This is a great post-reading activity, and I feel like I have come totally late to the party on this one. A Smashdoodle is a way for students to interact with a reading, to demonstrate comprehension, and to summarize these interactions in various ways. It is called a Smashdoodle, because essentially, one is "smashing together" various components of a reading in one place to demonstrate comprehension, reflection, and/or higher order thinking. A Smashdoodle can be done digitally on a slide or on paper. Students can create a poster summarizing different parts of the text, fill out a foldable graphic organizer, or fill out boxes on a sheet of paper.
You can ask WHATEVER questions you want on a Smashdoodle, but the purpose is that the artifact is a holistic summary of the text. Possible questions to address - students can answer this as written sentences or as images (digital or drawn):
Copy five sentences which best summarize the text.
Who are the characters in this reading?
Where is the location of the reading?
Draw a picture which summarizes the reading
Write down any words from the reading which are new to you
Write down (parts of speech) from the reading.
Reflection questions
I learned that…
I was surprised/shocked to learn that…
I found it interesting that
Below is my first attempt at a Smashdoodle - it is very basic and on paper:
As I said, there are SO many different ways to do a Smashdoodle, and I feel that others explain it so much better than I do (and they have student examples to show). Below are some blog posts from where I learned how to do a Smashdoodle:
As it is now a year since I have begun some form of digital teaching, at this point, I feel like I am scraping the barrel for new, novel ways for students to review stories in an online setting. I have been dog paddling for a year with digital teaching, doing everything I can just to keep my head above water, and I am weary. I know that my students are weary too of this weird hybrid teaching situation. Because of this, I am trying to limit the web app tools which we are using in class so that there is familiarity for students in using them and that they do not have to learn a new tool on their own. I feel like I have been milking Google Forms to an extreme, trying to find different ways of using them for assignments and for students to demonstrate comprehension/mastery of material.
My colleague John Foulk came up with a new way for students to review a reading: False Story Sentences. It is actually very simple and is a good way for them to demonstrate understanding and comprehension of a reading. If you are like me, one of the things which I hate about this hybrid teaching is that I really have NO CLUE if students are actually comprehending anything which we are doing. While they may be completing assignments, that does not tell me much per se, other than they completed the assignment. This use of false statements at least forces them to indicate meaning and understanding to me.
Directions
Take 10 sentences from a reading, and change just one word in that sentence. Do not change more than one.
Put those sentences in a Google Form, and put the answer setting as "Paragraph"
Give students a copy of the reading. They will use this to find the correct sentence.
Tell students that they are to figure out what is false in that sentence and then to write what is incorrect and what the sentence should say instead. Why in English? Because this is a comprehension activity. While students could tell me what the correct Latin word should be, e.g., the sentence should say "iratissimus" and not "laetissimus," that does not tell me whether students understood what they were actually reading. Considering that they have the actual reading as a resource, writing down the actual Latin word is nothing more than a copying exercise.
Observations
This definitely was a novel way for students to demonstrate comprehension while truly showing me what students understood and did not understand from the reading.
Since I was able to print up students responses on a spreadsheet, it made grading very easy, because everything was in a grid. I was able to compare student answers against each other and to see where there were common student errors.
This was a new way for me to use Google Forms - euge!!
This activity is one which I have not done in a very long time, but someone on Twitter recently used it in her classroom and thanked me for the idea (I had presented this idea years ago, so I am glad to see that people are using it). I learned this years ago from David Jahner, my district's world language coordinator at the time. I was not a CI-teacher then but used it with the textbook. It is a basic partner activity involving crossword puzzles, but there is a twist. This listening comprehension activity involves crossword puzzles between two students, where Student A has the target language clues for student B, and vice versa. This will require making two different crossword puzzles and cutting/pasting the clues onto the other puzzle. There are many crossword puzzle makers online. Directions
Student A will ask Student B for a particular clue, e.g. “5 down”
Student B will read the clue in target language to Student A
Student A will fill in the target language answer on his/her crossword puzzle
Student B will ask Student A for a particular clue. The above pattern will continue until both crossword puzzles are completed.
