Blog Archive Prepositions AT IN ON - place » ENGAMES A week ago I published a post on prepositions AT, IN, ON for time. Several students asked me if I could do something like that for prepositions AT, IN, ON but for places. So here you are. There is a mind map graphically explaining the usage of the prepositions and then there are 3 games to practise the grammar point. Prepositions AT, IN, ON for places – MIND MAP Here is a mind map, where I try to explain the difference between the three prepositions. Prepositions AT, IN, ON for places – GAMES Here you can try three games to practise the grammar point. Prepositions AT, IN, ON for places – penalty. The second game is called teacher invaders. Prepositions AT, IN, ON for places – teacher invaders. Are you looking for something quieter at the end? Prepositions AT, IN, ON for places – cloze test and Angry Finches. Follow us
The Great World Language Debate du Jour: Grammar vs. Communication I am embarrassed -- no, actually I would go as far as to say horrified -- that I spent ten years of my career teaching students about the Spanish language. I actually felt proud when they could fill out grammar worksheets with precision. Now, you may be thinking that, as a Spanish teacher, this is my job, but since my enlightenment, I understand that it decidedly is not. I am now certain that teaching them to communicate well in the language is my job. Honestly, who cares whether students can conjugate verbs correctly if they can't tell someone what they need? Getting to this point has required a colossal teaching philosophy transformation, but I've never been more proud of the work that I'm doing. Starting down this road can be wholly overwhelming. Here are some essential terms that I desperately wish I had known earlier. 1. These guidelines are important to consider when planning curriculum because they help you determine what students at certain levels can handle linguistically. 2.
6 Good Tools to Generate Writing Prompts All writing starts with an idea which is then expanded and elaborated, but coming up with ideas to write about is not always easy particularly when you have to teach different classes. This is where digital writing prompts come in handy.These are web tools that you can use to generate ideas and story starters for students to write about. I have compiled some of these tools for you below , check them out 1- Things to Think About Kids’ Things to Think About provides 100 prompts to spark thinking for written responses and encourage conversations about ideas and issues for kids. Created by students and teachers in Michigan, it can be used in classrooms or with families by allowing children to explore the prompts and by using them to guide a discussion or lesson. This is a good tool that can helpyou generate new ideas to be used for writing short stories, plays or any other writing task. Plinky is another wonderful tool for writing prompts. A story start is the first chapter of the book.
Curriculet Curriculet frees up my time outside of the classroom - no more collecting reading questions, trying to spot-check them, giving points for writing something down, whether or not they actually did the reading or understood it. - Jessica Rice, English Teacher at Summit Preparatory High School With Curriculet, I can not only change our reading instruction on a classroom level by flipping the instruction, but also influence reading instruction on a departmental level by encouraging the department to expand the curriculum: we can read MORE in less time with Curriculet. - Kate Baker, English teacher at Southern Regional high School I cannot WAIT to share this with my colleagues. Using Project-Based Learning to Teach World Languages Editor's Note: Today's guest blogger is Don Doehla, French teacher and instructional coach at Vintage High School in Napa, California. Don recently stepped up to become the new facilitator of our World Languages group. He's got some great ideas for teaching world languages, including the use of project-based learning. He shares a few of these tips today. We hope you'll join him in the World Languages group as well. The world may be small and flat, but it is also multilingual, multicultural, and more and more, it is an interconnected world. The Challenges Like other World Language teachers, I am constantly trying to focus on the essentials in order to create a standards-driven, communication-based curriculum for my students. The Rationale for PBL And so I come to project-based learning as a way of bringing it all together. Stage 1 Fluency Example: The Menu Project Stage 2 Fluency Example: The Children's Story Book We refer to stage two fluency as created language. Future Plans
Mix It Up! Authentic Activities for the World Language Classroom Do you ever feel stuck in a rut while planning your language classes? Perhaps you spend a lot of time lecturing at the white board, use the same activities with different vocabulary for every unit, or rely on teaching students grammar because that's how you were taught. No matter your "go to" activity, we are all much more engaging when we vary our activities and make them relatable. If the speaker is engaging, a good lecture every now and then is enjoyable. When dreaming up new activities, our main focus should always be authenticity. In a previous Edutopia post, I outlined how to best shape a unit around communication. Interpretive Mode Read children’s stories. Interpersonal Mode Engage your students in these activities: Sign a contract on the first day of school promising to use only the target language within your classroom walls. Presentational Mode Have students do these: Create a comic strip. 5 Rules for the 3 Modes They must be authentic.
