Wednesday 29 February 2012

#ILILC2


So my second visit to Southampton for the ICT Links in Languages was much anticipated and did not fail to impress. There was much excitement amongst the attending members of the #MFLTwitterati on Twitter in the weeks leading up to the conference, both from those of us lucky enough to have attended last year, and those who were coming for the first time.
There was a gathering of the clans on the Friday night, with the unveiling of the wonder that is Suzi Bewell's #mfltwitterati t-shirts.

This set the tone for the whole weekend. The workshops and talks were excellent, led by Joe Dale and José Picardo's fab keynotes, and the chance to network, meet new enthusaistic language teachers and chat was superb. I am going to blog about the brilliant workshops and talks I attended over the next week or so, but suffice to say there was plenty of expertise, stimulation and humour on show.
The highlight for many was the Show and Tell on the Saturday night, with just the right level in terms of weightiness of topics combined with singing, dancing and general euphoria. It is enough to mention human dominoes, Tchik et Tchak, turnips and barmen to provoke sniggers and laughs from all who were there.
In these days of pressure and stress, #ILILC2 was a much needed tonic and a wonderful opportunity to catch up with many of my PLN whom I now consider true friends.

Monday 27 February 2012

#ILILC2 LANGUAGES AND THE OLYMPICS

Here is my presentation on how we will incorporate the Olympics into our teaching at KS3. I am heavily indebted to Rachel Hawkes, Neil Jones and Greg Horton amongst others, who kindly gave permission for me to adapt resources they have made

Tuesday 7 February 2012

TRIPTICO TIPS


Today I used Triptico with Forms 2 and 3 (Year 8 and 9 in England) to spice up our verb work after several weeks of working through the basics and doing a lot of written practice.
Initially I used the class sorter to put pupils into groups, then the spinner to choose verbs and the scoreboards to keep track of points. When the spinner stopped on a verb, one pupil in each group had to conjugate the 6 parts in the present tense using a digital voice recorder. The first two groups to successfully replay their recording to me with correct pronunciation won the points. They had to switch the person conjugating each time which meant that all were involved, and the shyer pupils felt more confident without the spotlight shining directly on them. The kids loved it and I felt they made real progress both in terms of knowledge and pronunciation.