Story Characters - Using Body Biographies to Help With Character Analysis

This Smart Board Activity uses an INTERACTIVE character to go through the instructions!! Your students are sure to love participating with the character!!!

Purpose: Character analysis is an area that students seem to have great difficulty. Readers seem to really have problem grasping and connecting with characters in the text. A body biography is a visual and written representation of a character’s life. In creating a body biography, students practice character analysis, understanding literary devices, and determining author’s purpose. Not only are body biographies a comprehensive way to analyze individual characters, but the process is so enjoyable that students hardly realize that learning is taking place! Read on for ways to utilize this effective strategy in your classroom.

GOALS: Students will analyze a character to help them connect to that character. Within this analysis students will need to get explicit and implied evidence from the text to support these characteristics of that character:

1. Draw and color (in detail) your character. You will need to find evidence within your novel that supports the detail you put into your character. In other words, if you give your character brown hair, where in the novel did the author describe him or her as having brown hair? Can you support it with evidence?

2. Heart - on or around your character’s heart, DESCRIBE the most important relationship that he or
she has in the novel.

3. Spine – in To Kill a Mockingbird, what is the most important goal for your character? What drives
his/her thoughts and actions? Describe this on or around your character’s spine.

4. Head – Driving Thoughts/Actions – Consider thoughts that your character may refer to often
throughout the novel. Or, think of actions that are often repeated. Write these on the head of your
body bio.

5. Color – Colors are often symbolic. What color(s) do you most connect with your character? Why?
Work these colors through your portrait.

6. Symbols – What objects can you connect with your character that illustrates his/her spirit (how he
or she really is!)? You can use objects mentioned within the novel or objects you think correspond with
the character. Please place at least 4 objects on your portrait where you think they best fit.

7. Changes – How has your character changed within the novel? Trace these changes in words and/or
artwork. Please place this information at the bottom of your portrait.

MATERIALS: Computers for students to create Prezi's, OR
Poster board/butcher paper to outline themselves to create their body outline.
Markers
Magazines
Stencils
Copies of Directions and Character Rough Draft

COMMON CORE STANDARDS:
RL.6.1 Cite textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text.
RL.6.2 Determine a theme or central idea of a text and how it is conveyed through particular details; provide a summary of the text distinct from personal opinions or judgments.
RL.6.3 Describe how a particular story’s or drama’s plot unfolds in a series of episodes as well as how the characters respond or change as the plot moves toward a resolution.
W.6.9 Draw evidence from literary or informational texts to support analysis, reflection, and research.
SL.6.1 Engage effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grade 6 topics, texts, and issues, building on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly.
SL.6.2 Interpret information presented in diverse media and formats (e.g., visually, quantitatively, orally) and explain how it contributes to a topic, text, or issue under study.
SL.6.5 Include multimedia components (e.g., graphics, images, music, sound) and visual displays in presentations to clarify information.