Example
Like I stated earlier, I have not used this activity in quite awhile and never in a CI classroom setting. I was a bit hesitant about posting this activity, because I can see both benefits and drawbacks. As a result, I will discuss both here: Benefits
This is a great language lab activity, where partner pairs are scattered. Since partners are not seated directly next to each other, they must solely rely on listening.
This is another post-reading activity to review a passage/story. You can take actual sentences from the reading or ask questions about the reading for students to answer.
In using known sentences from a passage/story, students are continuing to receive understandable messages in the target language.
It is a novel way to get students to interact with both the language and each other.
Drawbacks
Because students are working with crossword puzzles, it relies on them knowing the correct spelling of the words. As most students are at the novice/intermediate levels of language proficiency, their target language spelling skills are still developing. In doing a crossword puzzle, correct spelling is absolute key. In my opinion, adding a word bank does not really solve the problem and actually works against the concept of a crossword puzzle.
If one is using this to review a story, students need to know the story well by the time you introduce this.
So CI teachers out there, try out this activity, and let me know how it goes, any changes which you made to it to make it more comprehensible, etc.
This is a great post-reading activity which I learned from my colleague Rachel Ash, who has her own write up about how to do it. There is a degree of work on the front end, but the actual activity is a great cooperative way for students to demonstrate comprehension of a known reading. Pre-Activity Preparation
Take a story familiar to students, and divide it into 10-15 sentences.
Draw pictures for each of the sentences. It does not have to be anything elaborate. To quote the great Latin teacher Sally Davis, "everyone can draw stick figures." Example of my pictures. I created a table on a document to draw the pictures.
Type up the sentences. I created table on a document to type up the sentences.
Make 10 copies (for a class of 30) of the pictures and sentences onto cardstock. You can use regular paper, but the cardstock makes the pictures/sentences sturdy.
Cut up the sentences and pictures - this is what will take up the most time in preparation. I had students cut these up for me.
In-Class Directions
Divide the class into groups of 3. There may be groups of 4, but that can be kind of big.
On a table/desk, mix all of the sentences together so that it is one big pile. On another table/desk, separately mix all of the pictures together so that it is one big pile.
Explain to students:
Their job is to match sentences to pictures. There are ____ sentences/pictures pairs.
As a relay, one team member at a time will grab 2 pictures, 2 sentences or 1 of each and bring them back to the team.
The next team member will grab 2 pictures, 2 sentences or 1 of each and bring them back to the team and so on.
As a team, members will try to match sentences with pictures, as more sentences and pictures are added.
As more pictures and sentences are added, team members will need to determine specific sentences or pictures which need to be gathered.
If a team receives a duplicate of a sentence or picture, then the team needs to send it back with their next "runner."
Teams will have to match the sentences with the pictures AND to put the story in order.
First team to complete the activity “wins”!
Observations
When explaining the activity to students, it does not make much sense, but once it begins and students begin to bring pictures/sentences to their teams, students understand how the activity works.
This can get VERY competitive depending on your students.
I love hearing students communicate with their runners, "Bring back the picture with _________" or "We need the sentence that says _________," as they now need specific sentences/pictures to complete the activity.
The activity took about 10 minutes. I thought that it would take longer but because students were very familiar with the story in the target language, they did not think that the activity was difficult to do.
Remind students that part of the task is to put the story in order! Many get caught up in the matching that they forget this part.
Alternate version - I have done this activity where I broke up pictures and sentences into clauses, instead of full sentences so that students were focusing on specific parts of the sentence.
This is another awesome post-reading activity which I learned from Linda Li this past summer (Martina Bex also has a great post about this activity). It is loosely based on a party game called Paper Telephone/Telephone Pictionary, and it works great as a way to get students to review a known reading.
Directions
Every student needs paper, pen/pencil, and the reading passage which you want to review.
Divide students into groups of six. There may be groups of seven or as little as four, but try to avoid groups of three. Arrange students in a circle.
Have students fold paper vertically/hot-dog style. Tell students that they will only be drawing on one side of the paper.
Tell students to pick ONE sentence from the story and to write it at the top of their paper. Write it as it appears in the story, i.e. students are NOT to translate the sentence.
Have students PASS their paper to the person on their left.
Now have students draw a visual representation of that sentence underneath it. Leave some space between the sentence and picture.
