The Little Prince book club

Methodological steps

  • Present in a lesson (1 learning unit) a general description of the book The Little Prince. The presentation can be provided during a lesson in presence or through a videoconference platform (Meet, Zoom). Explain the group work and the jigsaw structure of it: students are going to be divided into groups of four people; each group is going to deepen a part of the book (5-6 chapters each group); each student is going to have a certain task within its group. The jigsaw structure requires students to work both in the group they are assigned by chapters and in the group made up by those who have the same task. At the end of the lesson, ask students to read the book within one week.
  • In the second lesson, form groups of four students, assign students the different tasks and revise the jigsaw structure. The four tasks, assigned each to a single member of the group, are:
    1. To provide (at least) one meaningful illustration per chapter and to share it on a digital collaborative board (Padlet, Miro, Mural);
    2. To make a summary (e.g. 800 characters) of the chapter on a digital shared document;
    3. To express the feelings of the reader in each chapter and to write them on a mind map (using Cmap Tools);
    4. To describe the different characters in each chapter and to write them on a mind map (using Cmap Tools).
  • By the third lesson, students will have already read the book and supposedly done their own task. While teaching at a distance, divide them into sub-rooms you can control by the videoconference tool (Zoom, Teams work well for this). In each sub-room, students with the same task are going to meet up, present and discuss their works and collect them in a single shared document or collaborative board (Padlet, Miro, Mural). The outputs of this lesson are four different works (one for each task) that cover the entire book “vertically”. Each student is able to define relationships of what they have found in the part they have worked on, inside a broader analysis that encompasses the whole book.
  • In the fourth lesson, groups meet up into sub-rooms by the chapters they are assigned and each member brings into the groups the findings of the single tasks developed in the previous lesson for the entire book. The output of this last lesson/meeting is a multimedia presentation (e.g. on Genially) for the part assigned to the group, that you are going to evaluate.

Skills assessment

Use a rubric to assess their presentations, the single tasks, the level of coverage of the part, and the level of their cooperation. Make sure to share with the students beforehand the criteria of assessment, in particular those related to the development of transversal competencies, such as cooperation into a group or others less related to the evaluation of content knowledge. 

Students develop disciplinary skills and knowledge for language, literature, and arts. The jigsaw structure helps them integrate disciplinary skills with lifelong learning competencies such as collaboration, organisation, and communication.

Communication

Video Conferences with breakout rooms. Email. Messenger.
Outside school time, students might communicate through their preferred social media.