What is important for students to know about Act II, scene ii, in Romeo and Juliet, and how can I, as their teacher, make them learn it?

I don't believe that you can make anyone do or learn
anything.  As the old saying goes: "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make
him drink."  Maybe it would be helpful for you to focus on the things about the scene
that you really like, the things that you think are very neat or cool, so that your
enthusiasm might be contagious to the students?

Here are
some things about the scene that, for me, make it an exciting and interesting
one.

1. The scene opens with tons of dramatic
   suspense, created because Romeo is in the garden of his enemies.  Will he be
   discovered?  Will he have to fight one of his Capulet
   enemies?


2. Juliet is, in terms of her language, a much more
   straightforward, direct, and "masculine" character.  It's Romeo who has all the very
   flowery and romantic descriptions of things.  These characters (who go against the
   masculine and feminine stereotypes) might have been created by Shakespeare to have fun
   with the fact that he knew young men of almost the exactly the same age would play these
   two characters.  Have your class read parts of the scenes, interchanging guys and gals
   reading Romeo and Juliet.


3. Talk with your students about
   the fact that, except for the light in Juliet's window, the scene is meant to be taking
   place in the dark.  This means that, at least at first, Romeo can see her, but she can't
   see him.  Discuss how this affects the scene and at what point in the text it might be
   that Juliet finally sees Romeo.


4. Some of this text is the
   most famous in all of the English language.  For example "Wherefore art thou, Romeo?" is
   very famous, but often erroneously assumed to mean "Where are you, Romeo?"  So, it might
   be illuminating to pick out some of the more famous lines and examine them for their
   images and correct meanings with your
   students.

Again, the key is really to find the
parts of the scene that interest and excite you.  This will give you the greatest chance
of success with teaching the scene to your students.  For more about "the balcony
scene," please follow the links below.