Movie Talks/Clip Chats - Trying Something New

I LOVE clip chats (formerly known as "movie talks") - I love using them to introduce new vocabulary and could center my curriculum solely around doing these. However, if your students are like mine, they are not 100% on board when I do one:

• Many students hate the "jerkiness factor" of a clip chat when I play and then pause it to narrate. 
• When I turn off the lights to do the clip chat, many students use that as a time to "close their eyes"
• Even with PQAs and circling, many students do not participate.

So this year, instead of the play/pause narration of the clip, I start out with a dictation first (regular or listen/draw) of 7-8 sentences from the clip chat. When we finish the dictation, then I show the class the clip without interruption or narration - the clip is what the dictation was, just now in visual form. I do not know from whom I learned this, so kudos if it is you (I know that I certainly do not possess the ingenuity to have come up with something like this on my own). I then turn the dictation into a reading (much more expanded and fleshed out), and now I do reading/post-reading activities with it.

Observations

1. So yes - no more narration of the clip. However, compared to the traditional clip chat delivery, I like this much better, because since students are doing a dictation, they are paying more attention due to the nature of the activity.
2. The dictation previews the clip for students. They already have some kind of mental representation of the sentences in their mind (especially if they drew them), so showing the clip after the dictation is either confirming what they know or is filling in mental gaps.
3. Students are still receiving input - it is just coming in a different way.
4. I do miss the narration aspect of a traditional clip chat, but I also do not want students to tune out due to the pause/play factor or the temptation to fall asleep.
5. When students see the dictation-now-as-a-reading, it becomes a type of embedded reading. They have already interacted with the dictation sentences and are now adding new sentences (of they already have a picture due to seeing the clip. All I am doing is confirming their mental picture of the story with Latin sentences).

So give this a try and see what you think!

P.S. In my Latin 1 classes, I am solely focusing on introducing high-frequency vocabulary with lots of exposure and repetitions, so I have almost exclusively been using clip chats and using those as readings! Next semester, I will start introducing some short novellas. From a proficiency perspective, I do not think that novice-low students are ready to read a novella yet in their first semester unless the novella is short, incredibly-focused, and resembles something like Confidence Readers. 

Novice Picture Writing Proficiency Assessment w/ Rubric

I am trying out something new with writing in my Latin 1 classes. In previous years when I taught Latin 1, I had students doing timed writes after the first week based on readings/clipchats, but big picture, I never felt comfortable with that, because I felt like all students were doing was spitting back to me memorized sentences from the story, not necessarily any true acquired language. Since they have only had 8.5 weeks of Latin so far this year, they are "babies" when it comes to writing in the target language.

As a result, this year in my Latin 1 classes, I have been holding back on writing in Latin per se (outside of copying sentences from readings in lots of various activities or doing very guided writing. NOTE - these types of writing in the target language still have MUCH value!) so that I am not forcing output too quickly and have chosen instead rather to focusing on bathing them with sheltered vocabulary input before any true output.

After 8.5 weeks of Latin, I gave students their first written proficiency assessment based on a series of pictures which created a story (AI created the pictures). Although students had never seen the pictures before, they did mirror many of the sentences which had been in readings and also in bellringers. The difference, however, was that they had never written this many sentences before in Latin at once in one sitting and never in a sequence for the creation of a story. 

I gave them six pictures, of which there were at least 3-4 sentences which they could write for each of them. HOWEVER, I only asked them for 1-2 sentences for each picture. I debated about this:

• I knew that there would be some students who could only write one short, choppy sentence per picture.
• I also knew that there were many students who were already writing compound sentences using "and" or "because," so in writing one compound sentence, they were already demonstrating proficiency beyond the expectation.
• I was grading this on a rubric, so the minimum number of sentences was not the sole criteria but rather were they also adding details, combining details, etc in the picture?

Below is an example of one of the pictures used (I made two others):

Observations

1. Wow, I was absolutely amazed at what students wrote and how much they wrote! It was like after bathing them in so much input for the past 8.5 weeks that it overflowed similar to turning on a faucet - it all finally came out!
2. Student examples from picture 1 (in Latin and English):
1. Puer Marcus. Puer Julius. (The boy Marcus. The boy Julius).
2. Puer est Marcus. Marcus est parvus. (The boy is Marcus. Marcus is small).
3. Marcus est parvus. Julius est magnus (Marcus is small. Julius is big).
4. Marcus est parvus puer, et Julius est magnus puer. (Marcus is a small boy, and Julius is a big boy).
5. Hic est puer. Ei nomen est Marcus. Marcus est parvus et laetus puer. Hic est magnus puer. Ei nomen est Julius, et is est laetus. (This is a boy. His name is Marcus. Marcus is a small and happy boy. This is a big boy. His name is Julius, and he is happy).
3. It was so weird to see the Theory of Ordered Development occurring in their output right before my eyes. A number of students left out the Latin word "is" when trying to write "the boy is big" and instead wrote "the boy big." Before, I would have been frustrated over this and would have blamed the students, but knowing now the Theory of Ordered Development, I was like "Yay, you're proceeding along EXACTLY as you should be!"
4. Grading on a novice-low writing rubric informed by ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines made it so much easier! Because I was not focusing on errors and performance but rather on "show me what you can do and where you fall on the proficiency continuum/spectrum," this freed me greatly!
5. Yes, there were spelling and grammar errors - LOTS of them! However, when grammar errors are the norm and expectation since these students are novice learners, I only marked those errors if they impeded my understanding of their messages (even me as the "sympathetic receptor") which lowered their placement on the rubric.
6. I was surprised by how many students used vocabulary which I had not been truly targeting yet or for which I had not yet held them accountable. However, I had been using these words but usually they were glossed for bellringers, reading passages, and listening. Somehow, these students had already acquired those words, and those words were inside of them ready to come out!

