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. 

Movie Talk - High Rollers

Just recently I did the following movie talk. This may be a very specific movie talk due to target vocabulary words, but at the same time, if you ever need one with these words, here it is! 

For Latin 2, we are doing a series of readings about chariot races involving two characters Gaius and Scorpius (my colleague Liz Davidson wrote them a few years ago, and I have adapted them to new target words and structures). This particular chapter which we will be reading deals with two other characters betting during the chariot race, so I needed to preview gambling words (which are not very high frequency at all in Latin!). Here were the words which I wanted to target: sponsionem facit (is making a bet), alii...alii (some...other), nummos (coins), and plus (more).

Latin script

English script

Observations

1. I was surprised at how engaged students were when watching this. Not that the plot is not engaging, but I figured that they would figure out the twist very quickly - surprisingly, they did not!
2. I would suggest doing the actual movie talk without the sound first. There is a song which is playing to help convey the plot, and it can be distracting to keep stopping the animated short mid-verse many times.

Destiny Movie Talk

This is a great movie talk if you are introducing rooms of the house, numbers, or directional verbs of motion. I just recently introduced this movie talk in my Latin 3 classes, because I needed to target the words appropinquat (approach) and abit (go away), but this could easily be used in level 1 to introduce intrat (enter) and discedit/exit (leave).

Latin script

English script 

Observations

1. Because the main character is reliving an episode in his life, there are tons of repetitions in this animated short.
2. The first time I did this with a class, it went okay - students were kind of engaged but not overly excited. The second time I did it with another class, I made students pay attention to the number of clocks in each room by asking Latine how many clocks were in each room when I paused it (and then did a running total) and to what time it was on the clock when the man woke up each time - students really got into that and were A LOT more engaged in the movie talk, because the plot began to make much more sense.
3. There is an end-credit scene to watch at the end too!

Car Park - Movie Talk

Here is another fun movie talk which I had done 4-5 years ago and had completely forgotten about but just recently found it in my Google Drive. It is called Car Park (this animated short was made in the UK, so a "car park" is what Americans call a "parking lot" - I had to explain that to students. I remember when I said that the movie talk was called "Car Park," a student innocently asked, "Is that like a dog park?"). The animated short is relatively brief but gets in a lot of repetitions. Target words for this movie talk are man, dog, barks/makes a loud noise, car, looks for, finds, through the window, frightens/scares, is frightened/is scared, hides, his (reflexive use of the possessive pronoun).

Car Park - Latin script

Car Park - English script

Ormie the Pig - Movie Talk

Here is a fun Movie Talk which I had done many years ago, but I completely forgot about it. Just recently my colleague John Foulk reminded me about it. It is called Ormie the Pig (is he a character somewhere?) and his attempts to steal cookies from a cookie jar on top of a refrigerator. Again, the best movie talks are those with a lot of repetition in it in terms of action, and there is a lot of that here in this animated short. This is a good Movie Talk for words such as cookies, refrigerator, want, steal/take, in order to, on top of.

Ormie the Pig - Latin script

Ormie the Pig - English script

Sanjay's Super Team - Movie Talk

Here is one more Movie Talk which I would like to share with you: Sanjay's Super Team! It is now one of my all-time favorite animated shorts. Sanjay's Super Team is a Pixar short from 2015, and quite honestly, I do not remember this one at all when it came out (it was paired with Pixar's The Good Dinosaur in the theaters in 2015, and quite honestly, I do not remember that Pixar film at all either). Anyhow, I needed to preview a number of religious-related vocabulary words, such as pray to, worship, divinities, and temples (again, very specific upper-level Latin themes), so I was so glad to come upon this Pixar short.

However, a downside of this particular Movie Talk is that Sanjay's Super Team is only available on Disney + for now (it is not currently on YouTube in its entirety). Essentially, the plot is about a boy named Sanjay who loves watching superheroes on TV, but his father says that it is time to take part in a Hindu worship ceremony. Sanjay half-heartedly takes part in the worship ceremony to these divinities, but he really would rather watch superheroes on telelvision. That is where the action ensues! 

