Reflections of an iPad classroom 14/2/13

I have made the amazing discovery of the Bitsboard app but need to give it a health warning... The potential of Bitsboard for an alternative way to introduce or practise new vocabulary is tremendous for Modern Languages. I created a departmental account and was able to import the boards I had created at home into the school iPads. Pupils have thoroughly enjoyed playing a host of games created off the back of a core set of flashcards which took me around 10 minutes to make. 

The downside is that it appears to be slightly pernickety. I created a set of Flashcards last night for pets, in preparation for an observation lesson today. For whatever reason, signing in to the account and importing the board didn't work. It was extremely frustrating, especially given the focus and interest other pupils had previously displayed. I'll try again next week, as this is an app potentially worth its weight in gold. 

The meaning of Twitter for my PGCE talk

I tweeted tonight to ask people what Twitter meant to them in advance of my MFL PGCE talk tomorrow. Here's a Wordle of the responses.

#ililc4 Amanda Salt A level and new technologies

Here is my talk from #ililc4 on A level and new technologies:

#ililc4 Amanda Salt Apps R Us

Here is my talk, about apps I use with iPads in the classroom so far:

#ililc4 @valleseco Keynote

From Queen to Sinatra 

Under pressure 

Need for teacher personality, technology shouldn't kill this (The Buggles Video killed the radio star) 

Play Pointless or Family Fortunes 

Pupils will take repeated negative comments from a computer but not a teacher 

Use technology to enhance our skills and activities not replace them

Songsmith to make up songs 

Delicious to bookmark sites 

"I can" statements to assess what kids can do - see Claire's spreadsheet 

I started off making the notes above but then put the iPad down, sat back and let Clare's words flow over me. She was an excellent keynote speaker, capturing the mood and pushing most of us to the point of tears with her concluding song My Way. So that's that, #ililc4 is over and we leave inspired, enthused, full of friendship and love for these friends we only maybe see once or twice a year, or have only met this year for the first time at #ililc4. We stand tall and we move on with the love, humour, support and inspiration of the #mfltwitterati

 

#ililc4 @spanishsam Speaking

Speaking 

Weighting in GCSE 

Prepare them for KS5 and beyond 

Communication vs grammar 

Pupil desire to communicate 

Krashen 

LAD language acquisition device within us

Comprehensible input 

Acquired not learned 

Think about language we want them to acquire eg it's your turn 

Chomsky

Can't just learn by rote 

Importance of grammatical and linguistic competence 

How do we teach languages? 

Grammar - translation 

audio-visual 

Communicative approach 

St Martins 

Accuracy at the same time as fluency - mimes, song, team competitions, visual support, high levels of interaction and classroom routines 

Drip feeding language in routines & team competitions

SOWs developed with full activites in mind

Allow for spontaneous speech James Stubbs

TL as much as you can and as much as they are able 

¿Cómo se dice.. en español / inglés? 

¿Puedo ..?

¿Puedo hablar en inglés? 

Mimes to help them 

Phrases on the board 

Jesús , mentiroso, perdóname por haber llegado tarde

Spontaneous speech helps in the oral exam especially the borderline students 

Encourage and reward TL with team points 

TL OPPORTUNITIES 

Forfeits eg hopping on one leg, conjugate a verb etc 

objective setting 

Asking for stuff

Register

Team points

Homework setting 

Setting up pair work activites

Mimes and actions 

Mime for each word eg sign language thumb and fingers 

Encore une fois 

Colour coding for a reason 

Activities bag 

WC is whole class

Repetition 

Repeat if correct 

Encore une fois - trapdoor 

Pass the telephone 

Mime to practise 

Speed reading 

Songs 

Version with blanks, more blanks each time 

Planning a SOW

End activity

- pupil language

- Interaction language

- Content language 

Drip feed language all the way through

Use the structure do you prefer ..or.. ? I prefer .. because.. 

