Cover teacher — you need no subject knowledge
Print: this sheet, one per pupil. The scene summary and every quotation pupils need are printed below, so no copy of the play is required. If there are computers, pupils lay the feed out in Word or Google Docs (or Canva if the school has it); the lesson works completely on paper if there are none — the boxes on this sheet are the feed.
Run: 5 min read the scene summary and the quotations · 5 min fill in the "who posts what" planning grid · 25 min draft the six posts · 10 min write the community note and the caption check · 5 min swap and mark against the criteria. Safeguarding: this is a fictional in-world platform on paper or in a document. Nobody creates an account, nobody posts anything anywhere, and no real handles or real people are used.
Collect: this sheet from every pupil, plus a printout or a saved file if they worked on screen.
What you are doing
You are turning Romeo and Juliet, Act 3 Scene 1 into a six-post feed on an invented platform called Verona Voice. Each post belongs to a named character, is written in that character's voice, and must be anchored to something that actually happens in the scene. You then add a community note that fact-checks one of the posts, because the whole point of the scene is that everybody reports it differently.
The scene, in seven sentences
- Benvolio wants to go indoors because the Capulets are about; Mercutio teases him for pretending to be peaceful.
- Tybalt arrives looking for Romeo and insults him: "Romeo, the love I bear thee can afford / No better term than this: thou art a villain."
- Romeo — secretly married to Juliet, Tybalt's cousin, an hour earlier — refuses to fight and says he loves the name Capulet.
- Mercutio is disgusted by Romeo's "calm, dishonourable, vile submission" and draws on Tybalt himself: "Tybalt, you rat-catcher, will you walk?"
- Romeo steps between them; Tybalt stabs Mercutio under Romeo's arm and runs. Mercutio calls his wound "a scratch, a scratch" and then curses both families: "A plague o' both your houses!"
- Mercutio dies. Tybalt comes back, Romeo kills him, and cries "O, I am fortune's fool!" before Benvolio makes him run.
- The Prince arrives. Benvolio gives his account of the fight, Lady Capulet says Benvolio is lying because he is a Montague, and the Prince banishes Romeo: "Immediately we do exile him hence."
Quotations you may use
| Speaker | Line |
|---|
| Tybalt | "Thou art a villain." |
| Romeo | "I do protest I never injured thee, / But love thee better than thou canst devise." |
| Mercutio | "O calm, dishonourable, vile submission!" |
| Mercutio | "Tybalt, you rat-catcher, will you walk?" |
| Mercutio | "'Tis not so deep as a well, nor so wide as a church-door; but 'tis enough, 'twill serve." |
| Mercutio | "A plague o' both your houses! / They have made worms' meat of me." |
| Romeo | "This day's black fate on more days doth depend." |
| Romeo | "O, I am fortune's fool!" |
| Lady Capulet | "He is a kinsman to the Montague; / Affection makes him false, he speaks not true." |
| Prince Escalus | "Immediately we do exile him hence." |
Step by step
- 5 min — Read the scene summary and the quotations. Tick the three moments you think would actually get posted about.
- 5 min — Fill in the planning grid: six posts, six different characters, in the order the events happen.
- 25 min — Draft the posts in the frames below. Every post needs a handle, a timestamp, the post text and at least one quotation or paraphrase from the scene.
- 10 min — Write the community note. Pick the post that is furthest from the truth and correct it using evidence from the scene.
- 5 min — Swap with a partner and tick their sheet against the success criteria.
Planning grid
| # |
Character (handle) |
Moment in the scene |
Tone in one word |
| 1 | | | |
|---|
| 2 | | | |
|---|
| 3 | | | |
|---|
| 4 | | | |
|---|
| 5 | | | |
|---|
| 6 | | | |
|---|
Draft your feed
One frame per post. Write the handle and the time on the first line, then the post. Keep each post under 40 words — the compression is the skill.
Community note
Which post is the least accurate, and what does the scene actually say?
Success criteria
- My six posts cover the scene in the right order and come from six different characters.
- Every post is anchored to the text — it quotes a line or clearly rewrites one.
- The voice suits the character: Mercutio jokes even when he is dying, the Prince issues orders, Lady Capulet accuses.
- My community note corrects a specific claim with specific evidence from the scene, not just "this is biased".
- The feed is laid out so a reader can tell instantly who posted, when, and in what order.
If you finish early
- Write the reply thread under Benvolio's post from three citizens of Verona — one who believes him, one who does not, one who was not even there.
- Draft the Prince's official statement as a public notice rather than a post. What changes when the medium changes?
- Choose one of your posts and rewrite it as Shakespeare's original line. Which loses more — the post or the verse?