Targeted Words

colere - to worship

precari - to pray to

pupam - action figure/doll

veretur - is afraid

numina/numen - divinity

miratur - is amazed

servat - saves/rescues

ingens/ingentia - huge

templum - temple

English script

Latin script

Observations

1. What a great multicultural animated short! Most students had not seen this Pixar short, so it was nice to be able to introduce this to them. 
2. Once again, this movie short naturally lends itself to lots of vocabulary repetitions.

If you have Disney +, there are a lot of Pixar shorts there in its catalog which were new to me, and I am already looking for ways to use them!

Sand Castle - Movie Talk

Once again, like my previous blog post, this may only relate to the teachers in the Latin community, but I hope that other language teachers may find it useful.

So like I stated in my previous blog post, in teaching upper level Latin, we find ourselves having to address some very specific vocabulary, especially words related to war, empire, and imperialism. I shared my Royal Madness movie talk with you which introduced a number of war vocabulary words, and here is another one which addresses many of these words: Sand Castle.

Target words

arma - weapons

gens/gentem - nation

imperium - empire

procul - far away

acies - battle line

delere - to destroy

occupare - to occupy

cancer - crab

dux - leader

eques - cavalry man

English script

Latin script

Observations

1. Another great movie talk which lends itself towards lots of vocabulary repetitions.
2. As a Latin teacher who has to deal with very specific words such as cavalry, battle line, leader, and weapons, finding this animated short was a godsend!

Royal Madness - Movie Talk

This blog post probably only relates to the Latin teaching community but hopefully other language teachers can use this.

I have been teaching upper level Latin for the past few years, and if you do too, you know that we start to get into some very specific vocabulary themes in the upper levels, such as war, imperialism, Caesar in Gaul, empire, etc. I have also found that there are not a whole lot of school-appropriate movie shorts involving war vocabulary which I can use as movie talks to preview these words - there definitely are a lot of movie shorts out there about war, but they are either overly violent and gory or are WAY too emotional for the classroom (I once did the Robot and the Grandma as a movie talk and was told by students NEVER to do that one again, because it was way too sad!). Finally, however, I was able to find a movie short which I could manipulate to fit those war words which I needed but was still light-hearted: Royal Madness.

Target Words

appropinquat -  approaches              

bellum gerit - wages war

exercitus - army

imperator - emperor

in dolore - in grief

in proelio - in battle

mortua - dead

non iam - no longer

pax - peace

vicit - has conquered

English script

Latin script

Observations

1. This animated short lends itself naturally to TONS of target word repetitions!
2. This was the first movie talk which I did this school year, and it was done completely in a digital teaching environment (before we went hybrid). Since I had not physically seen students since March and honestly, since I could not say with confidence that students actually "acquired" any Latin during that time of distance learning in the last half of the semester, I approached this particular movie talk very gingerly and assumed that this was completely new material for students. 

In my next blog post, I will share another movie talk which I did following this one which previewed more "war/imperial" vocabulary.

Conducting a Live Movie Talk via Zoom

I am a huge fan of doing Movie Talks, because I feel that they are a great way to preview vocabulary and language structures prior to a targeted reading. As much as students will complain about me stopping the movie clip to narrate it and to ask questions, when we go over the actual reading of the movie clip in various ways, they actually like the fact that they have a visual image in their heads of the passage already and know what to expect. However, in the digital learning classroom environment, the question for me has been "What is the most effective way to conduct a Movie Talk via a Zoom session (or Google Meet, Microsoft Team, etc) with a class of 25-30 students? Is it even possible?"

The answer is both yes and no. Yes, it is possible to conduct a live Movie Talk via Zoom, but in some ways, it is going to be different from how students fully experience it in the physical classroom. There are going to be some aspects which are identical to a classroom usage, but at the same time, there are other aspects which you will have to sacrifice and therefore will have to address in other ways.