#ililc4 @lancslassrach Do you flubaroo?

Rachel has a closed Google site, pupils watch video, Google form to fill in and flubaroo marks it. 

Must keep answers short. 

Go to Google Drive 

Create a form

Theme and title 

Question title eg cat

Question type 

Must select required question and then click done 

Add item allows you to add a question 

Must include name 

Share form by emailing 

You must submit a response, call it teacher or your name 

Responses form - insert script

Search for flubaroo, select and install 

Select flubaroo and select 'Grade assignment' 

Assign points 

Select teacher responses as Answer Key

This was such a good session, the buzz was palpable at the potential for this to cut down on marking at the same time as assessing pupil learning and progress. Hurrah! 

#ililc4 @dominic_mcg Make a difference by differentiating differently

A brilliant talk on differentiation, thanks Dom! Here are my notes...

Make a difference by differentiating differently 

To keep pupils motivated and engaged 

Who do we differentiate for? 

Different levels of skill

Ability and proficiency 

Experience 

Motivation 

Attendance 

Social background 

Social development 

Emotional development 

Physical needs 

Types

By task 

By outcome (this is lazy) 

By support 

By resources eg reading comprehension at differing levels of complexity 

By interest 

By variety 

For ability by ability 

Listening

Underlining the correct answer (shouldn't test their reading/writing too, shouldn't penalise someone because they can't write in the language) 

Multiple choice 

Put phrases in correct order 

Smileys for positive / negative reactions (listen for tone of emotion first time round, do they sound happy, etc) 

Video clips to offer clues (more like real life) 

Give out the script

Hold up picture cards (eg weather forecast, hold up their card if hear their weather) 

Speaking activities 

Quiz quiz trade Q&A with model answers 

Completing a survey with all answers where student has to tick boxes, not write stuff down 

Allow cue cards - they can have these at GCSE and A level 

Give out a list of "must includes" - train them eg fabby phrases 

Speaking frames 

Allow students to improvise 

Use ICT (Dominic's talk yesterday) 

Reading activities 

Different or modified texts

Different presentations eg comics, websites, handwritten text, authentic pages  eg www.le-sac-des-files.net

Different questions 

Matching eg Tarsia http://changing-phase.blogspot.co.uk

Textivate 

Questions in English 

Multiple choice answers 

Number the lines in a text and tell the students which line the answers are on 

Writing activities 

Writing frames - MFL Sunderland 

Add a question at the bottom eg How could you personalise this? 

Vocabulary and grammar lists 

Vocabulary games eg wordsearches (differentiate by not giving words) extend by 10 subjects and 10 opinions then write sentences after done, crosswords

Write a poem, it must rhyme can make it funnier 

Mini whiteboards 

Lego blocks - use this for Spanish colours? http://domsmflpage.blogspot.com

T1- Top and Tail Sue Cowley's Seven T's of Differentiation 

Get students to use an exact number of words then build up a couple of words each time 

Give students words to include (random or key words) 

Student as teacher to group

Share good work and get others to explain whey 

Level their own work and say why 

Group student by mixed ability 

T2 Time 

Timers

Countdown timer eg Sandfields Benny Hill timer 

T3 targets 

Differentiate for one group of students per lesson - realistic, no time to do for all

Student of the week

Rewards - Classdojo

Some, most, all

T4 teamwork 

Ability, friends, skills,

T5 thinking skills 

Poster, paragraph, podcast 

"HOTS not MOTS" Peter Anstee 2010 higher order thinking skills not more of the same 

SNOT Self, neighbour, other, teacher (see three before me) 

T6 texts 

Use authentic texts - magazines, newspapers, comics (real, not off internet) 

Handwritten texts 

Songs 

T7 technology 

iPads, voice recorders, IWB, YouTube, QRcodes, Zondle, linguascope, Sutton High MFL Fun with Languages site (check this out!) 

