Home › Reading schedules › Much Ado About Nothing

Reading schedule · Grades 8–12

Much Ado About Nothing in 5 Weeks: A Reading Schedule

A five-week plan for reading Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing, one act a week. Each week gives the reading, a short summary of what happens, three discussion questions and the escape room that goes with it. For grades 8–12, in class or at home.

Pacing

One act a week suits most high school classes. Read the act across the first part of the week, in class or at home and ideally with some of it read aloud, then use the questions for discussion or a short written response and finish the week with the escape room. Acts vary in length, so give a long act an extra lesson if it needs one: nothing is lost by stretching a week.

Each week ends with an escape room on that week's reading: seven self-checking locks that run in any browser, with no logins, and progress is saved, so a room can be finished another day. Every room has free taster locks to try, and members can open them all.

Print this schedule Escape rooms on Much Ado About Nothing

Week 1: Act 1

Read: Act 1

Don Pedro returns from the wars to Leonato's house, and Beatrice and Benedick take up their sparring again. Claudio falls for Leonato's daughter Hero and Don Pedro offers to woo her for him at the feast, talk of the plan is overheard in the orchard, and Don Pedro's resentful brother Don John looks for mischief.

Discussion questions

1. What do Beatrice and Benedick's insults suggest about their past?
2. Why does Claudio ask Don Pedro to woo Hero for him?
3. What drives Don John?

Escape room: Lady Disdain (lockedlessons.com/rooms/much-ado-about-nothing-act-1/)

Week 2: Act 2

Read: Act 2

At the masked dance Don John tells Claudio that Don Pedro is wooing Hero for himself, but the mistake is cleared up and Claudio and Hero are engaged. Don Pedro plans to make Beatrice and Benedick fall in love, Borachio plots with Don John to make Hero seem unfaithful with the help of her maid Margaret, and the friends trick Benedick in the orchard.

Discussion questions

1. Why is Claudio so quick to believe Don John?
2. How does the trick on Benedick work, and why does he fall for it?
3. How do masks and overhearing drive the play?

Escape room: The Masked Dance (lockedlessons.com/rooms/much-ado-about-nothing-act-2/)

Week 3: Act 3

Read: Act 3

Hero and Ursula trick Beatrice into believing that Benedick loves her, and Benedick shows signs of love. Don John accuses Hero to Claudio and offers him proof; Dogberry's Watch overhears Borachio boasting to Conrade and arrests them, but on the wedding morning Dogberry's visit to Leonato explains nothing.

Discussion questions

1. Compare the tricks played on Beatrice and on Benedick.
2. How do Dogberry and the Watch end up uncovering the plot?
3. Why does Claudio decide to shame Hero in public rather than in private?

Escape room: The Night Watch (lockedlessons.com/rooms/much-ado-about-nothing-act-3/)

Week 4: Act 4

Read: Act 4

At the wedding Claudio denounces Hero, who collapses, and Leonato believes the accusation. Friar Francis proposes giving out that Hero is dead until the truth is known, Beatrice and Benedick declare their love and she asks him to challenge Claudio, and Dogberry examines Borachio and Conrade.

Discussion questions

1. Why does Leonato believe Claudio over his own daughter?
2. What does Beatrice's demand reveal about her and about the limits placed on women in the play?
3. Is the Friar's plan a sensible one?

Escape room: The Wedding Day (lockedlessons.com/rooms/much-ado-about-nothing-act-4/)

Week 5: Act 5

Read: Act 5

Leonato and his brother Antonio confront Claudio, and Benedick challenges him. Borachio confesses, Leonato requires Claudio to mourn at Hero's tomb and marry a niece in her place, Benedick struggles to write love poetry, and at the second wedding the bride is revealed as Hero; Beatrice and Benedick agree to marry, and the play ends in a dance.

Discussion questions

1. Has Claudio earned Hero by the end?
2. How have Beatrice and Benedick changed since Act 1?
3. Does the title of the play fit what has happened?

Escape room: Strike Up, Pipers (lockedlessons.com/rooms/much-ado-about-nothing-act-5/)