Stop students after 45 seconds, and have students FOLD the sentence over the back of the paper so that it cannot be seen. Only the picture should be showing.
Have students PASS their paper to the person to their left. It is important that students do NOT pass until you say so.
Now have students find the ONE sentence from the reading that matches the drawing. Students are to write the sentence underneath the picture. Leave some space between the picture and the sentence.
Stop students after 45 seconds, and have students FOLD the picture over to the back so that only the sentence is showing.
Have students PASS their paper to the person on their left. It is important that students do not pass until you say so.
Continue this pattern of drawing, passing, writing, and passing until students in a group of six have their original paper - it should be a total of six passes. For groups smaller than six, then they will continue to pass until the sixth pass. For groups larger than six, they will not get their original paper back so they will have to find theirs.
Tell students to unfold their papers to see how accurate others were with drawing pictures/writing sentences for their original sentence.
Observations
Having taken part in this activity myself when learning Mandarin from Linda Li, I can tell you that it is great activity for post-reading on so many different levels: re-reading of a known text (thus getting in more repetitions of language), comprehension of what is being read demonstrated non-verbally through a picture, comprehension of what is being communicated in a picture and writing that in the target language via the story/passage.
Depending on students' interpretation of the pictures/sentences given to them, this activity mimics the game Telephone, because the sentences and pictures can begin to change. It is always fun to hear some students at the end talk about how their original sentence changed.
This is a great listening comprehension activity, which I learned this summer from Linda Li in her Fluency Fast Mandarin class. It is very much like a regular dictation, but the difference though is that instead of having students write down the target language sentences as you say them, they draw them! I would recommend that you do this as a post-reading activity, instead of as a pre-reading activity. Directions
Take 6 sentences from a story which you have been going over in class. These sentences need to be "drawable."
If needed, write any target vocabulary on the board with their English meaning.
On a sheet of paper, tell students to draw a 2x3 grid which should fill the entire paper.
Have students number each box from 1-6.
Tell students “I will say a sentence, and your job is to draw a visual representation of that sentence. You will have 2-3 minutes to draw.”
Begin reading the first sentence slowly. It will be necessary to repeat the sentence many times.
Continue with the other sentences. Remind students that words are on the board if they need them.
At the end, repeat the sentences and tell students to check their drawings to ensure that they have drawn everything needed.
Alternate version - ask students to draw their visual representations with their NON-DOMINANT hand. This will take a lot more time for students to complete and will cause them to focus more on what they are drawing (which means you saying more repetitions of the sentence). Observations
The sentences need to be very comprehensible, because students are drawing what they hear. If the sentences are too long or are incomprehensible, students will become frustrated.
Students were much more engaged with this type of dictation instead of a regular one, since it involved them having to draw a visual representation of what they heard, as opposed to just writing down words.
Because students had to draw what they heard, it was necessary for me to repeat the sentences many times, which meant LOTS of great repetitions.
Students did not complain about doing this type of dictation, because it did not "feel" like a regular dictation.
Because students were already familiar with the story and vocabulary, it was not a difficult activity for them to do.
This is another great post-reading activity for going over a story and to get in more repetitions.
Example (taken from a Movie Talk called MonsterBox)
Ecce puella et duo monstra: parvum monstrum et mediocre monstrum! (Behold a girl and two monsters: a small monster and a medium monster)
Faber facit casam parvo monstro (The craftsman makes a house for the small monster)
Puella est laeta, quod monstro placet casa (The girl is happy, because the monster likes the house)
Ecce puella et tria monstra: parvum monstrum, mediocre monstrum, et magnum monstrum. (Behold the girl and three monster: a small monster, a medium monster, and a big monster).
Faber facit casam mediocri monstro (The craftsman makes a house for the medium monster).
Faber non facit casam magno monstro, quod magnum monstrum est molestum (The craftsman does not make a house for the big monster, because the big monster is annoying).
This is great, quick post-reading activity which you can do with students. I got this idea from Annabelle Allen's blog (if you are not reading her blog, bookmark it!), specifically from her post on "Milking Movie Talks." Bob Patrick and I had done a Movie Talk last week, and I was looking for some new novel post-reading activities to do with it. Annabelle's post was perfect for what I was looking! "Find the Difference" is exactly what students will do: find the differences in a reading which you have been reviewing! Directions
Type up a current reading, and make vocabulary word changes to it. It is important that students are quite familiar with the reading. In many ways, you do not want to completely change the reading - you do not want more differences than similarities.
