Popularity

English home language

Grade 6

Module 11

Popularity

What do you think POPULARITY is all about? Before we take a closer look at this phenomenon, write an ACRONYM of what your opinion on the topic is:

What do you do in an effort to be popular at school? What is considered necessary to be part of the POPULAR group? Give this some thought and then write a piece of approximately 120 words, titled To be or not to be. Plan your writing in rough and then edit it. Hand in your rough work as well as your finished piece.

Hints:

Be brutally honest

Consider peer pressure

What lengths are you prepared to go to, to be popular?

What will you NOT do to be popular?

Where do values fit in with your choices?

Read Shakespeare’s “To be or not to be” and the poem “IF”.

• Let’s start on familiar ground – the school grounds. Each group is to nominate a candidate for the most popular girl, boy and teacher in the school.
• Each group will be given a maximum of five minutes to present their candidates and motivate their choices referring to the criteria.
• You might like to take a class vote at the end of all the presentations.

Now it is your chance to do some FUN research and then to MODEL your findings. Yes – move over, Naomi and Brett! Make place on the catwalk for the Grade 6’s.

What to do:

• Choose an era (Gatsby/Punk/Disco/Rave/Rock/Hippy…)
• Mind map your ideas.
• Research the fashions of your chosen time (hair/shoes/skirt lengths/accessories…).
• Refer to movies, (Titanic/Grease/Saturday Night Fever/Austin Powers) magazines and family photos.
• Dress up for your presentation.
• Present your information in poster format.

FASHION MINDMAP

Okay guys – the moment you have been waiting for! You have to EAT your way through this one. Yummy! Fast food outlets are very POPULAR in our modern society where TIME = MONEY.

What to do:

• Survey the POPULARITY of four fast food outlets (e.g. Wimpy, Steers, Spur, MacDonald’s, KFC.).

• Draw up a questionnaire.
• Your survey should include both male and female participants and a variety of age groups.
• Present your findings to the class with the results depicted in graph format.

What to do next:

• 

  Debate: MacDonald’s is better then KFC.

If music be the food of love, play on! Did you know that Johan Strauss and the waltz were considered OUTRAGEOUS at first? Picture the waltz being hot – or cool – depending on the IN saying! Have you noticed that MUSIC can mess with your MIND? Truly. Just think how the STAR WARS or MISSION IMPOSSIBLE or SUPERMAN or 007 themes inspire you by making you feel strong. Notice how soothing classical music played in the classroom helps to create a peaceful atmosphere, which helps you to think and work better. Keep this in mind when choosing your music and lyrics for next project.