The way in which I conducted a Movie Talk via Zoom was through the use of Google Slides. Now this is actually not a new concept at all, because I know of many teachers who have been using Google Slides for Movie Talks for years. When I created the Movie Talk Google Slide, I actually liked the layout very much, because everything which students and I needed was there on the slide itself. The layout of the slide was very basic and only had the list of target words and the video clip itself (directions for inserting videos into Google Slides). Below is my actual Google Slide for the Movie Talk (it is an active Google Slide, so you can push/play pause to see how it works):




I used the screen sharing function so that students could view it on their computer or device. 

Observations

1. Asking questions and having students respond back and forth does not work too well in a Zoom session. I tried doing this, but since students were already muted, it took too much time for students to unmute themselves and to respond. As a result, it ended up being more of a Story Listening experience. I guess you could make it like Dora the Explorer by asking a question, pausing, and then answering it yourself.
2. Having the target words on the slides is very helpful, and if you set the cursor for "laser," it helps draw attention to which word you're pointing and pausing at.
3. Because I was not asking questions, I repeated the sentence an overly amount and used different variations of sentences using the target words to get in repetitions. At the same time, sentences need to be simple and short and full of repetitions with pointing and pausing to work in this environment.
4. Whenever I pointed and paused at a target word using the laser pointer function, I truly had to pause and count to 4 in order to allow for student processing.
5. In many ways, you are talking into the nethers. I found myself talking extra slowly and self-defining a lot of words as I went along to ensure that students were understanding. 
6. I had A LOT of screens and tabs open for this (Zoom, Google slides). This made it kind of tricky at times.
7. if possible, use the chat function for student comprehension check. They can enter in a number of 1-5 letting you know their comprehension level. Make sure it is set only to "Communicate with host." At the same time, depending on how many tabs/windows you have open, it may be too much.
8. I would set "students cannot unmute themselves" during this, because I had a student who kept sneezing and there was a lot of background noise from students who were unmuted.
9. This took about 25-30 minutes - maybe too long for a Zoom session, since it was just a listening activity? I told students get comfortable before we did this.
10. My colleague John Foulk suggested that we use Google Slides for doing Movie Talks when students return face-to-face again. I tried it out by projecting it onto my classroom screen, and I really liked having everything there that I needed on the one slide. 

How is your Movie Talk experience going in a digital environment?

Movie Talk - Joy and Heron

Here is a Movie Talk which I presented this week in my Latin 2 classes. I was looking for a short animated movie short for which I could introduce the words boat, board a ship, river, and fishing. Unfortunately, the National Movie Talk database did not have anything related to these words, but after a Google search, I came across this movie short (I have now added it to the database). I really like this Movie Talk, because it is a cute story involving a dog, its master, a big bird, and a can of worms with LOTS of repetitions and a very nice ending.

Movie Talk script - Latin

Movie Talk script - English


Consider using this!

Laundry Quandary - Movie Talk

Here is a fun Movie Talk which I did last week. With my Latin 2 classes, I am finishing up the last section of the Perseus myth (the part which deals him with rescuing Andromeda from the monster) which I have adapted, and I needed to preview the words in periculo (in danger) and servat (rescue/save). Once again, using Jason Fritze's National Movie Talk database, I was able to find a Movie Talk which addressed these words in a very humorous way.

The movie short is called Laundry Quandary, and it is about a superhero whose service is needed on his laundry day.

Latin script

English script

Observations

1. Lots of good discussion on superheroes in the target language during the Movie Talk! I could have done a whole period of PQA's just on superheroes.
2. I was kind of disappointed with the end of the movie short, as the woman ends up becoming all "fan girl" over Captain Beautiful. I would have liked to have seen the woman end up being a superhero and her saving the city.
3. A number of students really liked the soundtrack - a couple students said to me, "You have picked some really good movie talks lately - they have had good music."

Snack Attack - Movie Talk

Here is a movie talk which I did last month. With our Latin 2 classes, we are doing the Perseus myth, which is quite a long, involved story with some very specific words. We were beginning the section of the myth dealing with the Graiae sisters, so I needed to preview the words short, old woman, and steal. Using the national movie talk database started by Jason Fritze, I found the following short movie called Snack Attack.