Print up reading.
Classroom
Students will need a highlighter for this activity.
Hand out a reading to each student. You can pair them up if you want to focus on collaborative work.
Explain that students are to find the differences in the reading from the real story. Tell students HOW MANY differences for which they will be looking. This will be very helpful for students.
When students find a difference, they are to highlight the word(s) in the story.
Review the answers with students. I projected the story onto a whiteboard and had students come up and underline the difference.
As an extension, you can ask students to replace the differences with the correct word(s) in the target language.
Observations
I was surprised at how quickly students were able to get through this activity. Because it was a reading with which students were familiar, (due to being a Movie Talk and having gone over it a few different ways), it did not take long.
Because I had told them ahead of time how many differences there were, students paid closer attention to the reading.
This is another great way for students to interact with comprehensible messages.
Students were becoming tired of this story so this activity gave the reading some novelty!
Example in Latin:
Knock Knock Movie Talk reading
Ecce vir! Vir in spondā considit. Rē verā, vir totum diem agere vult in spondā. Rē verā, vir cenāre vult in spondā!
Subito, aliquis ianuam pulsat. Vir ianuam aperit, sed rē verā, nemo adest. Quod nemo adest, vir ianuam claudit. Aliquis iterum ianuam pulsat. Rē verā, vir totum diem agere vult in spondā. Rē verā, vir cenare vult in spondā! Vir iterum ianuam aperit, sed rē verā, nemo adest. Vir iterum ianuam claudit, et iterum in spondā considit. Subito, aliquis iterum ianuam pulsat. vir ianuam non aperit, quod totum diem agere vult in spondā! Vir cenare vult in spondā! Iterum aliquis ianuam pulsat! Vir valde iratus est! Vir irate ianuam aperit. Rē verā, nemo adest! Vir ianuam claudit, sed rē verā, non in spondā considit. Aliquis ianuam pulsat. Vir iterum ianuam aperit, sed rē verā, nemo adest... Find the Difference reading (changes are italicized here for your purpose)
Eheu vir! Vir in lecto considit. Rē verā, vir totum diem agere vult in Germania. Rē verā, vir aspicere televisionem vult in Germania!
Subito, aliquis ianuam pulsat. Vir ianuam aperit, sed rē verā, parvus catulus adest. Quod parvus catulus adest, vir ianuam claudit. Aliquis iterum ianuam pulsat. Rē verā, vir totum diem agere vult in lecto. Rē verā, vir cenare vult in lecto! Vir iterum ianuam aperit, sed rē verā, infans adest.
Vir iterum ianuam claudit, et iterum in spondā crustulum consumit. Subito, aliquis iterum ianuam pulsat. Vir ianuam non aperit, quod totum diem agere vult in spondā! Vir cenare vult in armario! Aliquis iterum ianuam pulsat! Vir valde laetus est!
Vir irate ianuam aperit. Rē verā, magnus porcus adest! Vir ianuam claudit, sed rē verā, non in ursa considit. Aliquis ianuam pulsat. Vir iterum ianuam aperit, sed rē verā, nemo adest…
Movie Talks are becoming more and more a staple of CI strategies which teachers are implementing in their classrooms. The premise is simple: take a very short movie or a clip from a movie (preferably one with little or no dialogue) and when showing it to students, pause it at certain points to deliver understandable messages to students (circling, discussing what is going on). Even though I had seen presentations on Movie Talks at various conferences, I deliberately held off on doing them, because quite honestly, they looked very difficult to facilitate. In addition, a Movie Talk seemed like it would take A LOT of planning, because not only would I have to find a short movie to fit my particular lesson needs, but I would also have to script it for places to pause and to ask questions/discuss. To me, it just appeared WAY too much effort for the result. However, at last summer's NTPRS conference, I got the chance to experience a Movie Talk myself as a student in a session where Alina Filepescu was teaching Romanian. She seamlessly presented a Movie Talk to us in very comprehensible Romanian and had us interacting with the movie short in the target language. More importantly though, because the movie short which she was using was incredibly compelling, I was so focused on movie short that Romanian simply was the vehicle to learn what happened next, so the learning became subconscious. As a result, this past school year, I did a few Movie Talks. Yes, I struggled with them, but I found that students really enjoyed them and that they did lead to language acquisition. As a result, I will continue to implement Movie Talks. Miriam Patrick has written up a great set of directions for implementing a Movie Talk on her blog Pomegranate Beginnings. With her permission, here is how she prepares a Movie Talk.
