One great way to get intermediate and upper level students engaged and curious about an upcoming book or film is to ask them questions pertaining to its plot before they begin. This not only activates students’ brains and imaginations as they consider what might be ahead, but it also provides
Definition of a doodle: an aimless or casual scribble, design, or sketch; also : a minor work There aren’t many favorable definitions out there regarding doodling and scribbling. As teachers, however, we see it day in and day out on homework, warm ups, tests/quizzes, journals and even desk tops. It
I recently read this blog post in Path to Proficiency and began to reflect on my own sub plans for when I am not able to be in class. How can students effectively use class time to continue their work towards proficiency? Will they actually do what I leave them?
So you are used to seeing High Tech Low Tech articles that discuss options for improving your students language learning experience. These options are presented in various ways requiring different amounts of technology or none at all. The outcomes are intended to be the same regardless of whether you
The Leadership Initiative for Language Learning (LILL) provided world language teachers with 6 Core Practices in 2015 and though some of the practices are not new to teachers, they do take some planning and effort to incorporate in teaching. For some teachers, the most challenging Core Practice to incorporate into
As we observe our students in the classroom setting, we look for them to be engaged in learning, not just “busy,” nor “on task.” We want them intellectually active in the target language with challenging content in a real world context. While attending my most recent district professional development day,
“I overheard my daughter talking with her friends in German.” “A person came through the line when I was bagging groceries and didn’t understand the checker. I was able to help her because I spoke Spanish!” “My granddaughter showed me how she can write in Chinese!” Our students can be
Student presentations are commonplace in world language classrooms and have been for a long time. Teachers use them for all the right reasons: instruction moves from teacher-fronted to student-centered, students gain responsibility for course content, and learners practice ACTFL’s presentational mode of communication. Presentations offer a possibility to assign research
When Karen Fowdy and I began to talk about other people who could support our programs, we realized immediately that our own students had to be a part of the list. They are the ones who are heading out into that global world we keep talking about; they are the
Using ACTFL’s 21st Century Skills Map as our guide, how can we strengthen the ways we teach recurring cultural themes such as food? Food seems to be a favorite topic of our students and many of us teach a unit on food or often incorporate it into our lessons. We’ve
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