NOTE - In Latin, the word for old woman is anus (pronounced ahh-nus), but I deliberately chose the word avia (which means grandmother) for this based on the maturity level of some of my students. Latin teachers, it is your call on this.

English script

Latin script

Observations

1. This is one movie talk in which my students got VERY involved. They were absolutely INCENSED that the young man would even think of brazenly eating this old woman's cookies. As we know, we learn best when emotionally engaged in a lesson.
2. Students actually thought that the entire movie was going to be about the old woman trying to get the cookies from the vending machine and found that part of the movie very funny.
3. When it was over, I asked the class in English "Why did the old woman smile at the end?" I was very surprised at how many understood the reason why: "Because the young man was actually being very nice and patient with this crazy old lady."

Monster and Dumpling - Movie Talk

Here is a movie talk which I just recently did with my Latin 2 students. I was wanting to preteach vocabulary involving body parts, since we will be doing some readings related to monsters and fantastical beasts in the ancient world. Having found this movie short on Jason Fritze's national movie talk database, I thought that it did a great job of introducing this needed vocabulary.

The Movie Talk is called Monster and Dumpling (Monstrum et Cibus in Latin). 

Latin script

English script

Observations

1. Students reacted well to this movie short. A number of them said that it had "feel goods" of the three-legged dog Movie Talk. One student insightfully said, "Both the monster and boy are outcasts - I'm glad that they found each other."
2. Pause and ask students specifically at 3:00 in the movie short why the monster is sad. Some students thought that the monster felt sorry for the boy, because the boy was blind, but many caught that the monster felt bad for taking advantage of the blind boy.
3. There is some English narration at the beginning of the movie short (about 6-7 seconds). My students did not like that! They have become so accustomed to Movie Talks having NO English in them that it did not feel right for them to hear it. 
4. I showed the credits at the end too, because it shows the preliminary storyboard of the movie short. It appears that originally, the monster was ostracized by other monsters because of its looks, the character was a girl not a boy, and that the girl too was ignored and demeaned by others, because she was blind. 

Cecilia the Balcony Girl - Movie Talk

This is a Movie Talk which I just did with my Latin 2 students this past Monday. It was the beginning of the second week of school, so I wanted to do a Movie Talk which would both recycle lots of words from last year but at the same time introduce some new words. It is actually a Movie Talk which I feel could be used in a level 1 class depending on which words you wanted to introduce, because one could introduce a lot of high frequency basic vocabulary through this movie short.

Cecilia the Balcony Girl - link

Latin script

English script

Observations

1. I was really surprised at how engaged students were during this Movie Talk! This Movie Talk allows for a lot of predictions so that helped keep it engaging for students. Even though it is only a 3 1/2 minute movie short, the Movie Talk itself went for about 35-40 minutes. I myself was surprised in all of my classes how quickly the time went by.
2. Students really liked the twist at the end.
3. Even though I use what some teachers may feel are advanced structures for the 2nd week of Latin 2 (according to a traditional grammar-translation syllabus), as long as the message is understandable (in other words, meaning has been established), students will understand what is being communicated. Comprehension is the goal at this point, not production. 

This Movie Talk is a keeper and definitely one which I will use again in future years.

Movie Talk - Changing Batteries

Here is a Movie Talk which Bob Patrick and I did this week in our Latin 1 classes. I have known about this particular movie short for a long time but debated on whether or not to ever use it, because it is SO SAD! However, Katya Paukova always says that the best movie shorts are those which will engage students emotionally, so I finally decided to use this one. Two of my target words were sick and doctor, and the only other movie short which I could find involving these words was one about the Berenstein Bears going to the doctor's office. For high school students, I thought that they would not like it, so I decided to hit them with an emotionally-packed Movie Talk!

This particular movie short is called Changing Batteries. Be prepared to have a few tears shed during this Movie Talk!