See Dom's last slide re links for further reading 

#ililc4 Show and Tell

End of Day 1 and we all came to the Show and Tell at Highfield House armed with at least 1000 calories each as Zena has suggested we bring snacks so we took her at her word (and then some) An excellent night was had by all. Here are my scribbled notes:

Isabelle Jones @icpjones  "Any excuse for a song!"

iPod roulette in the car driving to work, Isabelle has a list of questions to decide if she will the song with a class or not 

Helen Myers talked about ALL webinar and events 

Google site http://sites.google.com/site/missmyerslearninglanguages

Lisa Stevens

Stamp clap click activity using one two three in the language between partners (A says 1, B says 2, A says 3, B says 1, etc)  then they start replacing the numbers little by little with a stamp for 1, then a clap for 2 and finally a click for 3. A great brain gym activity and I don't think @missmclachan and I were the only two who struggled....

Rachel Smith The 20 day challenge 

Rachel watched Matt Cutte Try something new for 30 days TED talk video 

Talked to pupils about dead time in the day (bus, etc) 

What could we do for 10 mins every day? Duolingo etc. 

Display with ideas 

Twitter: 5 words a day, video, retweets, Peppa Pig 

The idea is that doing something for that length of time is habit-forming

Joe Dale song by John Connor. Brilliant. Enough said. 

Clare Seccombe post-its

Speech bubble post-its and normal ones 

Grid 8/16 stimuli, stick on post-its

Translation either way

Sherlock Guess Who type game 

Instant feedback

Padlet and Linoit

Silent feedback while kids work

Question wall

Venn diagrams or sorting activity 

Vote 

Two, one with question and one with answer

Question in book for teacher 

Question on board - pupil response 

Sam Broom Songs

Numbers, restaurante, el rap de los verbos 

Preterite song 

Slideshare for songs Spanish Sam

Ricky Martin song for arriving late. 

I wish I could sing!! 

Simone Haughey 

Confucius classroom year of the horse has included bringing two horses in, choir, panda mosaic etc. Fabulous! 

Garry Mills 

sporcle.com  Spanish then loads of choices 

Movie titles en español translation game or box options 

Eleanor Abrahams 

Physical response to text eg Mexican wave for capital letter, finger click for comma, two claps for full stop, finger click for apostrophe, panic expression for exclamation mark, one clap for accent. Love it though hurts my head! 

Nina Elliott

Hip Hop Phonics 

Ti etc phonemes 

2nd time = stand up! 3rd time = Physical reaction as well as stand up eg rapper move 

How much did we love this?! The batman videoed it, he thought it was so fab lol. 

Chris Fuller 

Steps to TeachMeet MFL

1 find a collaborator to help share the workload and the fun

2 find a venue and choose a date 

3 find a sponsor 

4 create a TM wiki sign up page 

5 spread the word then nag

6 keep it simple 

Time to do an MFL TeachMeet in Northern Ireland then... 

Glennis Pye 

Tellagami

Getting pupils to speak

Intensive courses, need pupils to work more on stuff at home 

Listening 

Predicted the vocab in advance 

Sent home to listen to video. Edmodo quiz that accompanied listening 

Transcription of listening set as HW or weaker could ask for blankfill 

Translation of the transcript 

Extra = spot the mistake 

Duet John Connor and Simone Haughey. Brilliance again :-) 

Dominic McGladdery

Mot de passe (password) game. 

Word association

One word clues for Alex who has back to board as words flash up. 

Off to make some myself.. 

#ililc4 @elvisrunner In at the deep end

@elvisrunner aka Eleanor Abrahams has recently come into a department as HOD, where possibly the biggest issue was that the kids were not engaged. In this session, she talked about the different targets she has had and the strategies she has employed to help the department move forward, bringing the pupils on board as they go. 

