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Unit
II
Classwork
Applications of Fieldwork Basics
Lesson 2 The
Practice Interview
I am always seeking for most of
the older [Chitimacha basket] designs. I feel that this is a way of
preserving the natural history of my culture. My basket weaving
provides a better living for my family.
—Melissa Darden
Brown, St. Mary Parish
Grade
Levels
4-8
Curriculum
Areas
English Language Arts,
Social Studies
Purpose of
Lesson
Students are introduced to the interview process by interviewing
each other in pairs using a name game.
Lesson Objectives/Louisiana Content Standards, Benchmarks, and
Foundation Skills
- Students learn how to formulate and ask effective interview
questions.
ELA-4-M4 Speaking and listening for a
variety of audiences (e.g., classroom, real-life, workplace) and
purposes (e.g., awareness, concentration, enjoyment,
information, problem solving). (1, 2, 4,
5)
ELA-7-M2 Problem solving by using
reasoning skills, life experiences, accumulated knowledge, and
relevant available information. (1, 2, 4)
- Students identify, locate, select, and use resource tools to
help in collecting, analyzing, and synthesizing information.
ELA-5-M6 Locating, gathering, and
selecting information using graphic organizers, outline, note
taking, summarizing, interviewing, and surveying to produce
documented texts and graphics. (1, 3,
4)
ELA-4-M5 Listening and responding to a
wide variety of media (e.g., music, TV, film, speech). (1, 3, 4,
5)
- Students practice interviewing skills.
H-1A-M6 Conducting research in efforts
to answer historical questions. (1, 2, 3,
4)
ELA-2-M5 Recognizing and applying literary
devices (e.g., figurative language, symbolism, dialogue). (1,
4)
Time
Required
5 to 7 class periods
Materials
Construction paper for name plates. Provide a Field Kit -- For Teachers
for each student and/or team and students' Interview Folder -- For
the Teachers. If you plan to do the activities in the
Explorations and Extensions section, students will need additional
Interview
Checklists. Decide whether you will show Sample Fieldnotes: Teen Memories of Grade School
Traditions on a big screen in the classroom or need to make
copies for students. Print and duplicate the Worksheets and
Assessment Tools listed below.
Technology
Connections
Internet Resources
Conducting an Interview
Essay
Discovering Our Delta: A Learning Guide to Community Research
Language Arts Lesson: Posing Good Interview Questions
Indivisible, Educator's Guide, Duke
Center for Documentary Studies
Learning From Your Community
Sample Fieldnotes: Teen Memories of Grade School
Traditions
Louisiana Folklife Bibliography Search for videos
Louisiana Music: A Select List
Adaptation
Strategies
Improving
Listening Skills, in Fieldwork Basics
Taking
Notes, in Fieldwork Basics
Photography,
in Fieldwork Basics
Audio
Recording, in Fieldwork Basics
Videography,
in Fieldwork Basics
Ethics, in
Fieldwork Basics
Student Worksheets
Interview Folder
-- For the Teacher (for teachers)
Interview Folder -- List of Contents (for students)
Interview Checklist
Oral Release Form
Written Release Form
Audio Log
Photo Log
Notetaking Worksheet
Insider / Outsider Worksheet
Field Kit -- For Teachers
Field Kit List of Contents (for students)
Careers in Music - Notetaking
Performance and Video Notetaking Worksheet
That's a Good Question Worksheet
Fact-based, Open-ended, and Follow-up Questions Worksheet
How Not to Conduct an Interview
The Reluctant Guest
Assessment Tools
Interview Checklist
Conducting an Interview Evaluation
Fieldwork Rubric
Evaluation Tools/Opportunities
Process
- Notetaking Worksheets
- Fact-Based, Open-ended, & Follow-up Questions Worksheets
- Interview Checklist
- Fieldwork Rubric
Summative
- Conducting an Interview
Checklist
- Name plates
- Conducting
an Interview Evaluation
Products
- Name plates
- Name plate summaries
- Journals and/or Notetaking Worksheets
Background Information for the
Teacher
Before students interview in a formal setting, practicing with
each other—and with you—in the classroom will prepare them. It's one
thing simply to hold a conversation; it's another to prepare a list
of questions, turn on an audio recorder, make notes, take photographs,
and ask for permission forms to be signed! Practicing informally
allows students to become more comfortable and capable with the
mechanics of holding an interview.
Modeling and Practicing
Modeling and practicing interviewing and using equipment are
crucial to successful fieldwork. Even experienced folklorists at
times find their photos underexposed, recorder batteries dead,
or videos dubbed over. This is harder that it first appears! And
interviewing is more unnerving than it seems, so practicing will
reduce butterflies, improve diction and listening skills, and build
confidence. Try a couple of techniques, such as asking students to
critique your model interview of a student or another teacher,
pairing students off to take turns questioning and answering, using
the scripts below to prompt student critiques, and reporting on
interviews conducted at home. Through practice, students learn to
improve their questionnaires, listen to responses; follow up
interesting leads, and share stories of their own to give the
Interviewee some examples and "prime the pump" to elicit
answers.