English script

Latin script

Observations

1. On the day after I formally did this Movie Talk, as a warm up I re-showed the movie short and narrated it again in Latin this time without pausing. In one of the periods, an administrator came to do my formal observation, and she was very impressed, because of the fact that a) I was narrating this short movie in Latin and that students were understanding it (if she had come the day before, she would have seen an actual Movie Talk and its process) and b) the movie short was so good - she even reacted emotionally to it!
2. Pay attention to the date July 5, 2011 in the very beginning of the movie short, because it will help explain how much time passes later on. I originally thought that this movie short took place over a few days, but my students pointed out the calendar to me while viewing this. 
3. After viewing this, a few of my classes told me that I am never allowed to show this again to them, because it was so sad. For the record, these are the same classes which told me that I could never show Bear Story again too.

Monster in the Closet - Movie Talk

Today, Bob Patrick and I are beginning Chapter 4 of Brando Brown Canem Vult. As always in lesson planning, I typed up the story in order to enter the chapter in an online frequency word counter so that I could see if there were any high frequency words which I need to pre-teach prior to the reading. If you know Chapter 4, it is the one where Brandon brings home the puppy for the first time and must hide it from his mother. In Chapter 4, there are A LOT of bedroom words, e.g., obdormit, evigilat, armarium, lectus, and a number of phrases, e.g., magnos sonos facit, multos sonos facit, ianuam aperit.

Once again, the Movie Talk database came to the rescue. When I did a search for the word "bed," I came across this short movie, and it fit perfectly for the words which I was wanting to pre-teach - it was as if this short movie had been created solely to preview many of the words for Chapter 4 of Brando Brown! 

The movie short is a Spanish film called El Monstruo en el Armario, or in Latin, "Monstrum in Armario." Even though there is some dialogue in Spanish, this version does have subtitles - I still ended up narrating the dialogue in Latin.

Below are two scripts which you can use - one in Latin, one in English.

Latin script

English script

Observations

1. I found that this movie talk was a very easy one to ask questions which required responses more than just the basic circling questions/answers. I was able to ask many "what do you think" kinds of questions.
2. In the Latin script, some may be surprised to see that I asked/rephrased sentences and questions as indirect statements. A traditionalist would state that indirect statements are "too difficult" for Latin 1 students and should be reserved for Latin 2 or even Latin 3. However, I have found that as long as you establish meaning for words like "do you think" by writing them on the board and use the indirect statement, probably most students will understand what you are saying. Again, our goal is comprehension. There is NOTHING but tradition which says that indirect statements cannot be used in Latin 1.
3. In using an indirect statement, some students may ask why the verb form has changed. I will do a quick pop-up grammar, explaining that the structure needed a different form, but I will not go into a lengthy explanation about indirect statements. Usually, I will respond first, "Did you understand what i said?" and then go from there.
4. Normally I will turn the sound down in a Movie Talk, but this one required sound when going through it due to the "sounds" which the man hears.
5. Even though this is a 3-minute Movie Talk, I found that I was able to go for 35 minutes or so with this. 

Movie Talk script - The Present

In trying to pre-teach vocabulary for the 2nd chapter of Brando Brown Canem Vult, I wanted to do a Movie Talk which incorporated the words birthday, birthday party, bring, gift/present. Quite honestly, I could find NOTHING on the Movie Talk database relating to these words. I was shocked, because I thought for sure that there would be an animated short about a children's birthday party. 

On Vimeo, I did, however, come across this animated short called The Present (I have now added it to the Movie Talk database). Although it does not have a birthday party in it, I could pre-teach words like gift and brings. It is only about 3 1/2 minutes, but wow, it is really good! At IFLT this past summer, Katya Paukova said that the best movie talks are those which engage the emotions - I saw Katya demonstrate one involving a one-minute Budweiser commercial which totally drew me in due to its emotional content. The Present is definitely one which will hold students' attention (much like Bear Story, although my students have made me swear never to show anything that sad again!).

Below are scripts in Latin and in English. Hope you can find them useful!

English script

Latin script.