Set Up
Choose your video.
I chose films based on, primarily, the vocabulary I was working with. I can
edit the grammar to be whatever I want for whatever level I want, but the
vocabulary needs to be sheltered, so this was key. For this particular unit, I
was focusing on words like polypus (octopus), transcendit (climb across), and
tam/adeo/tantus...ut... (he was so.... that...). YouTube has a wide variety of
videos. All one has to do is search for Pixar Shorts, Disney Shorts, or movie
shorts.
Write Your Script.
You won't need it except for the first few times you use it, but it is good to
have it written down, especially since you will be pausing the video in key
spots. I found this to be, by far, the most time consuming of the project, but
even then, if you have chosen a video and know your end goals clearly, it did
not take more than a few minutes.
Set up support
activities. This is a great CI activity that you can use for one day or for
multiple days. You can use other activities like TPR and TPRS with this. After
we spent the first day going through this video, we then did it daily for a
while, but only once, and paired with embedded readings, PQA, and TPRS.
(taken from the blog Pomegranate Beginnings)
Back to me now. Procedure 1) Using your script, show the video but stop at the times where you wish to talk about is in the screen. 2) Circle, and ask questions about what is on the screen. 3) If you wish, ask a responsible student to serve as the "Movie Talk pauser" - this student will need a copy of the script to know when to pause.
Movie Talks can be used in a couple different ways. One way is to preteach vocabulary (which is how Miriam describes in her directions). The following is a screencast of me demonstrating how to do a Movie Talk - I would not use a screencast to do with this students, but in this, you can see how I implement circling and PQAs in Movie Talk. I did this particular Movie Talk recently at the ACL Summer Institute as part of a presentation. The Movie Talk is not very long, but you will get the idea.
Movie Talk to Preteach Vocabulary
Movie Talk as a Predictor
You can also use movie shorts to get the class to predict what they will happen when you pause the movie. This takes a bit more language control though due to the output. Last summer at Rusticatio, Justin Slocum Bailey demonstrated how to do this. As a group, we all had whiteboards, and when he paused the video, he asked us what we thought happened next. Following that, we would share them in small groups and then he asked us for examples to share with the group as a whole. After that, he would unpause the movie, pause it again at a particular point and restart the process all over again. The following is an example of this activity with the same movie clip as above. Students would not have seen this video clip prior.
So consider doing a Movie Talk.Yes, they take A LOT of planning, but in the end, it is worth it. Resources
Movie Talk database - this is a MASSIVE searchable Google database started by Jason Fritze. As it is a collaborative document, new Movie Talks can be added.
Mike Coxon explaining and demonstrating how to do a Movie Talk
Alina Filepescu demonstrating a Movie Talk in Spanish
Here is a great way to introduce past tenses and to use them in a way which demonstrates the "past tense" nature as compared to the present tense. At NTPRS 2014, during my group's session with Blaine and Von Ray, they introduced the concept of "events," which essentially are flashbacks in a story with which students are already familiar. Now this concept of "events" was a departure from what I had learned at my first TPRS workshop in 2008, where Blaine Ray himself had said that it was important to teach past tenses as soon as possible, since most stories were written in the past tense; he posited that we should just begin telling stories using the past tense and expose students early to the concept. At NTPRS 2014, Blaine's changed his tune a bit, as he and Von explained that the use of "events" now allowed for past tenses to be usedin a meaningful context, while at the same time distinguishing themseves from other tenses. After having implemented "events" in stories, I can definitely say that they work and are a wonderful tool to use. The set up is very simple: Take a story which you have already used with students, but the key part is that it needs to have been written in the present tense (I suppose you can take a story written in the imperfect/perfect tense if you wish to introduce the pluperfect tense). The idea now is to create a flashback which will either explain details of the original story or add new ones. So here is how I used an event to introduce the imperfect and perfect tenses in Latin 1. After roughly six weeks of school, I "revisited" the very first story which I had used with students. Part of Original Story
Earl elephantum vult. Earl est tristis. Aliyah elephantum habet. Aliyah est laeta.