The Best Tools For Creating Fake “Stuff” For Learning The fake “stuff” I’m referring to in the headline includes newspaper articles, sports “trading cards,” iPhone conversations, Facebook pages etc. These can be used for conversation practice, to create reports on historical figures (or on natural disasters or on just about anything) and for numerous other learning activities. Here are my choices for The Best Tools For Creating Fake “Stuff” For Learning: Boy, this could be a great tool to help English Language Learner students practice writing and reading dialogue — FakeiPhoneText lets you create a text conversation that looks like the real thing and give you a unique url address of your creation. Plus, no registration is required. I Fake Text Message is a simple tool to create…fake text messages. ClassTools has created a similar site for text messages, though theirs can be embedded. Twister can be used to create fake tweets, as can this Fake Twitter Generator. Simitator is another one I’m adding to this list. Related November 8, 2014 Neat!
Word Up: Bring the World's Languages to Your Classroom Here are four steps to adding that je ne sais quoi to your language lessons via free Internet resources. One of the biggest challenges for foreign language teachers is to expose their students to authentic speech by native speakers. Another is to immerse them in the culture of the language they're studying when that culture may be half a world away. But in our expanding digital age, it's increasingly easy to connect live with overseas students, find related videos and audio clips, and discover examples of living language online -- all free. "The Internet has made accessing authentic materials and interacting with native speakers an everyday occurrence in many schools across the country," reports Marty Abbott, director of education at the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL). Keeping It Fresh To keep their classes fresh and current, teachers can incorporate material from foreign Web sites. No Passport Needed Global Group Learning The French (and More) Connection
Euro Blog Léonard de Vinci Et voici les chindogus et leurs inventeurs!! Les images sont cliquables, pour être affichées en taille réelle. Amale : the toothpaste squeezer Théo : the bright glove Quentin D. : the housework box Elodie : the cloth wallet Laura : the cotton pen Emma : the head pen Lucas : the no-stress box Mathilde : the best lunettes Marie H. : the shopping umbrella Margaux : the lipstick pen Clément : the drinking cap Valentin : the all-think Hugo : the French cap 5000 Thomas : the comb-phone Quentin G. : the multi-pen Marie W. : the relaxow Gauthier : the insect crusher Bravo à eux pour le travail fourni : un grand moment! Global Language Education: Learning the Lingo A sampling of schools that take foreign language teaching to task. Learning a foreign language is no longer contingent on textbooks filled with stiff vocabulary exercises. Today, classes have context, from live connections with native speakers to project-based learning in which Skype, wikis, and a dozen other new technologies serve as powerful connecting tools. Highlighting Hindi More than 400 million people in the world speak Hindi, yet the language is rarely taught in any K–12 schools in the U.S. In 2007, the International Education and Resource Network (iEARN) partnered with the Edison School District in New Jersey to create a collaborative, project-based curriculum that allowed students to virtually connect with their peers in India, as described in a PDF press release from the project's launch. Supported by a three-year grant from the U.S. "Skype is a very exciting tool," says Neelam Mishra, a multilevel Hindi teacher at Edison High who helped launch the program in 2007. Technology?
Talk about yourself Examiner: Hi. What’s your name? Kelvin: My name is Kelvin. Examiner: Kelvin, OK. Kelvin: I think I like economics most because I can study different kinds of demand and supply theory and I can use it in my daily life to observe the market. Examiner: OK. Kelvin: Actually, I don’t like physics too much because I need to calculate many difficult questions and all those mathematics words. Examiner: I see. Kelvin: Yeah, sure. Examiner: OK, and what would you like to study there? Kelvin: I think I would like to study something about business. Examiner: OK, that’s great. Melissa: My name is Melissa. Examiner: Melissa? Melissa: Yeah. Examiner: Hi, Melissa. Melissa: I’ve got no sisters and brothers. Examiner: And your dog? Melissa: Yeah! Examiner: Great. Melissa: I like mathematics the most because I think it’s satisfying to calculate the solution. Examiner: OK. Melissa: And English, I think, because it’s fun to learn a language. Examiner: Great, OK. Examiner: Sure, OK. Examiner: OK, that’s great.
Should We Give Up on Foreign Language Programs? Foreign language is on the chopping block in school districts around the country. So when Jay Mathews wrote a piece a few weeks ago about the foreign language study basically being a waste of time I was floored. Now is not the time to grease the rails for further cuts to language programs. But Mathews's question prompted me to raise another: Why not go whole hog on foreign language? Why are we making such an anemic commitment to this critical subject? In Mathews's defense, he too seems to believe in the whole hog approach, but for him it's all or nothing. Seattle's John Stanford International School (JSIS) shows us how well the whole hog approach can work. JSIS proves that immersion programs don't have to take time away from other academic work. Of course, such programs are about as rare as a migrant worker at a Sarah Palin meet and greet. I sympathize with Mathews, but I can't agree with him. In the end, I'm not sure we should give in to Mathews's all-or-nothing vision.