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Content Type: 1
Title: Getting Your Students Set Up on Online Accounts
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From https://srahuff.wordpress.com
Emily Huff finds it challenging to get all of her students set up the variety of class accounts that she uses for instruction: Quizlet, Flipgrid, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube pages, blogs, etc. This year she's using a grid with different sites for students to set up accounts on and explore, setting a time limit for in-class time to explore but leaving the document with links available throughout the year.
Read the post and see her grid at https://srahuff.wordpress.com/2018/08/15/quick-class-account-set-up/
Source: Meaningful Ed
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Title: Interpersonal Writing
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From http://teachinginthetargetlanguage.com
Interpersonal writing includes email, instant messaging, texting, and social media platform interactions. In the blog post, get some ideas for preparing your students for successful interpersonal writing (by first doing lots of interpretive activities) and for authentic interpersonal writing tasks: http://teachinginthetargetlanguage.com/two-way-communication-getting-our-students-to-master-the-skill-of-interpersonal-writing/
Source: Teaching in the Target Language
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Title: Using TripAdvisor Reviews at Authentic Resources
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Didi you know that TripAdvisor is available in different languages? Sara-Elizabeth Cottrell points out that the proficiency level of different reviews also varies widely; there is something for every learner in your classes. She also notes that TripAdvisor can be used across a wide variety of units, not just for travel units.
Read her full blog post for ideas on how you can use TripAdvisor as an authentic resource with your students: https://musicuentos.com/2018/08/tripadvisor-itinerary-spanish-class/
Source: Musicuentos
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Title: Advice for Addressing the Question "What Is Culture?" with Young Learners
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Recently a 6th grade teacher posted this query to the Ñandutí listserv: "[T]his year my school district decided to do an "Introduction to World Language" for the 6th grade class. My principal does not want to run the program 100% as a FLEX program, but she wants to introduce different culture points to the students. The first quarter we are going to focus on 'What is culture' and I am freaking out in what to do with them the first week of school!"
Discussion of and responses to the teacher's question have been excellent and full of good advice and references to essential resources.
Follow this thread at http://caltalk.cal.org/read/messages?id=60656
Source: Ñandutí
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Title: Authentic Resources and Young Language Learners
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From https://passion4theprofession.com
Using authentic resources is considered good practice in language teaching. However, using writing-heavy authentic texts with preliterate children isn't likely to be successful. In this blog post, get some ideas for materials selection (picture books, songs, cartoons, infographics, fine art, and more) and how to use authentic resources with young learners: https://passion4theprofession.com/2018/08/10/using-authentic-text-with-young-language-learners/
Source: passion4theprofession
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Title: First Days of School Resources
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It's the beginning of a new school year, and teachers are sharing what they do in the first days of school. Here are some helpful blog posts and listserv threads:
Christina of the Daring English Teachers blog shares what she does on the first day of class to make the day memorable for her students, how she sets expectations, and how she gets her students started writing in this annotated collection of past blog posts: https://www.thedaringenglishteacher.com/2018/08/gearing-up-to-go-back-to-school.html
Larry Ferlazzo has curated a collection of online resources, "The Best Resources for Planning the First Days of School," available at http://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/2011/08/08/the-best-resources-for-planning-the-first-day-of-school/
Valentina Gonzalez shares three mistakes to avoid in the first days of school (and good practices to implement in their place) that are especially welcoming to English learners but really beneficial for all students: https://elementaryenglishlanguagelearners.weebly.com/blog/3-common-mistakes-we-make-on-the-1st-day-of-school
In this Edutopia article, Maurice J. Elias shares questions to ask your students at the beginning of the year, during the second and third weeks, and throughout the year: https://www.edutopia.org/article/important-questions-ask-your-students
Here's a creative approach to dealing with student cell phone use in class: a video helping Spanish learners to say goodbye to their phones at the beginning of class and hello to them at the end of class: https://minutebyminutespanish.com/spanish-teachers-phone-policy-for-gen-z-when-admin-refuses-to-create-a-uniform-policy/
Here's a link to an infographic-style letter to parents about what to expect when their child is in a proficiency oriented class: https://martinabex.com/2018/08/07/parent-letter-for-proficiency-oriented-language-classes/
Here are some free resources especially helpful for middle and high school students from Señora Chase: a student survey, hall passes, the syllabus, etc.: https://senorachase.com/2018/08/01/free-back-to-school-resources/
Maris Hawkins draws on her own and other teachers' resources and ideas to provide a variety of ways to get to know your students and their language abilities without doing explicit reviews in this post: https://marishawkins.wordpress.com/2018/08/01/back-to-school-week-ways-to-avoid-a-review/. She’s also compiled an extensive collection of back-to-school links, resources, and ideas here: https://marishawkins.wordpress.com/2018/08/03/back-to-school-bonanza/
Avoid a review unit by diving directly into a Netflix unit with your returning language students, as described here by Megan Smith: http://www.creativelanguageclass.com/ditch-the-review/
Get lots of ideas for classroom seating arrangements and options in this blog post: https://srahuff.wordpress.com/2018/08/09/flexible-zone-seating-in-high-school/
Emily Huff plans to use Goosechase (a scavenger hunt using mobile devices) with her students to review syllabus content. Read her post for more details and for other ideas to make syllabus review an active process: https://srahuff.wordpress.com/2018/08/07/combining-goosechase-and-syllabus-information/
This name game ball toss not only gives you and students a chance to learn each other’s names, but it also established the norm of target language use: http://misclaseslocas.blogspot.com/2018/08/1st-day-of-spanish-1-name-game-speedball.html
Bryce Hedstrom advises, "Almost every year the honeymoon phase will trick you into thinking you don’t really need a coherent classroom management plan because these kids are the ideal group you have been waiting for. Don’t get fooled again. You have just a few days to establish the tone while the students are malleable, before the class begins to create their own routines they will follow. You don’t want those routines." Read his suggestions for routines to establish, especially for the beginning and ending of each class, at https://www.brycehedstrom.com/2018/first-week-to-do-list
Source: Various
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Title: Shaped Poems for Language Learners
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From https://getcreativecom.wordpress.com
In this blog post, Kasia describes how to guide students through creating shaped poems about summer. Students arrange the words of the poem in the shape of the topic of the poem. This activity could be adapted from summer to any topic.