Event (with original story embedded in it) hodie, Earl elephantum vult, sed heri Earl leonem volebat. heri Earl dixit, “ego leonem volo!” mater leonem ei dedit. Earl erat laetus. sed leo patrem consumpsit. nunc Earl est tristis.
hodie Aliyah elephantum habet. heri, Aliyah elephantum non habebat. Aliyah erat tristis. heri Aliyah erat in Arbys. Aliyah elephantum et senem vidit. Aliyah dixit, “ego elephantum volo.” Aliyah senem pulsavit. nunc Aliyah elephantum habet. Aliyah est laeta.
Obsevations
I was surprised by how seamless it was for students to pick up the imperfect and perfect tenses this way.
Using flashbacks in a meaningful context truly allowed for students to distinguish between the different tenses, because they were being used and contrasted at the same time.
Because I was taking a story with which students were already familiar and one which involved their classmates, the flashbacks were compelling for them.
Because I was limiting vocabulary, I could focus on taking known words and "milking the heck out of them grammarwise." When introducing the new language structures, because I was using known vocabulary words, students could focus purely on the new form and meaning.
The only new vocabulary words which I introduced were hodie, heri, and nunc, which served as adverbial timemarkers necessary for introducing the time shifts in the story. I also had to introduce the word erat.
Now I try to write some type of "event" in all of my stories in order to work in both past and present tenses at the same time. There is no reason why I cannot introduce future tenses this way too!
For some reason, "events" used to be known as "bird walks" - I do not quite know why...
With the school year having already started (or soon to be starting) for CI/TPRS teachers, many folks have asked me about circling, specifically what to do when it is not "working" and students are not responding. First off, let me say that this student reaction happens to me ALL THE TIME, so please do not think that it is you and that you are the problem per se. However, when this does occur when I am circling, then this does communicate a message to me. Below are a few situations with possible solutions: Students did not respond, because they did not fully comprehend what I was asking. When I attended my first Blaine Ray workshop back in 2008, I vividly remember him saying "If you are not getting any response from students during circling, do two things: ask the question again but this time more slowly." I have always remembered that statement, because I have had to do what he said SO MANY times. In many occasions when students are not responding, it is because I, the teacher, am speaking WAY too quickly for them to process what I am asking or I am asking TOO MUCH. When that happens, I take a breath, repeat what I am saying again more slowly and if possible, I will point and pause at any words which are projected. Sometimes, I will also do a comprehension check and say, "What did I just ask in English?" Students did not respond, because they do not want to respond. One of my class rules is that everyone is required to answer aloud during circling. NOTE - there is a difference between students who are introverted and students who do not want to be part of the class. In each case, I still require each to respond chorally with the hopes that each will feel more comfortable being part of the community as a result. Students gave an incorrect answer to the question. If students gave an incorrect answer, then it is possible that they did not comprehend the question itself. When this happens, usually I will point and pause at the particular interrogative which is on my wall to establish meaning, and then I will ask the quesiton again more slowly. Students did not respond, because they have figured out the basic pattern of circling. If you hold to the basic order of circling all the time, then students will figure out the pattern, as it is very predictable after awhile. During my first year of using TPRS, I had students who figured out the pattern after 3 days! As a result, you need to keep students on their toes. Vary up the order, and ask the questions in reverse order. Students did not respond, because they have become bored with circling. Let's be honest: circling can get very boring both for the students hearing the questions and for you the teacher asking them. I had always run into this wall, but I never voiced my concerns, because I thought that I was circling incorrectly. It was not until I heard Carol Gaab at NTPRS 2014 say, "Circling gets really old, really fast," that I felt understood! This, however, does not mean that you should throw out circling, but rather that you need to vary up the types of questions. A few months ago, i wrote up a post about circling and how to vary it up. The key is "the brain CRAVES novelty," so you need to change things up with W questions, PQAs, and higher order thinking questions. Another strategy is to circle with certain groups in the class. On the first day of class, I divide the class into two groups: Bubones (the owls) and Mortuambulantes (the walking dead). To vary up things during circling, I will direct certain questions to one specific group and then ask the other group particular questions. I hope that this helps some of you who are experiencing some difficulties in circling. Feel free to leave some strategies which you use!
