Surrealism in the Classroom!

After teaching a unit on Belgium I also introduced surrealism art through the art of René Magritte the famous Belgian Surrealist artist.  We looked at a variety of pictures by Magritte and then I asked them to create their own piece of "surrealism".  This is the perfect opportunity for students to get cross-curricular credit from another course, mainly from Art or if you offer a segment of Art History this will also work.  This dual credit is of course negotiated with the Art teacher in advance.  The students that negotiated cross-curricular credit did large paintings in the Surrealism style.  They were extraordinary!  The student samples here are ones that were for my class alone.  Each student had to not only produce a piece of Surrealistic art but they also had to describe it using a wide variety of adjectives that we had learned and also use a specific number of "sentence patterns" that I had given to them.  I like to use "guided sentence patterns" in some of my activities as it forces the students to raise to a level that I desire them to write at.  It also helps to introduce a variety of sentence structures that they might not normally think about.  I was amazed and thrilled at the art and creativity that my students produced for me.  I did not mark their "art" but enjoyed immensely what they had produced.  It was a required component to the assignment and was considered a "given" to be done, but I gave the "graded marks" towards their French written piece.  On "presentation" day I used the inside/outside circle activity for students to share their work in French with each other!  Lots of fun!

mini video clips!

Pixar mini video clips are a perfect way to have students do either a creative writing or an oral activity by having them retell the story.  The most recent one I have used is one with a snowman in a snowglobe.  The video clip has little or no dialogue in it but has some music to go along with the "story".  The mini clip with the snowman is perfect for this time of year even if you don't happen to have snow where you live.  It has a wintery feel to it mixed in with a beachside vacation and of course a "girl" in a swimsuit.   After watching the short 2-3 minute video I asked the students to "tell me what was going to happen next"!  Their imaginations are not always pushed at a high school level but it is certainly fun to hear about what will happen to the snowman next!  :) 

Bonne Année! Happy New Year!

Happy New Year everyone!  It's a new page for everyone; a fresh start to the year and a great way to welcome back your students!  I like to start with some simple things for the new year with my students such as "sorting their notebooks".  If your students are anything like mine or even my own children you will know that "Spring cleaning" needs to come much earlier than Spring and so cleaning out and reorganizing the notebook is a great start to the new year.  You  and your students may be surprised at what they find!  - work to be submitted?!  probably yes.  Remember to teach your students where they are at in their learning and your students will work at fulfilling your goals for them along with the goals they have made for themselves.  Happy Teaching! :)

Fun with graham wafers!

Each month the languages department in our school holds a multi-cultural seminar where we bring in students who study both French or Spanish to participate in an activity.  This month we wanted to do something a little bit different and so we held a 'monuments making' activity class.  We began by showing some prominent French and Spanish monuments or buildings such as the Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame Cathedral in France.  The students created their own versions of the monuments out of milk carton bases, graham wafers, royal icing, jujubes, candies, mints, licorice, etc......  Here are just two of the creations that we are most proud of.  :)  The students are still talking about this activity and students from all over the school have heard about it and have come by our classroom to have a look! 

 

la Tour Eiffel

la Cathédrale de Notre Dame

Allons-nous à la plage?

Non!  We are not going to the beach but your students will have fun with this one!  This is a wonderful idea that I picked up at a conference just over a year ago now and have just had the opportunity to try it in my classroom this year.  For each unit that you teach, write a variety of questions about that unit on the beach ball.  When you're busy taking attendance and the students are waiting for you or when you have a few minutes at the end of class, toss the ball out into the audience.  Yes - to your students! :) When a student catches the ball he or she must answer the question wherever his thumbs are.  That means of course that your student has a choice of two questions but that's certainly ok! The student must first read the question aloud and then come up with an answer to the question in French, bien sûr! The students then take turns tossing the beach ball to each other.  If the same question comes up, that student must answer the question touching the other thumb!   :)

Push the envelope!

Push the envelope in terms of sentence structures with your students.  Do they always give you sentences that are 4-5 words in length?

The roll of the dice will soon change that! 

My students know that when a pair of dice is put on the table that there will be some serious thinking involved!!  and some fun too!  :)   All students must create a sentence with the number of words that is shown for the number on the dice when rolled. I set my cell phone timer and they must write, write, write.  Just when they think they are getting the hang of it all, I throw an additional dice onto the table, and another the next round and another and another.   Soon, the students are combining long sentences together in order to reach the number thrown on the dice.  If the group is lucky the student throwing the dice throws low numbers, if not, the students are trying to make crazy sentences!!  Today, one group had to try to make a sentence with 40 words.  Yes, that's not very practical, nor is it good French, but it gets the students to pull words out of their heads that they had forgotten were in there!  

Afterwards, each student shared their favourite sentence (not the shortest one, nor the longest) aloud with the class.  This was my opportunity to help with pronunciation and correction of sentence structures and vocabulary usage.  I am always amazed at what they can put together.  :) Give it a try!

Moving away from script to "real" speech

How can you help students move from writing French scripts to doing true French oral production?

It is so easy for students to use an on-line translation site to assist them in creating their "speech" but certainly detrimental to their development in so many ways!  As the difficulty level increases while learning a second language so does the difficulty for students to create conversations without the use of "written aids".  When you ask a question students seem to immediately want to pick up a pen and write an answer down!!  Crazy but true! It's a comfort mechanism for them which if not curtailed can hinder their speech development.  HOWEVER, I believe that there's nothing wrong with students being able to jot down ideas or words to help them out. 

My beginner's class will soon be putting together a presentation to tell me about their likes and dislikes in terms of food, beverages, leisure activities, and school subjects along with information about themselves, their families, and pets. We have been working with -er verbs, one and two verb sentences, avoir expressions, partitive articles, idiomatic expressions and preferences.  This is an awful lot for them to remember and use!  We have been practising for two months now and soon they will show me what they have learned.  I know that this will be very scarey for some of them, but I also know that they will be able to manage their presentations with a little help.  So, today, I showed them exactly how to do this.

Using PowerPoint or Word or a cut and paste picture they will make a "slide" or "mini-poster" with a picture on it with a couple of words included.  They are "prompts" to help them put together a sentence or sentences of their choice.
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mon chien - 14 ans - le ballon
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Students can create many sentences from the above bits of information:

Voici mon chien, Bear.
Il s'appelle Bear.
J'ai un chien.
Il a 14 ans.
Il est brun et blanc.
Il aime jouer avec mon ballon.
Il aime jouer.
Il dort.
Il préfère dormir. Il n'aime pas jouer avec le ballon.
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With a little bit of persistence and much modelling and scaffolding your students will be amazed at how much they can actually say!!!  :)  Have fun with this!  After all, everyone wants to be able to speak their new language!