Wednesday, April 9, 2014

Greetings & Introducing Yourself (7th Grade)

Hello Hello! For this post I thought of some activities for the 7th Grade topic, Greetings and Introductions.

I tested these activities out on Prezi and was really surprised how many cool tools this page has! 
Click on this link ----->PREZI and Enjoy my Prezi presentation about Greetings and Introductions!


I used all of the 4 skills so there's no need to go else where to make sure you covered your students' reading, writing, speaking and listening skills. 


I have a few ideas in mind for games you can incorporate into the presentation. 

  • For the 1st Slide labeled "Costa Rica," introduce the topic by asking your students what are some common ways of greeting people in Costa Rica (between friends, family, or strangers.)


  • Next, pick out students to read 1 sentence at a time. 
    • Where ever there is a bold word with an asterisk, click to the next slide because the definition is going to show up next.  
    • By clicking next, you'll be taken back to the short paragraph for the next student to read. 


  • The same happens when reading about China. 


  • Next the class will watch a video from Misterduncan from English on saying Hello & Goodbye. 
    • You can stop the video whenever you want to ask your students questions however I have thought of some stops for you with questions. 

    1. The first pause would be right before Misterduncan starts talking about greeting people when you are in a hurry. 
    2. The next slide is a question.
      1. This will give you a chance to "popcorn" your students with a stuffed pillow and ask them different ways to 
        • say hello
        • say a double greeting
        • say a 1st time meeting greeting
        • say a long time no see greeting. 


  • The next slide will take you back to the video for the class to keep watching. 


  • Again you will pause after Misterduncan has talking about greetings in a rush. 
    • Ask your students if they can think of other ways to greet people when you are in a rush!


  • Back to the video, for the last section which is all about "good-byes." 
    • Click on the slide and it'll take you to a question for you to ask what were some of the ways that people can say bye. 


  • Time to review the vocabulary words that were in bold from earliers reading sections about Argentina & China


  • Time to learn how to introduce yourself! 
    • Click: Watch the video on how to introduce yourself. 


  • Click:As a class answer the questions and practice introducing themselves. 
    • This is a great opportunity to incorporate a game. 
      1. Have the students play "hot potato" in a circle with a toy while you play some music or tap on a desk. 
      2. Whoever has the toy in their hand once the music or tapping stops has to introduce themselves. 
      3. You can either have the students sit down once they have participated or keep playing, that's up to you.  


  • To finish off such a great topic, ask the students to write a short dialogue or essay having to do with the topic. 



Let me know how it went if you used my presentation. I would love to hear from you! 


Wednesday, April 2, 2014

Famous Athletes and Musicians (9th Grade)

Hello again my beautiful teachers!

This time around we are going to tackle a 9th Grade topic that can always be a lot of fun! LIFE AND ACHIEVEMENT OF FAMOUS ATHLETES AND MUSICIANS. 
Artist Creates Portraits Of Famous Musicians Using Cassette Tape - DesignTAXI.comMichael Jordan, the best player to ever play the game of basketball and my IDOL. I am an avid Chicago Bulls fanatic. In my free time I watch the NBA hardwood classics TV show where they show all the best basketball games from the 90's, which were dominated by MJ. Not to mention I was born when Michael Jordan hit his famous cross over fade away over against the Utah Jazz.#HandsomeMichelle Kwan - Orange Coral Skating / Ice Skating dress inspiration for Sk8 Gr8 Designs.Michelle Kwan

For this activity we're going to be incorporating some technology into it to make it that much funner!
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To introduce the topic, we will talk about what famous athletes or musicians students like and what they know about them.

Students will then be paired up using the Stick-In-A-Cup method. (Every student picks a stick out of a cup. Two sticks will have the same number so once everyone has a stick they have to find their pair according to the number on the stick.)

Once the pairs are made, students will choose a famous athlete or musician to do a thorough research on their life because they will later be interviewing each "Famous Person."

After the students have researched their famous person they will decide who will be the interviewer and who will be the famous Athlete or Musician. The roles will interchange later on. 

We will watch a couple of short interviews using youtube to see what type of interviews can be done so that the students can start getting an idea of what type of questions to ask their partner. 

Working with their partner the students will type up a dialogue for an interview based on what they have learned about their famous person.

I will record the interview but the catch is that the students have to get into character and act or speak like their famous person.  The roles will then be switched so that the interviewer will then be the famous person.
After I have recorded all my students then I will make a one big video of all the interviews and share with the class.

 Here are two very short videos. One is of Bob Marley, a famous musician and Bethany Hamilton, a famous surfer. 

Bethany Hamilton – Soul Surfer, Professional Surfer, Role Model, Inspiration » Galleries » Photos♫♪ Bob Marley el rey del reggae, Robert Nesta Marley. En 1978 ♪♫ musician bob marley

I really like this activity because from the surface it seems very fun and simple but it involves so much more. It involves technology because the students will need to access the internet to research their chosen person along with being in front of the camera which indirectly they are in the presence of technology, something that they might not be in contact with every day. Also, it is asked that the students type up their dialogue which involved word-processing. They can easily write it down but being able to edit, spell check, play with graphics and the page layouts allows them to be more creative with their dialogue. 

If you try it out, let me know how it went and if you altered anything please go ahead and share what changes you did and it how it went.