This lesson offers a model of good interviewing in Sample
Fieldnotes: Teen Memories of Grade School Traditions. For two scripts that students may act out in
class to help them become aware of ineffective interviewing skills,
see How Not to Conduct an
Interview and The
Reluctant Guest. Discovering Our Delta: A Learning Guide to
Community Research includes a 26-minute video that follows
five students from the Mississippi Delta as they conduct research on
their communities.
Consider your students, curriculum, and community as you design
the practice interviewing and fieldwork
activities for your students. Adapt the steps and tools that you
think will work best for each project you undertake. For suggestions
see the chart of fieldwork activities in Louisiana Voices included
in the Unit II Classroom Applications of
Fieldwork Basics Introduction. Consider introducing students
to folklore and fieldwork through Unit III Discovering the Obvious:
Ourselves as the "Folk" which focuses on children's, school,
and family folklore. This approach reinforces to students that
everyone has folklore--including themselves.
At times you may want students to use a short, casual approach to
gather games, stories, or songs from other students and adults; at
other times you can teach higher-level inquiry skills, audiovisual
equipment use, or technology and embark on more detailed fieldwork.
For example, you may choose to hone students' listening and
notetaking skills, using only a notepad and pencil for some
interviews. Or you may teach high-end technology through
videography, digital cameras, and the Internet. Consider your
school's resources, your students' abilities, and your curriculum.
Students, of course, can also help to decide what tools they would
like to use and how detailed they would like the process to be. The
student products that result from interview fieldwork will both
influence the steps and tools you choose and be influenced by them.
See Photography,
Audio Recording, and Videography
for points to consider about different kinds of equipment you may
choose to use. Also see Indivisible, Educator's Guide by the Duke
Center for Documentary Studies for useful activities for working
with photographs and taking documentary photos. Also review Taking
Notes and Ethics.
Notetaking is a sophisticated, multi-task process that usually
doesn't come naturally. Most students, especially young ones, need
to be taught how to take notes. Though many interviews will be
recorded, students should also learn the "old-fashioned" way for
times when that may not be possible or feasible.
To Prepare
Check that the Field Kit --
For Teachers has all necessary equipment and materials.
Talk to your library media specialist to see what equipment the
school can provide. If it is impossible to arrange for an audio
recorder and/or camera for each pair of students, then provide
Journals or steno pads for handwritten notes. Place students' Interview Folder -- For
the Teacher in an easily accessible spot.
4th and 8th Grade
Activities
Part 1: Interviewing
- Have students reflect on the Photograph / Special
Object exercise done in Unit II Lesson 1. Tell
them that what they did was an interview because they were
observing a situation, asking questions, and forming
conclusions.
- Ask students where else they have heard interviews. Perhaps on
TV? Why was it "good?" What kinds of questions were asked? Ask
them if they could interview any famous person in the world today,
who would it be? What questions would they like to ask that
person? Tell them that interviewing someone is a skillful and
artful task that takes practice. This lesson will give them some
necessary practice before they invite a guest to their classroom
or go outside the classroom to interview someone.
- Begin this lesson by reading and discussing Sample Fieldnotes: Teen Memories of Grade School
Traditions. Show it on a big screen or print it out for
students. This sample provides an excellent model for the entire
interview process, and especially for notetaking. Generate
discussions about it, and make students aware of the key areas
that will be covered in this, and other lessons.
Notetaking
is a sophisticated, multi-task process that usually doesn't come
naturally. Most students, especially young ones, need to be taught
how to take good notes. Although many interviews will be recorded,
students should also learn the "old-fashioned" way. Access Taking
Notes for strategies to use if your students need to learn
this skill.
- Tell students that before they conduct an interview with
someone outside of the classroom, they will practice with each
other. The purpose of this worksheet is for students to experience
the value of listening, courtesy, and preparation in conducting an
interview. Select two students to play the roles of "Reporter" and
"Guest," on the worksheet How
Not to Conduct an Interview. Give each a copy of
the script and ask them to read their assigned parts. Tell
students that the reporter is interviewing a tourist. After the
interview, ask the class to explain what was wrong with the
reporter's approach. Write the responses on the board as students
offer them.
- Use The Reluctant
Guest to show students the value of asking questions that
elicit meaningful responses. In this activity, the teacher should
play the part of the reluctant guest. A team of students should
act as reporters at a press conference and ask the printed
questions. Tell them that they may ask you follow-up questions
based on your answers. You should answer the questions offering as
little information as possible, using one-word answers, for
example. The rest of the class should take notes on your answers,
using their Journals or the Notetaking Worksheet,
and they should also critique the reporters' good points and
mistakes. After the exercise, reflect with students on the
Interviewer's task of drawing out information from the
Interviewee. Have them write responses on the right-hand side of
their Journals or Notetaking Worksheets.
What does an Interviewer have to do to ask good follow-up
questions?
- Before students actually interview each other, work with them
on asking good questions. Use That's a Good Question
Worksheet to help them get started. Use the Fact-Based, Open-ended, &
Follow-up Questions Worksheet to explain and review the
different kinds of questions. Explain that before an interview,
they'll need to make a list of fact-based and open-ended
questions. During the interview, they'll need to listen closely to
be able to ask follow-up questions. Stress that the best
interviews depend heavily on follow-up questions because they are
drawing out what the Interviewee wants to say. In this activity,
students will learn that certain questions elicit certain depths
of knowledge.
