Interview a Peer

Learning Target OR Standards & Connections
  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.6.1 Engage effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grade 6 topics, texts, and issues, building on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly.
  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.6.5 Include multimedia components (e.g., graphics, images, music, sound) and visual displays in presentations to clarify information.
Essential Outcome(s) Level(s)
Students will…

  • Understand how to conduct an interview and intentionally listen to the responses.
  • Produce and publish an audio interview to share about a peer.
  • Create a visual display (graphic) based on their interview to represent the person they interviewed. 
 Any Grade (can be adapted but I used in Grade 6)
Activity/Project
  1. Ask students if they have ever been interviewed or interviewed someone before. Discuss why someone might be interviewed. (Getting to know each other, school/job interview)
  2. Explain to students they are going to practice their public speaking and listening skills by interviewing each other. However, before any good interview, they need to prepare. Share StoryCorps, The Great Questions List with students, and as a class discuss why these are good questions for an interview. (Open-ended, creative, allow for follow-up questions, etc.)
  3. Explain to students the importance of listening to the person you are interviewing, the appropriate body language, how to listen, and respond with follow-up questions. 
  4. Watch examples of an interview. Options: PBS News Hour Interview or StoryCorps video, 4 Tips for a Great Interview
  5. Ask for a volunteer to model how to ask and answer questions. The teacher will use a few of the questions from The Great Questions List and demonstrate how to respond and follow up. 
  6. Explain to students they are going to choose 4-5 questions from The Great Questions List and come up with at least 2 questions of their own. Students can write their questions on notecards, paper, or a Google Doc, etc. 
  7. Introduce students to Soundtrap. Use the tutorial videos and allows students time to explore.
  8. Once students are comfortable using Soundtrap, students will record themselves asking their interview questions and their partner’s response utilizing the skills they learned from the videos and classroom discussion. 
  9. As students finish with the interview, they can edit audio if needed and add intro/outro music with loops.
  10. Students can share their interviews in a small group, class, or school community. 
Extended Learning
  1. Make a classroom podcast! If wanting to make this an episodic feel or make this a podcast season, students could all start and end their interviews the same way. For example, “Today in Mrs. Barrett’s class, I am sitting down with… that’s all we have for today’s interview star in Mrs. Barrett’s class. Check us out next week when we interview….”
  2. Create podcast artwork for the person they interviewed based on their responses using Canva or Adobe Spark.
  3. Create a podcast trailer with Canva!
Additional Resources

 

This lesson was created by Becky Barrett, a former Education Specialist at Soundtrap, and was inspired by StoryCorps and Educatopia’s resources. Prior to joining Soundtrap, Becky was an Education Technologist, Technology Integrator, and third and fifth grade teacher. You can find her on Twitter @BeckyEDU.

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

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