Improve ethos 

Engagement 

Reward

Project-based SOW

Parental involvement 

Target 1 engagement 

Create a dance routine with commands (drama strong in school so she decided to tap into this) 

Watched Ashleigh and Pudsey routine from Britain's Got Talent, and got pupils to say what would Ashleigh say, then they had to shout commands as Pudsey moved. Much hilarity ensued as we tried this ourselves... 

Target 2 accurate assessment data 

Standard tests for all brought in

Joint moderation 

Standardised level calculator 

Reliable tracking 

Visual aids for pupils to see improvement as their name moves up the ladder 

Target 3 Improve the image 

Company logo and teacher name in each room 

Resources onto the wikis 

Performing Arts department strong. 

Lyrics to Summer Nights, sort according to the order they think lyrics should be in 

Starter - 4 words one pic idea for 4 different musicals. 

Subtitle bingo - subtitles mixed on each pupil page, they tick as they see it in subtitles. 

Character analysis followed, based on the film and they created a poster using the imperative to advertise it. 

Lead the department 

Leadership is not a position or a title, it is action and example 

Move away from the textbook but keep their assessments, vocab can guide you as you write your SOWs (this is what we do) 

Venn diagram of key topics, with words to place on the circles - makes them think of how they can apply vocabulary in more than one area

Cluedo

Connect 4 

Strip bingo

Colours - buzz word bingo. Differentiation 

Check out all the ideas on the amazing http://elvisrunner.blogspot.com/

Start with your colour then try the next colour if you can manage it 

Eleanor decided to allow pupils exposure to past and future tenses . She recognised that she could allow the kids to be better by exposure to it and using it. 

This was a brilliant, interactive and inspiring session and gave me so many ideas to take away. The full presentation is on Eleanor's blog http://elvisrunner.blogspot.co.uk where she explains it all much better than me

#ililc4 @dominic_mcg Talking Tools

NB I have decided to leave these blogposts as more or less the notes I took at the time, as sometimes lists are easier to digest and quicker to find key ideas. 

Traditional talking tools 

Dice - name number of words acc to dice roll for a given topic 

Cooperative learning structures Kagan - quiz quiz trade 

Hats masks and disguises (I think it was Sadie McLachlan who talked about having a moustache stuck to a pencil and the pupil in the group talked when they had the pencil in front of them) 

Technologies 

Audacity - see also José Picardo's guide to podcasting. Kids like changing their voices 

Audioboo - up to 3 mins 

Fotobabble 

Blabberize 

Crazy talk - expensive PC programme but £0.69 on iTunes 

Voki (you can save them into Publisher file) 

Goanimate (make voice files on audacity) 

Talking Tom Cat (cartoon) 

Dubbler 

Puppetpals 2 

Songify - see songify in action with the hilarious video "this reality hits you hard bro" on YouTube 

Rory's Story Cubes 

cueprompter.com great for CA practice Visoprompt free does the same job 

Duolingo 

Yakit kids 

Line learner lite 

Tellagami - some say it is better than Voki 

There were lots of fab ideas in Dom's session plus we had time to play about with the apps and create different speaking activities and examples. He is putting his two talks on his blog http://domsmflpage.blogspot.co.uk

#ILILC4 @icpjones More than words

NB I have decided to leave these blogposts as more or less the notes I took at the time, as sometimes lists are easier to digest and quicker to find key ideas. 

The way words look

Visuals to support language you introduce 

Get pupils to visualise new language 

Think about presentation of work 

The way words sound

TL sounds different to different learners 

Response to sounds (boys self-conscious that French sounds girly) 

Differences without stereotyping 

Pure listening without reference to MT is nearly impossible 

Rhymes 

Reading out loud - old fashioned but pupils enjoy 

Jacques Prévert Spectacle poem - mix of translation and play on words 

Jacques Prévert L'amiral - like a tongue twister . Pupils have a set idea that poetry has to rhyme and this shows them it doesn't.