- Once you believe that students are able to ask each other
questions in a practice interview, talk to them about how to
operate an audio recorder and camera. Distribute the Field Kit -- For
Teachers and briefly review how to use each item. Review
Photography,
Audio Recording, and Videography,
which explains the different kinds of equipment. You should stress
the importance of being properly prepared with working
equipment.
Practicing Interviewing With The Name Game
- To have students practice interviewing with each other, play a
"name game." First place students in pairs. Assign one student the
role of Interviewer; the other, the role of Interviewee. Have each
student playing the role of Interviewee make a name plate by
folding a piece of construction paper in half, length-wise, so
that it stands up. Have them write their name on one side then
hand their name plates to their Interviewers. Tell the
Interviewers that they will be interviewing their partners about
their first and last names. Use the Naming Traditions
Worksheet to get ideas for questions.
- Remind students to consider the Interviewer's insider and outsider
positions. (Consider positioning in each of
these lessons because it is such an easy task to forget. Students
should be reminded of their relationship to the Interviewee
because it guides them in formulating questions.) If a student is
partnering with a good friend, chances are s/he already knows a
story about the friend's name. Review the Insider / Outsider
Worksheets from Lesson 1, or have them complete new ones
if they are having difficulty with this concept. Reflect with them
on how this might affect the interview: Are there some questions
they don't have to ask because they already know the answer? Will
there be information they won't know because they are
outsiders?
- Brainstorm with the class about all the possible questions
they can ask about a name. Have them consult the Conducting an Interview
Essay for ideas if necessary. List the questions suggested
by students on the board and tell the students to use these topics
as a guide for formulating their interview questions. Encourage
them to use phrases such as "tell me about" to elicit rich
responses. Tell them they are going for the STORIES that can be
discovered by asking questions about someone's name.
- Review the list of questions that the class derived and put
"FB" next to fact-based questions, and "OE" next to open-ended
questions. Remind them that they'll want to ask some "follow-up"
questions based on what they hear, and these should be labeled
"FQ" on the board.
- Distribute the Interview Folder -- For
the Teacher and Field
Kit -- For Teachers to students. Have Interviewers conduct
a test of the recorder(s) by reading the Oral Release Form into
recorder and recording Interviewees responses. Then stop the recorder to listen to sound quality and make needed adjustments.
- After the preliminary checks, allow students to start the
interview, using questions generated on the board. Allow 20-30
minutes for both interviews, 10-15 minutes each. Ask the
Interviewer to jot down keywords, special language, terms, ideas,
and questions that they find interesting, important, or those they
need to explore more on the back of the Interviewee's name plate.
Remind them to take pictures of the Interviewee, if possible, and
have them sign the Written
Release Form.
- Have the partners work together to evaluate their interviews
using the Interview
Checklist. Also have them fill out the Audio Log and Photo Log, and
label the tape with the name of the Interviewer and Interviewee,
the place, and the date. Have them store all these in their Interview Folder -- For
the Teacher for now. In Lesson 5 they will learn how to
use the Archive
Folder for storing these materials.
- Once the interview is complete, ask each Interviewer to
introduce the Interviewee to the class and explain the "story"
behind his/her name. Then ask the Interviewee to comment: Does
he/she believe the Interviewer got it "right?" Is there any
additional information to add?
- Reflect on this interview activity with your students. What
did they find harder than they expected? What did they learn about
their partner? What surprised you, intrigued you, stirred or
disturbed you? Have students write follow-up notes in their
Journals.
- Have students read over their Conducting an
Interview Evaluation and check off the steps they have
learned in this lesson. If desired, check them yourself and
administer grades.
- If you are using the Fieldwork Rubric
to grade students at the end of the unit, review it with them now
and ask them to self-evaluate their progress.
4th and 8th Grade
Explorations and Extensions
- Have students switch interviewing roles: the partner who
interviewed will now be the Interviewee. Complete the process
described above. Once each student has taken notes on the back of
a name plate, these name plates can be used as a form of
assessment: Did the Interviewer ask fact-based, open-ended, and
follow-up questions?
- Select two students to "model" the Name Game interview in
front of the class. Have the rest of the class fill out the Interview
Checklist as the two students model the interview. After
the interview is finished, go over the list with the class to
discuss what was done well and what could be improved.
- For students having difficulty developing good questions, have
them visit Language Arts Lesson: Posing Good Interview
Questions and Writing Interview Questions to learn more
about the subject.
- Interview a family member about his or her name, using similar
questions that were used in the classroom activity.
- Have the Interviewer/Interviewee partners work together to
produce a summary paragraph of the Interviewee's name. Also, have
them take photographs of each other and submit the
paragraph/photos as a partner project. Final products is more
developed in Lesson 5 of this unit.
- For a related lesson, see Unit III Lesson 3
Activity 1 Naming Traditions.
Unit II Resources
Unit II
Outline
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