This awesome article was written by Momma Jo.  Thanks so much for sharing this with us!

Here's an article I wrote for the parents of our homeschool co-op's musical theater students, a class I'm teaching next school year:

Introducing Shakespeare

(Almost) Painlessly

Just the thought of introducing Shakespeare into your homeschool can be intimidating at best, and downright frightening to some. The language is difficult, some of the themes make you blush, and all the talk of witches and fairies and death can be hard to explain to youngsters.  But there is a way to introduce the Bard to your children, and explore these plays that have had such a powerful impact on our world, our language, and our art, in a fun and easy manner.

Step 1. Pick your play

                Starting with Macbeth or Hamlet or King Lear is not a good idea.  Comedies are easier to understand for newbies, especially kids who are sensitive to scary elements in stories.  A Midsummer Night’s Dream is an excellent place to start, followed by something like The Taming of the Shrew or Twelfth Night.

Step 2. Children’s version of Shakespeare’s plays

                I recommend either Charles Lamb’s version (Tales From Shakespeare which can be found online here: http://shakespeare.palomar.edu/lambtales/LAMBTALE.HTM) or Edith Nesbit’s Beautiful Stories From Shakespeare (which can be found at the Baldwin Project online: www.mainlesson.com ).  Read the children’s version of the play out loud.  Then, if you can find it, get it on tape or CD.  Jim Weiss reads some great ones, including A Midsummer Night’s Dream.  Listen to it in the car and talk about it.  Children’s versions are generally edited for content, and kids get the plot line fixed in their heads this way.

Step 3.  Video adaptations

                My family likes to rent movies, so naturally we gravitate toward the Shakespeare movies by Kenneth Branagh or whatever we can find on Netflix or at the library in the video section.  Often these films have current TV and film actors in them.  We turn on the closed-captioning so we don’t miss anything, and follow along.  Sometimes we still miss things, but knowing what is happening from reading the children’s versions keeps the kids focused and in the loop.  Many times the kids will pause the movie to ask me about what’s going on, or I’ll pause it to discuss something, and occasionally I have to fast forward through an inappropriate romance scene or something.  I’ve found the kids will understand the meaning of unfamiliar words simply from the context, but often we’ll pause to look things up in the ever-present dictionary.

Step 4.  At last!  We’re ready for a live performance!

                Knowing what is going on is key to keeping the kids engaged in the action of a live stage performance of Shakespeare.  We can’t pause, rewind, or turn up the volume.  We can’t turn on the captions.  If someone can’t follow along with the story they will lose interest very quickly.  Don’t attempt a live show without going through the preceding steps!  Especially if the kids are young, it has great potential to end up being a disastrous waste of time.  On the other hand, if done right, this is one of the things your kids will look forward to year after year.  My kids love “Shakespeare Summers,” and we literally devote our summer months to this process of learning to appreciate the Bard.