This is a pre-reading activity which I learned from a language arts teacher at my school and then saw Carol Gaab demonstrate at NTPRS last summer. For this, you will need the Wordle website and a reading which you plan to introduce . If you are not familiar with Wordle, it is a website which will take a reading passage and then based on word frequency, it will create a word cloud, showing which words are used more often than others - the bigger the size of the word, the more frequently the word is used.
This particular activity is something which you will want to do just prior to reading a story for the first time, because students will be predicting what they think the story will be about based on the words which they see. As a result, you as the teacher will have needed to preview any new vocabulary/language structures through other prereading activities.
Instructions
Cut/paste a 5-6 sentences from the reading onto the Wordle website.
Project the word cloud onto the board and based on the words in the word cloud, ask students to predict what they think the story is going to be about. I ask students to create sentences in Latin. This is why students need to know already the vocabulary/language structures in the story.
An example:
Observations
Students really do like to predict what they think they the story will be about.
Because students have predicted the plot of the story, they have a more vested interest in what they are reading, as they are mentally comparing their version with the actual story
After reading the story, I have actually had students say, "I like my version so much better than the real one." Many times, I will make a mental note of what they thought the plot to be and will write an alternate version of the story which incorporates their plot for them to read later.
This is another very quick post-reading strategy which I learned from the great Carol Gaab last summer at NTPRS and then saw demonstrated again at ACTFL last November as part of Krista Applegate's presentation. I do not know if they specifically called it "Sound Effects Theater" - I call it that - and it is a variation of Readers Theater. Instead of acting out a story (like in Readers Theater), the class adds sound effects to the reading. The idea is simple: assign students to make certain sound effects every time a particular vocabulary word is said in a story which is being told/read aloud. Example of some sounds with vocabulary words: pater - "da da" mater - "mommy" iratus - "grrrrr" tristis - "boohoo" scribit - "Dear Diary" leo - "ROAR" feles - "meow" pirata - "arrr" pulsat - "POW" Instructions
You will read aloud/tell the story a few times.
When reading aloud/telling the story the first time, do it slowly and allow for the assigned students to make the sound after you say the word - if the word is repeated more than once in the story, the better!
Read aloud/tell the story again, but do it a little faster. Students who are making the sound effects will have to keep up with the pace.
Read aloud/tell the story again, but now quickly. Those making the sound effects will really have to listen so that they do not miss their cue!
Observations
Another fun way to re-read through a known story and to get in repetitions of vocabulary. Even though the story speeds up with each reading, because it is a known story, the reading remains comprehehensible for students.
Another way for students to personalize vocabulary and to associate it with a sound.
This is a great listening activity to do at the last 10 minutes of class, and it involves whiteboards - like bacon, in my opinion, everything is better with whiteboards!
Planning
1) Write 3 VERY short comprehensible descriptions in Latin of famous people (characters, historical figures, or real people), where the first description is
most general and the third is most specific, i.e., by the third
description, it should be obvious who the character is
Activity
1) Have students grab a whiteboard and dry-erase markers.
2) Have students number 1-3 on their whiteboards.
3) Explain to students that you are going to read a series
of descriptions and after each description, they should write the name of the person/character whom they think it is. All three descriptions are about the same person/character.
4) Read the first description, and next to number one, have students write whom they think is the character/person. 5) Read the second description, and next to number two, have students write whom they now think is the character/person. If they think it is the same person/character as what they wrote for number one, they are still to write down that name. 6) Read the third description, and next to number three, have students write whom they now think is the character/person. If they think it is the same person/character as what they wrote for number one and two, they are still to write down that name. 7) After reading the third description, ask
students “quis est?” and have them respond aloud. Ask
them to hold up their whiteboards so that you can see their series of answers. 8) Start again with a new person/character. Examples: Beyonce 1) femina 2) cantatrix 3) uxor JayZis Laocoon 1) Troianus vir 2) sacerdos 3) interfectus a serpentibus
Observations
This is a GREAT way to review characters if you are reading a story with lots of characters.