Observations
1) Even though The Present is only 3 1/2 minutes, it allows for lots of repetitions and some great opportunities for circling. I was able to get a lot out of this movie short.

2) Stop at 2:33, and then go back to the beginning to watch it again all the way through uninterrupted. I did not want to ruin the impact of the ending with me interspersing circling questions.

3) I actually had a number of students show this movie short to their parents that evening!

Movie Talk Script - Short and Sweet

Yesterday, Bob Patrick, Lauren Watson, and I were invited to give a 1/2 day CI in-service at a neighboring county about an hour away. Bob, Lauren, and I have given numerous CI in-services in our own district, so we felt very honored to have the chance to visit another district to share our CI knowledge (in fact, a teacher in that district asked us to come, because she found our names through Martina Bex's database of CI teachers - thanks, Martina!).

I always love giving presentations with Bob and Lauren, because I get the chance to learn so much from them during their demos. Lauren teaches French, so learning some French via CI is ALWAYS helpful, because I get to experience her demo like a student. Yesterday, Lauren's demo was a Movie Talk in French, and I really liked what she did...so much that as a result, I actually typed it up in Latin and did it today with my own Latin 1 classes. It is with Lauren's permission that I share her Movie Talk with you here. 

The Movie Talk is called Short and Sweet, and Lauren used it to introduce words such as boy, girl, loves, big, small, not, sad, says. It is actually very short, but you can do SO much with this. I was actually surprised at how engaged my students were in watching it.

English script

Latin script

Observations

1. When Lauren demonstrated this, she only showed it up to 1:50 the first time, because there is a plot twist which occurs. It is best when the Movie Talk is shown completely through a second time uninterrupted with the ending.
2. Lauren also showed it without sound the first time. She says that she likes to do this in order to keep students focused. Normally I will do a Movie Talk with the sound, but for this one, I would do the first run-through without sound, because I found the background music to be very annoying - it sounds like something from the Kahoot soundtrack.
3. My students absolutely were totally taken in by the plot twist at the end (as was I when I saw it the first time). 

Thanks, Lauren - my students really enjoyed it. 

Movie Talk Script - Bear Story

After my post on Movie Talk and EdPuzzle, I received a number of requests for Movie Talk scripts which I have used in class. I am by no means an expert on doing Movie Talks, but today my colleague Bob Patrick and I recently did a Movie Talk which I think went extremely well with our Latin 1 students. As a result, I thought that I would share it with folks. 

I was wanting to do a Movie Talk which I could use to introduce family words, such as mother, father, son, etc., so I consulted Jason Fritze's Movie Talk database. If you have not seen this, then I highly suggest that you take a look at it and bookmark it! This summer, Jason Fritze began to create a list of Movie Talks using Google Docs, and then he shared it publicly for others to add additional Movie Talks. The database is sorted by possible target nouns, verbs, and adjectives, so I did a search for the terms mother and father, and I found this absolute gem of a movie short. 

The movie short is called Bear Story, and it recently won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short. This Chilean short movie (made with help from Pixar) is incredibly powerful and absolutely emotional yet heartwarming - when I first saw Bear Story, I found myself so vested in the storyline emotionally. Watch it on your own, and see what you think - Link to Bear Story (note - I cannot guarantee how long this link will remain active before it is removed for copyright violations). Katya Paukova says that the best movie shorts are those which appeal to the emotions, because then students will be more engaged in them. Wow, Bear Story definitely had me engaged!  

Anyhow, Bob and I used this movie short today to introduce the words mother, father, and son, as well as some other target words. I am providing two different Movie Talk scripts: one in Latin, and one in English so that it can be adapted to your target language. NOTE - any movie short can be adapted to your own target words/structures if you watch a movie short closely enough.

