LOL

__Laugh Out Loud:__
//What makes something funny?// The following teacher generated ideas might help you enrich this unit: Use the front page of this placemat with several "funny" video clips of your choice to allow students to gather some data. Remember to keep the length of the video clips the same. Students can then discuss their noticings/wonderings and differences in their data with a partner. This will help generate student's own inquiry questions related to the idea of humour and what makes something funny.

**Writing Humour:** Humour is hard to write! Consider differentiating the type of writing form a student can choose from as they attempt to write humour. Improv activities and warm ups might also help with the humour part. If we can get students comfortable with reacting to a moment or prompt, the humour will come. ( This is what they told us at a Second City Workshop on Improv and Writing! After living the experience I am tending to believe this!!)

Try: __**Conducted Story**__ as a class or in small groups Players form a line on the stage. A title for a story, and a story genre is obtained from the audience. The MC starts the game by pointing to a player, who needs to start telling the story. At any point in time the MC can switch to another player, who needs to continue the story flawlessly, even if the switch happened in the middle of a sentence or even in the middle of a word. The last player ends the story.

Try: **__Word at a Time Letter__** Play in pairs. The 2 players will compose a letter, one word at a time. Have them actually write down the letter. Anything, even `where` on the paper one starts writing, is an offer. No need to sidecoach, but the possibilities are endless; think about greeting cards, thank you notes, love letters, legal stuff, promotional letters, etc.

Here are a few other documents shared in our Language Arts network sessions to support you with writing short stories: