I made this writing assignment last weekend. Here’s the link.
The COVID-19 pandemic is impacting our world in so many ways. It’s disrupting normal life routines including school and employment, and social activities such as weddings, prom, and graduations. In fact, the county next to mine just announced a thirty-day shelter-in-place order.
Nearly every aspect of American life has changed. It is truly a historic event.
So when California high school English educator Kelly Gallagher tweeted last week that students “should write daily about this time history,” I thought Yes, of course! What an awesome idea!
So I got busy creating an assignment sheet for students to use to capture this moment in time. (Full disclosure: In the end, actually, I summarized this sheet and made it part of a larger “distance learning packet” that students took home with them at the end of the day on Tuesday, March 17.)
Here’s the link to a Google Doc of my handout. You should be able to edit it to suit your needs and/or students. Get the link here: LIFE IN THE TIME OF CORONA writing assignment.
Again, credit goes to Gallagher for the inspiration for this assignment, which I have named “Life in the Time of Corona,” a play on words mimicking Love in the Time of Cholera, the 1985 novel by Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
My assignment is a journaling and scrapbook project that encourages students to document their experiences, activities, and thoughts about the coronavirus/COVID-19 pandemic.
It also asks them to collect some artifacts… news stories, screenshots, a few squares of toilet paper (ha!), a list of cancelled events.
Here’s a snapshot of what the assignment asks students to do:
Over the next week, keep a journal of your activities, thoughts, and experiences in the midst of the coronavirus outbreak. Here are some ideas:
- Write about what you do know about the virus.
- Write about what you don’t know.
- Is it business as usual? (Describe business as usual… your normal routine.)
- Are you going out? Where?
- What have you cancelled?
- How has COVID-19 affected your life so far?
- Have you tried to shop for supplies in case of a lockdown? How did that go?
- Do you know what to do if we are restricted?
- Write about the contradictions or confusion that exists in the media.
- Reflect on the memes that seem to be multiplying faster than the virus itself.
- What news stories have you heard, read, or watched?
- Has anything or anyone inspired you in the midst of the coronavirus?
- In short, write about whatever you want to write about as it relates to the pandemic.
At the end of our break (or at some other time yet to be determined), turn in:
—Five journal entries of at least one paragraph each, typed or handwritten.
–A media report, story, or timeline. Print out a news article or take a screenshot of an article about the virus and its spread.
—One artifact of the epidemic…In twenty years, for example, when you’re nearing forty years of age, what item would remind you of today? A photo of empty store shelves? The label from a hand sanitizer bottle? A listing of cancelled events? Some squares of toilet paper?
Audience: Yourself, your future children??? Think of this as a scrapbook of sorts, or an entry in a memory book.
Again, get the link here: Life in the Time of Corona
If you try this assignment, please let me know how it goes. And, by the way, this is NOT road-tested, obviously. This is all new territory, so if I’ve left anything out, please let me know!
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