Movie Talk script Latin

Movie Talk script English

Observations

1. Do NOT show the full movie short prior to the Movie Talk. Students will not be as engaged in the Movie Talk if they know the ending! You do not want to spoil the ending.
2. Many of my students were on the verge of tears as they watched Bear Story.
3. Due to the massive amount of repetitions and to the emotional engagement, I was surprised by how many of the target words students had acquired in this Movie Talk.
4. The ending may seem ambiguous to students - the big question which many had was "Did the bear actually return to his family? or did he create his own fantasy ending in his picture box show?" My take: the bear does indeed return to his family. Although the bear is alone in the beginning of the movie short, it appears that his wife and son are not home. Pause it at 1:23, and you will see an imprint of both bears' bodies in the bed, and they are holding hands! Plus at the end of the movie, the father bear smiles, as looks at the picture of his family. Again, this is my take on it. 
5. Explain the story behind the making of Bear Story to your students after you view it. It makes the animated short all the more powerful. 

I hope that you will be able to use this Movie Talk with your students!

P.S. Quite ironically, Anabelle Allen (who is my current IFLT heroine) today posted in her blog about doing Movie Talks - I highly recommend that you read her post here! I always learn so much from her!

EDPuzzle and MovieTalk

The following is taken from my presentation "Technology in the Comprehensible Input Classroom," which I gave this summer at both the ACL Summer Institute and IFLT conference.

I love doing MovieTalk in my classes, and quite honestly, I do not know why it took me so long to implement this CI strategy (actually I do - read my recent blog post about Movie Talks). This past summer at IFLT, I got the chance to observe both Annabelle Allen facilitate a Movie Talk in Spanish, and Katya Paukova demonstrate one in Russian. As I know neither languages well, the Movie Talks kept me engaged in the language acquisition process. 

However, whenever I have done a Movie Talk, although I was able to use the movie itself as a pre-reading activity to teach vocabulary and language structures, I never really did anything with the movie afterwards or implemented any type of formative assessment with students to determine the Movie Talk's efficacy.  

During my graduate courses in Instructional Technology, I learned about EDPuzzle, an online tool which allows students to interact with videos as they view them (N.B. Zaption is no longer around but if you have already created lessons with Zaption, you can import them into EDPuzzle. Click here to find out how). While EDPuzzle is promoted as way to implement a flipped classroom, when I saw this tool, immediately I thought, "I could use this after a Movie Talk! I can actually pause the movie in the same exact places where I had paused during the Movie Talk and now see what students acquired (if anything) as a result."

Below is an example of an EdPuzzle formative assessment which I created for a Movie Talk demo this summer at the ACL Summer Institute and IFLT. Because it was a demo, this Movie Talk only used a 24-second clip, but the target Latin vocabulary words were avis (bird), currit (runs), and cibus (food). As stated earlier, the EDPuzzle video pauses in the same exact place where I had paused the movie during Movie Talk.




Observations

1. In the beginning, it can take awhile to create your first EdPuzzle video, because there are lots of tools which you can implement - cropping of videos, add both written and audio questions, etc. Like any tool, though, the more one uses it, the easier and quicker it becomes to create an EDPuzzle activity. 
2. Students like being asked a formative question in an EDPuzzle video at the very same place where you asked a circling question during Movie Talk, because it seems familiar for them. 
3. BUT there is no need to pause and to ask EVERY single question from a Movie Talk in an EdPuzzle video. Just pick the highlights.
4. You can either use EDPuzzle as an in-class activity or as a self-paced activity for students to do on their own. 
5. If your school is a 1:1 school, then EDPuzzle is a great tool. As I teach at a BYOD school, when using EDPuzzle as an in-class activity, I will reserve a class set of laptops for students to use. Although students can do this activity on their smartphones or tablets, as we know, a disparity of technological capabilities exists among devices. I would prefer that all students have the same access for this activity, hence, in my opinion, the need for uniformity among devices. 
6. Because it is a formative assessment, I am only interested in what students acquired/did not acquire from the Movie Talk, i.e. what words/structures do I still need to target more and to get in more meaningful repetitions? 
7. In order to preserve the novelty, I do not implement EDPuzzle after every Movie Talk which I do, because I do not want students to resent a Movie Talk if they feel like they have to do some type of assessment afterwards.