Read the blog post at https://getcreativecom.wordpress.com/2018/08/10/summer-poems/
Source: Get Creative
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Title: Avatars in Language Classrooms
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Source: Sabrina's Weblog
Inputdate: 2018-08-17 16:08:13
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Content Type: 3
Title: Are You Interested in Culture? The Limiting Nature of Using Learner Interests as a Vehicle for Engagement
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By Stephanie Knight, CASLS Assistant Director
Culture is both critical and slippery content in language classrooms. This dual nature of culture exists due to a variety of complex variables that can be distilled into the disconnect between what is overt (food, flags, and festivals), and what is more nuanced (perceptions, belief systems, positive and negative facing acts). As a result, the work of a language educator is not unlike the work of a paleontologist; he or she generally knows what the dinosaur looks like at a glance (food, flags, festivals), but also has to pay attention to how and why the smaller components of the dinosaur (the more nuanced or subtle representations of culture) work and fit together.
This important work becomes a complex endeavor when one considers the meaningful engagement of learners. On the surface, overt cultural phenomena (see: food) are engaging for students. These overt phenomena are easy to incorporate into lessons and are almost universally interesting. However, when we as educators use learners’ interests as a vehicle for building engagement, we risk missing opportunities for in-depth and long-term, rather than superficial and fleeting, engagement. In other words, we risk promoting culture at a consumptive, rather than at an interactive and/or participatory level.
So how do we integrate instruction about culture at a profound level that transcends consumption? One, perhaps obvious, way is to craft mechanisms for target culture community participation (participation in target culture social media groups, place-based language learning, or even pen pal communication). Another approach is to apply the tenets of concept-based learning to instruction and lesson design.
Concept-based learning shifts learning from single subject areas and focuses on big ideas that are universal and transdisciplinary. This shift is small but meaningful; the learner is not a vessel to be filled with information, but rather an active participant and contributor to the learning environment; since concepts are universal, learners come to the table with something to contribute before they are ever taught any content.
Consider a world language class for example. A common content-specific language function to to teach is personal descriptions. Oftentimes, teachers tie this content to learner interests by first teaching the learners the appropriate syntax in the target language and then asking the learners to share a little about themselves with the classroom. This exploration may even involve cultural phenomena or artifacts (I like paella / Me gusta la paella).
Now, consider a world language classroom where learners are tasked with exploring the concept of identity and learn the appropriate structures to convey personal descriptions as part of that exploration. Learning is prompted by exploring various target-language profiles on social media sites. These profiles provide examples of appropriate syntax and word choice, but they also provide learners with the opportunity to think about how one’s identity is (mis)represented by (social) media. This is a salient consideration with relevance in history (e.g., the lens provided to historical facts by the historians who document them), to biology classes (e.g., genetic makeup), and to math classes (e.g., learners engage in statistical analysis and compare individual survey results to overall results). Furthermore, as learners ponder this question of identity as they deconstruct the social media sites, they are likely to gain awareness of subtle cultural nuances (e.g, common social media conventions) and build appreciation for the fact that language and culture are inextricably intertwined.
Concept-based learning involves a true shift to a learner-centered paradigm, and as such, it cannot be easily accomplished overnight. This week’s Activity of the Week provides offers a series of steps to realize the social media activity explained in this article.
Please check out these resources related to Concept-Based Learning and Instruction!
Erikson, H.L. (2012). Concept-based teaching and learning. IB position paper. Retrieved from http://www.ibmidatlantic.org/Concept_Based_Teaching_Learning.
Erikson, H. L., Lanning, Lanning, L., & French, R. (2017). Concept-based Curriculum and Instruction for the Thinking Classroom. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Publishing.
Murphy, A. (No Date). A quick guide to concept-based learning and curriculum. Rubicon International. Retrieved from https://www.rubicon.com/concept-based-learning-curriculum/.
Source: CASLS Topic of the Week
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Content Type: 5
Title: Welcome to New Oregon Experience Program Cohort
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This year CASLS is welcoming 17 Japanese college students to participate in the place-based Oregon Experience Program from August 27th to September 20th before their full-time study at the University of Oregon. We will have 15 students from Tamagawa University, one student from Seinan Gakuin, and one student from Hitotsubashi University in Japan. "I am happy to see how other exchange students see the value of OEP and join us," said Li-Hsien Yang, program coordinator. Students will get to know campus life, interact with other university students, discuss issues regarding sustainability and emergency response, and finally do service learning in local community.
Source: CASLS Spotlight
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