Looking for some online resources to round out (or start) a learning experience about Greek Mythology for your middle school ELA students?
Below are a few helpful websites that have lots of passages, short myth stories, and activities and ideas. I can tell you that typically, kids LOVE reading the script / play versions out loud whole-class or even in small groups (they get to read more parts that way, and it helps make your shy students feel more comfortable while getting to participate!).
Another activity NOT listed below that I would love to develop (it might give you an idea, too) would be to have students each choose one character from Greek mythology to basically “become.” They’d have to do all their research, figure out who they get along with / don’t get along with (those gods and goddesses sure like to fight and squabble with all the drama they have going on in the stories!).
I’ve always wanted to ultimately have students dress up one day as their character (as much as possible) and have a “dinner” in the class, like a dinner party, and the whole conversation is from their perspectives as those characters.
Imagine your students planning out where to sit and who to sit next to or avoid based on what they learn about their own characters as well as others:
- I can’t sit next to him- he killed my friend.
- I can’t sit next to her- she cheated on me with the god across the table.
- I don’t even want to talk about the adventure I had planned because you made a storm and it blocked me from my journey.
- No, way! I only made the storm because I had to stop that other ship…).
Online Resources —
1) Here’s a collection of all the famous Greek myths. The cool thing is that each little story is less than 4 pages long.
2) This website has several lessons and ideas, and #3 looks like a really fun one!
3) Greek myths – kids can go through and read online (it’s geared towards younger students, but if your 7th graders are struggling readers and / or if they have pretty much no knowledge of Greek myths, then this would be a good resource).
Finally, don’t forget to check out these Greek Myth animated YouTube videos for ways to support the learning and to further engage students. Keep in mind that YouTube is pretty much a visual / video search engine, so it’s another fantastic resource to help you bring Greek mythology into your classroom.
