CPD on Graphic Novel Adaptations

In early March 2010, we did a CPD illustrated talk for teachers on graphic novel adaptations as part of the Scottish Book Trust OTIR (Online Teacher in Residence).
Teachers gathered in a class room at Inveralmond Community High School, and we talked briefly about our history as metaphrog, then explained what graphic novels are, before taking a closer look at The First Men on Mercury comic adaptation of Edwin Morgan’s poem we made last year. Next, we examined how several graphic novels were adapted from literature. Firstly we looked at three very different interpretations of Robert Louis Stevenson’s The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde: by Alan Grant and Cam Kennedy, Klimowski and Schejbal, and Mattotti and Kramsky respectively. Then we explored how comic and visual storytelling techniques have been deployed, by P. Craig Russell, to bring out the themes and enhance the reading of Neil Gaiman’s Coraline, before moving on to Peter Kuper’s version of Kafka’s The Metamorphosis, and finally David Mazzucchelli and Paul Karasik’s adaptation of Paul Auster’s City of Glass.

Feedback from the teachers on the CPD was excellent, and some even said this was the best CPD they’d attended! For our part, we were really excited about (re)reading and researching these books and putting together the presentation. Michael Stephenson, English teacher at Inveralmond, talks about the session and his own experiences working in the classroom with graphic novel adaptations on the OTIR blog here: http://www.scottishbooktrust.com/blog/teacher-in-residence/2010/03/michael-stephenson-graphic-novel-ideas

We now have created three bite-sized online presentations for everyone to view, extracted from this workshop. They have been hosted on the Scottish Book Trust website here: http://www.scottishbooktrust.com/otir/metaphrog-voicethread (with an explanation of how to use voicethread), and you can also view them here, below. Do feel free to add your own comments to these voicethreads (you can do this – very quiclky – by registering for free on voicethread and either write or record your comment).