ENGL 150 – Multimodal Remix
To help students prepare for the Multimodal Remix module, Allya Yourish has designed a lesson plan for the beginning of the module after students have been introduced to the module requirements in order to help them understand multimodality. Students will enter the lesson having read from the textbook for basic context on multimodal design, and should be familiar with the basic vocabulary of visual design (line, color, shape, size, etc.).
OBJECTIVE FULFILLMENT
The lesson works towards MO 4.1 and 4.2, as it encourages critical analysis and creative conceptualization alongside public speaking and speech delivery, without demanding the time commitment of completing a design.
Students will demonstrate analysis of multimodal design via small group conversation about a music lyric video. In the following component of the activity, students will work in small groups to conceptualize their own music lyric video for any song of their choice. Students will be given the opportunity to practice speaking in front of the class via turn-based reporting to the classroom after their conversations.
PROCEDURE
- Students warm-up by putting themselves into groups of 3-4 based on favorite musical artist. Students are challenged to achieve this categorization without speaking aloud. If a student struggles to find a group due to too many people enjoying the same artist, or not enough people, they will be encouraged to find a second (or third) favorite artist.
- Within these groups, students will be prompted to discuss why they enjoy that artist so much, including what features are typical of songs by their artist, what music videos typically look like for the artist, what style of clothes or art is associated with the artist. Small groups will discuss and then assign a person to report their findings to the larger class.
- The class will watch Katy Perry’s “Birthday” Lyric Video (https://youtu.be/jqYxyd1iSNk) together. In their small groups, students will be prompted to analyze the video– what visual choices were made? What lyrical choices were made? What auditory choices were made? The group will assign a different reporter from the previous prompt to share their findings with the class .
- Students will then be instructed to work within their group to select a song they all enjoy by their artist and design a lyric video. This group work should involve discussion and sketches (digital or paper). Students may elect to sit in the hallway together and listen to the song, if needed. Students should answer: How would the text be presented? What’s the background? What colors would be present? What would the camera do? Students will elect a new reporter to share their conceptualization with the class.
- Students will be given the homework of writing a personal reflection on the activity in order to check for individual comprehension. Students will summarize their music lyric video conceptualization and reflect on why they made the choices they made as a group, what the effect of the choices would be, and what their priorities were when selecting visual language for their song.
ASSESSMENT OF LESSON
Learning will be assessed after class via written reflection.