I plan to do more of these kinds of writings!

New Page on my Blog - Proficiency-Based Grading

There is a new page on my blog - Proficiency-Based Grading. It is now listed at the top in the navigation bar. I hope that you will find the information useful.

Proficiency-Based Grading 

Performance vs. Proficiency

I am now in week 8 of school - I cannot believe that I have been with students for almost two months! One of my goals for this year has been to fully implement a proficiency-based grading system. While I have dabbled with the concept in the past few years, this year I wish to fully commit to it.

However, when discussing proficiency-based grading with others, I have come to realize that there are lots of different views about this, of which many are incorrect. Much of this comes down to one's understanding of performance vs. proficiency. I will admit that I did not learn about this concept until a few years ago, and now having an understanding of it has completely transformed the way I view grading. 

So allow me this excursus to distinguish between the two in a language classroom - none of the following information is mine but comes from years of learning about the topic from Martina Bex, Elicia Cardenas, and many others:

Performance

• “spit back what you know," rehearsed
• should be formative in nature when employed, informs teacher of where the knowledge gaps are and what gaps need to be filled
• focuses on errors made
• results tend to be quantifiable in nature, follows the "start from 100 and deduct errors" model
• rubric/traditional number grading

Proficiency 

• unrehearsed, real world
• "show me what you CAN do!"
• should be summative in nature
• holistic grading - "where do you fall on the rubric/continuum based on exemplars?"
• rubric (possibly based on ACTFL guidelines)

So when assessing the different modalities of a language classroom, what do formatives vs. summatives, performance vs. proficiency look like?

Reading (When assessing reading, always ask questions in commonly shared classroom language (probably English) and have students respond in that language. See Martina Bex’s blog post - “Reading Activity or Reading Assessment” for explanation).

• Performance
• formative
• answer questions about a KNOWN reading with which students are already familiar. Again, the "spit back what you know" model.
• Proficiency
• summative
• answer questions about a SIGHT reading but based on KNOWN vocabulary and structures. This will inform you as the teacher if/what students have acquired.

Listening

• Performance
• formative
• examples: which picture (A or B) am I describing?; draw what I say from a known story; which character from the story am I describing in the target language?
• Proficiency
• summative
• examples: based on KNOWN vocabulary, draw these unfamiliar sentences which I say; write the correct target language response to what I am saying.

Writing

• Performance
• formative
• example: timed write where students retell a KNOWN story in the target language, write a guided story using known vocabulary; write 4-5 sentences about what you see in the picture.
• Proficiency
• summative
• free write examples: change a detail in the story and write about it; write a sequel/prequel to the story; write about a parallel character; write a story about what you see in the picture.

Speaking

If possible, avoid speaking assessments in the first two years (due to output theory)

Grading rubric examples

• Martina Bex - Comprehensible Classroom
• Scott Benedict - Immediate Immersion

Other blogs on the topic

• Martina Bex
• Eric Richards
• Kawai Resources
• World Language Classroom

Rotating Desks

If you have not gotten a copy of Eric Richards’ book “Grafted Writing,” please do so. In it, he details numerous ways to get students writing in a very guided manner - this is great for beginning writers! One of his ideas is called “Rotating Desks.” At the 2023 CI Summit in Savannah where Eric demonstrated numerous strategies from his book, I took part in this activity, and it is a lot of fun!

Directions (his and my adaptation)

1. Choose a text (or write your own), and use it to create a projectable slide presentation.
2. Remove an element from each slide, such as vocabulary or grammar, to create “blanks.” 
3. Label the blanks with the missing element (“noun,” etc.) so the students will know what they are looking for. Students will be adding their own details based on the "blank" description.
4. After you have created the presentation, you can do the following activity in class. First, have students start with a whiteboard (write their names on their boards) at the top but small OR use a piece of paper.
5. Then project slide one on the board. Students will write down the entire text from the slide and insert the missing elements/new details. Tell them to write small because there are a number of sentences.
6. Students rotate to the next desk, but the paper/whiteboard STAYS. Teacher projects slide two. Students read the previous sentence and then add the content of slide two to the paper/whiteboard.
7. Repeat until slides are done.
8. Students return to their desks and read them.
9. MY ADAPTATION - since I am in a trailer this year and am deskless, students used whiteboards, and the whiteboards "rotated" for each slide.

