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Grades level iconsGrades 9–12
Video resource type iconVideos

Write With. . . Life Stories: Find Your Funny with Roz Chast

by 826 National and Life Stories
In this lesson, you will find the funny in your everyday life experiences and depict those moments in a cartoon.
About the Author

Roz Chast is an American cartoonist and a staff cartoonist for The New Yorker. Roz Chast’s work has appeared in numerous magazines through the years, including The Village Voice, National Lampoon, Scientific American, Harvard Business Review, Redbook, Mother Jones, and The New Yorker. Chast attended the Rhode Island School of Design, where she studied painting.

About Life Stories 

Life Stories is a 501(c)(3) non-profit media organization that creates and distributes documentaries, interviews, and educational resources about people whose lives inspire meaningful change. These stories address issues of civics, history, politics, the arts and culture by shining the spotlight on relatable human stories of purpose and meaning in times of change. We provide open access to all our content for communities and classrooms through our curated website and YouTube channel.

About The Thread 

The Thread is a new documentary interview series exploring what it means to live a purpose-driven life through conversations with multi-faceted people who have helped shape our society. Each 30-minute episode takes viewers on a personal journey into the life of extraordinary people who candidly share their triumphs and failures. The Thread is available on the Life Stories website and YouTube channel, and as a podcast across all major platforms. Teaching The Thread brings the series  into the classroom with episode lessons designed to strengthen social emotional learning and media literacy skills and expand the scope of subject matter in Social Studies and English Language Arts. Future seasons of The Thread will include similar curricular support.

What You Will Do

Introduction:

In this lesson, Roz Chast reflects on growing up as an anxious child of immigrants, with overprotective parents and an odd sense of humor. Chast discusses the challenges of aging, the importance of pursuing what you love, and how storytelling emerges as a way to make sense of life, connect with others, and express empathy. Please visit Roz Chast: Drawing From Life to see the full lesson provided by Life Stories.

 

Before You Begin: 

  • Decide which of Roz Chast’s cartoons you’d like students to view (suggested cartoons are linked in the materials section.) We recommend choosing at least three cartoons, with a mix of dialogue-based and situational humor.

 

STEP 1

Begin by watching a section of Roz Chast’s The Thread interview (6:19 -10:37). In this clip, Roz Chast says, “. . . I also liked, with cartoons, how you didn’t...

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