Ana Tijoux: Las horas rap  (one of her songs is in FIFA game so lots of kids recognise her, she has loads of songs on YouTube) 

See Isabelle's YouTube account for playlists 

The way words interact with each other 

Etymology: prefixes & suffixes 

http://www.etymonline.com/index.php

idioms (lost in translation language) 

<<awkward English>>

Teach them set phrases and expressions - I really liked this idea and am going to get them to create photos eg ponerse rojo como un tomate 

Look on Youtube 

Use Blabberize.com to animate a photo

Fluency of learning words and phrases? Not necessarily part and parcel of the fluency but nice to have and good for pushing more interested/ able pupils 

Kit Brett book with podcasts for French 

Be aware of languages words have been borrowed from eg piano from Italian 

Rhyming words dictionaries 

Text types

Think about the type of connectives you teach them. (Last column) Helps you focus on that when preparing your lessons

 

Playful with the links between languages 

http://trabalenguasenespanol.com Tongue twisters 

Chistes de Lepe www.1000chistes.com/chistes-de-lepe jokes website 

Poetry links 

Le message - pupils can copy the structure to do their own poetry 

Give them recipe list above for writing poetry. 

Un verbe: Aimer (on YouTube) kind of rap, about the excitement of meeting somebody new 

Colour poem "what is blue? The sky is blue" idea 

Word clouds and calligrammes 

Wordle and Tagxedo (import your own picture) 

Diamond poems eg to reinforce grammar

Haikus - great for speaking 

Kennings - form of metaphor, 2 word phrase. eg whale-road for sea

http://text-to-speech.imtranslator.net Use this, it's not perfect but it models it for them 

ivona.com also for text to speech 

Storybirds 

Decide Now app

Made-up songs for specific purpose eg Soy Una pizza on YouTube 

Musical translation - eg Kevin, Karla y la Banda Wrecking Ball. Show them parallel texts of the song lyrics. Don't show them the video if it's a distraction. 

Muy interesante website has lots of great stuff on it. 

Segundamano.es

Guía de reciclaje para móvil 

Guardia Civil medio ambiente page 

Warner Bros add .es etc to go to the Warner Bros website for that language 

Copy the page you want them to read, paste it into Lingro and Lingro acts as a dictionary 

Isabelle uses the following to decide if she will use technology or not.. 

As always, this was a great session by the ever-creative and inspirational Isabelle Jones. Her original presentation will be in her blog http://isabellejones.blogspot.co.uk

#ililc4 @joedale keynote Putting the Pedagogy into the Technology

This year was the fourth ICT Links into Languages conference at the university of Southampton, brought about by the hard work of Zena Hilton and her team.  King of the #mfltwitterati, Joe Dale, kicked off proceedings for the weekend with his keynote. The theme of this year's ICT Links into Languages was putting the pedagogy into the technology. In a breakneck race through a multitude of slides, Joe showed us a lot of links and information to support this. 

The key message I took out of the Carol Dweck video was that pupils need to see setbacks as opportunities to learn.  As teachers, we need to see the pedagogy in using the technology and recognise the fact that technology is a tool not a learning outcome. Another key idea to remember is that pupils are technology comfy not technology savvy. 

Joe showed us a video which talked about the Tpack: that sweet spot where technology, pedagogy and content knowledge all come together. He also showed us slides on the SAMR model of Substitution augmentation modification and redefinition. I really liked the way the video explained it: 

Substitution is using Google docs as a word processor. 

Augmentation is sharing the Google doc. 

Modification is using the Google doc for collaboration and comment. 

Redefinition is sharing the Google doc across the world, speaking comments and embedding the final text into your class website. 

We all should aim for the top two levels of modification and redefinition and Joe had zillions of links to teachers doing amazing things in terms of flipping their classrooms, sharing good practice and improving the learning. You will get a chance to check them out on his blog http://joedale.typepad.com

With Joe having set the tone for the weekend, we then set off excitedly in search of our talks and workshops, iPads, tablets, pens and paper at the ready..