This is a wonderful, low affective filter, output activity, since it just requires students to write down the name of a character/person.
Because it is such an easy listnening activity, I have found students to be very engaged whenever I have done it.
This is a fun listening comprehension, partner activity to do with students as either a post-reading activity or as a review of known material. I learned this as a language lab activity, but it is not necessary to use one. For this, you will need sentences from a reading which you have been reviewing or sentences with which you know that students are very familiar - in other words, the sentences need to 100% comprehensible for students to hear aloud! Nugas (which is Latin for "nonsense") is a very short guided dialogue/listening activity between two students, where
one student is designated as Student A, and the other is Student B.
each student has a sheet of paper which has numbered sentences, which are specific for that student, i.e., neither student sees each other's sentences
student A will read aloud his/her first sentence to Student B
student B will read aloud his/her sentence which is a response to student A
students A and B will determine whether the dialogue made sense.
If it does, then students will say “Recte!” If not, then students will yell “Nugas!”
Students will continue with next set of sentences.
Examples:
1) Recte examples
Partner A: ubi est Marcus?
Partner B: puto Marcum esse in Foro.
Partner B: quomodo te habes, Marce? Partner A: bene me habeo. 2) Nugas example
Partner B: cur Metella in via festinat?
Partner A: mihi placet consumere crustula. Partner A: Salve, Diana! Partner B: quod ego sum iratus.
Unfortunately, on your end as the teacher, it takes quite a bit of prep, because you need to come up with a series of 2-sentence dialogues (both recte and nugas) and then to transfer those to both Partner A and Partner B handouts separately. For example, partner A's handout would look like this: 1) Partner A: ubi est Marcus? Parnter B: _____________ 2) Partner B: _____________ Partner A: bene me habeo. Observations
This is a great partner, listening activity, but the key point is that the sentences must be 100% comprehensible and not too long.
My students LOVE yelling "nugas" when the two sentences do not make sense.
This is a fun way to get in practice of "memorized, life skills" sentences (greetings, salutations, textbook dialogues).
If you are using a story, this is a way to ask questions about a story and to get in repetitions of the story in a different way.
One of the components of Krashen's Comprehensible Input hypothesis is that when one's affective filter rises, learning is compromised. Perhaps, a better way of putting it is that in order for students to learn, they need to feel emotionally safe in your classroom: safe to ask questions, safe to interact with their peers, and safe to make mistakes. If students feel safe in your classroom, they are more apt to learn. Our primary goal as CI/TPRS teachers is to deliver understandable messages in the target language. Many CI/TPRS teachers incorporate a "safety net" for students, which is a series of hand gestures which students can use to communicate non-verbally when anything impedes the comprehension of those messages. Students have full permission to use any of these signs/gestures whenever they want. Some basic signs are:
Slow down, you're speaking too quickly
Louder - I cannot hear you
Say it again please
What does X mean?
I don't understand at all what you are saying
My friend Evan Gardner, founder of Where Are Your Keys? best explains it when he tells students, "These techniques are like super powers. You have the power to control me, your teacher. You want me to slow down? Use your "Slow Down" power. You want me to say something again? Use your "Again" power, and I will do it." I always add, "If I ever say something in Latin which you do not understand, then that is MY fault. BUT if you do not use your powers, I am going to assume that everything is okay, and I will keep moving on. If you do not understand something, do NOT just sit there and suffer in silence when you have the power to control your own learning."
You can make the gestures whatever you want them to be, or
you can have the class create them. The idea though is that these gestures are
part of the class "safety net". Because these signs are communicated non-verbally, they do not interrupt class; students can give a sign without saying a word, and you as the teacher can address the concern on the spot without drawing attention to that student.
I am amazed by how students
have taken ownership of these hand signs and use them in class. As a teacher, I SO appreciate it when students will flash me a sign. In fact, I have students
saying, “I wish that I could use these hand signs in my math class!” Why don't more teachers in other subject areas adopt them?!
