Buffo Theatre in Warsaw to watch The Great Gatsby performed in English. Their enthusiasm afterward—filled with questions about the language, the characters, and the dazzling world of the Roaring Twenties - inspired me to create this lesson plan.
This lesson serves as both a preparation for watching the play and a follow-up activity to deepen students' understanding of the story, its themes, and historical context. It can also be adapted for those studying The Great Gatsby in book or movie form. Through engaging discussions, vocabulary exercises, and creative tasks, students will explore F. Scott Fitzgerald’s masterpiece while improving their English skills. Let’s dive into the Jazz Age together!
Introduction to The Roaring Twenties and The Great Gatsby
Before your students watch or read The Great Gatsby, it's important for them to understand the time period in which the story takes place - the Roaring Twenties. This was a time of great change in America, with rapid economic growth, new social freedoms, and a booming entertainment culture. The novel explores themes like wealth, class, and the American Dream, which were all central to life in the 1920s.
In the movie, you'll see characters like Jay Gatsby and Daisy Buchanan living in a world of excess, wealth, and glamour - much like the real-life parties, music, and social changes of the time. The movie reflects how the 1920s shaped modern American culture, making it the perfect setting to understand the excitement, but also the challenges, of this period.
To provide historical context and spark discussion, I asked my students to read an article from History.com titled "How The Great Gatsby Captured the Roaring Twenties—And Its Dark Side". This insightful piece explores the glitz and glamour of the 1920s while also revealing the era's underlying social inequalities and moral decay—key themes in Fitzgerald’s novel. The article served as a foundation for our discussion, helping students connect the historical period to the story and its characters.
Below, you can find a printable version of the article along with a handout featuring vocabulary exercises designed to help students engage with key terms and concepts from the text.
To further enrich our discussion, I also incorporated the video "The Roaring 20s: Crash Course US History #32". This engaging resource provides a broader perspective on the social, political, and economic changes that defined the 1920s. Covering topics such as the rise of consumer culture, the impact of Prohibition, and shifts in gender roles, the video helped students grasp the complexities of the era beyond the glamorous parties depicted in The Great Gatsby. By analyzing these historical changes, students were able to better understand the novel’s setting and the motivations of its characters.
To support comprehension and discussion, I have also prepared a handout with exercises based on the video, helping students reinforce key concepts and vocabulary while making connections to the novel.
As a follow-up assignment, my students were asked to complete a creative writing task as homework. They were instructed to imagine themselves as guests at one of Gatsby's lavish parties and write a journal entry describing their experience. The task required them to reflect on what they saw, how people behaved, and their thoughts on the extravagant excess surrounding them. Additionally, they were encouraged to analyze how wealth and opulence influenced the atmosphere and the guests' emotions—were they genuinely happy, or merely caught up in the illusion of glamour?
This activity aimed to deepen their engagement with the novel while also enhancing their descriptive writing skills and critical thinking about the themes of The Great Gatsby.
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