Here is what I recently did with my Latin 1’s:

1. Puer est in (name of place/ store/ city).
2. Is est (size) puer.
3. Ei nomen est (name).
4. Is (name of female cartoon character/ female singer / female celebrity) videt.
5. (name from #4) est tristis, et habet (name of object / thing/ food).
6. Puer (different object / food/ thing) fert.
7. (name from #4) non puerum amat, sed (name of male cartoon character / male singer / male celebrity).   

Student example (in English):

1) A boy is in Buc-ees.

2) He is a big boy.

3) His name is Oscar.

4) He sees GloRilla.

5) GloRilla is sad and has a CrockPot.

6) The boy brings Takis.

7) GloRilla does not love the boy but Cookie Monster.

Observations

1. I love this activity on SO MANY levels! I do not know where to begin. This activity definitely has a Mad-Libs feel to it. 
2. First, I love the guided output aspect of it. Although I am telling students what to write (and those messages are hopefully 100% comprehensible for them!), there still is a degree of choice for them of what details to add.
3. This is a GREAT example of purposeful communication, because students are playing with the language in adding their own details.
4. This is a written form of TPRS/Storyasking! Instead of asking students to come up with details orally, they write them down instead.
5. Because I am asking them to write down known vocabulary and phrases, students are getting repetitions of understandable language in a context which adds to/modifies/enlarges their brain's mental representation of Latin.
6. When students get a new whiteboard, they must read what has already been written before they can move onto writing the new sentence. What they read should already be 100% comprehensible by this point, because A) the sentence frames are recycling known phrases and words from class but also B) students have already interacted with those sentences by writing them down on the whiteboard.
7. I loved hearing students laugh when they got back their original whiteboard and read what students had added!

Consider adding this to your toolbox of writing activities!

Trying Out What I Learned This Summer

I have now been back with students for 3 1/2 weeks - I started with students on Monday, August 4 after seven days of pre-planning which began on Thursday, July 24! This past summer, I attended both Comprehensible Iowa and CI Summit, and I came away from both conferences with many new strategies which I was wanting to try out in this new school year. Here are those strategies which I have begun to implement:

• Magic Cards - I learned this from AnneMarie Chase at CI Summit, and it is SUCH AN EASY way to call on students and to assess them in the moment for a formative grade - no more popsicle sticks! It simply involves a 3x5 card which students fill out in the beginning of the semester, and you keep it on hand. I have been using them to call on students for bellringers, and they are so easy to use!
• Left/Right PQA's - I learned this from Eric Richards at Comprehensible Iowa when we co-led the German workshop lab, and he then facilitated it in his German lab at CI Summit. It is a great way to implement movement in a class while asking PQAs - it definitely exemplifies purposeful communication. Last week, I just happened to be observed by an administrator when I was doing a Left/Right activity (students had to guess in Latin which was the most popular sports in certain countries by moving to X side of the classroom), and he thought it was such a great kinesthetic activity!
• Write and Discuss - Although I have known about Write and Discuss for awhile, I never really used them properly as intended. I primarily had used them the day before a timed write to prepare students, but I have since learned that a Write and Discuss is something which should be done as often as possible as a way to review that day's material. At CI Summit, I saw Andrea Schweitzer do this with a One Word Image which she had created in Spanish with our squad. I now see the power of a Write and Discuss in giving students another added layer of input as a review. Although I am now slowly implementing Write and Discusses as a review, my goal is to facilitate them as often as possible.

What is a CI strategy which you learned this summer which you wish to implement?

When a Lesson Bombs

Today, I had a lesson that just went NOWHERE with students - it totally bombed.

I felt a gamut of emotions. I felt very frustrated, because I did not feel that this class connected with me or with the lesson at all. It was also hard not to take "personally," since it was a lesson which I created - was there a personalized connection factor missing which I had neglected? However, on the other hand, when I took a step back from it all, I actually did not see it as that big of a deal, because I realized "Okay, tomorrow is a new day, and I can start over from scratch."

After 28 years of teaching, I have come to accept that daily I deal with over 100 variables known as students, and then throw in another variable which is me. There are going to be days where I am on, and students are off. There will be days where I am off, and students are on. There will be days where both students and I are off (I consider those a win-win day, because we all can start over the next day from scratch). But then there are those golden days where both students and I are on. I do not take those days for granted.

It is okay to have a lesson which bombs with students, and the sooner you accept that, the easier it is to deal with. As teachers, we want to hit homeruns every day with our students, but that is absolutely not realistic at all. Give yourself permission to strike out or to get hit by a ball! We must learn to manage our own personal expectations of ourselves. When we realize that teaching is a marathon and not a sprint, we learn to pace ourselves emotionally. Teaching is like grilling brisket - it goes low and slow.

FYI - for the next class, I quickly retooled the lesson. It worked a bit better but still did not garner the reception/engagement which I wanted. But you know what - that is okay!