FINAL PROJECT

TOPIC: What’s the weather like?

LEVEL: 2nd of ESO

TIMING: Two sessions of one hour each.

OBJECTIVES:
- Involve students with real English oral production
- Learn ways of expressing weather predictions
- Use technological resources (Audacity, Blogs…)
- Produce competent oral productions
- Express both orally and in writing their own creation

COMPETENCES:
-Communicative linguistic and audiovisual
-Artistic and cultural
-Treatment of information and digital competence
-Learning to learn
-Autonomous and personal initiative competence

CONTENTS:
-Present simple and continuous tense
-Weather vocabulary
-Pronunciation tools
-Information and technology tools


Session 1

(Listening and writing)
1. Listen carefully and do the activity proposed about weather. Afterwards, tell me through an entrance on your blog whether you like the activity or not.

http://learnenglishkids.britishcouncil.org/en/practise-listening/whats-the-weather

HELP!!

√ If you need a bit of support according to weather vocabulary you can use this website: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PScGbLBOvKo

√ Moreover, for some more information, you can just check this other website: http://eo.ucar.edu/webweather/

(Listening)
2. Who is Gerard Butler? Do you want to see him as a weather forecaster?

(Writing)
3. You are almost experts now! Write down a SHORT weather prediction for today of your country. Write it and upload it in your blog. I’ll correct it as soon as possible!

Session 2

(Reading and listening)

1. Read some of these nursery rhymes http://www.nurseryrhymesonline.com/weather/ and choose one of them, the one that you most like. Then, look for it in youtube and check its pronunciation.

HELP!!

√ There is a free online pronunciation dictionary. Check it if necessary:

(Speaking)

2. You must record your own voice (with Audacity) as a formal weather forecaster BOTH with the prediction you wrote down the last day in your blog and with the chosen nursery rhyme in the end. Good luck!

Then, upload it in your blog so everyone can listen to it.

HELP!!

√ There is a free online pronunciation dictionary. Check it if necessary:

A COOL alphabet song!!

Today I am going to use a video about an alphabet song for primary levels (for 1st and 2nd year of primary school kids).

I hope you enjoy it!

It's great fun!!

Irene

WEB 1

-Enllaç escollit: http://www.fonetiks.org/dictations/

-Per què? He trobat interessant aquesta pàgina web ja que és un recurs que permet escoltar un fragment en anglès real i el qual et demana que s’hi pari específica atenció. El fet de forma calmada poder escoltar quatre vegades el mateix fragment crec que funciona tant per alumnes amb més dificultats, ja que tenen varies oportunitats; com per alumnes amb menys dificultats, ja que això els anima a fer-ho el millor possible. I per altra banda, penso que poc sovint es para atenció a la fonètica i pronunciació, i aquest és un exercici senzill, interessant i que pot obrir més portes a altres activitats. Finalment, és molt positiu el fet que els alumnes s’autoavaluin en aquesta activitat.

-Com la faria servir a la meva aula? Penso que aquesta és una activitat ideal per fer amb els ordinadors i per tal d’explotar-la al màxim. Jo enviaria a través d’un Moodle el link d’aquesta pàgina web i demanaria als alumnes que escollissin dins del bloc ‘Elementary’ (comptant que estic amb un grup adequat per aquest nivell, però evidentment segons el nivell un bloc diferent) una ‘dictation’. Els hi demanaria que fessin l’activitat que se’ls hi demana tot llegint les instruccions de la mateixa pàgina i que m’enviessin via mail el seu resultat amb document Word. Els hi diria que tan sols ho poden escoltar les quatre vegades ja programades i finalment els demanaria que del text que ells mateixos han escrit, amb el programa ‘Audacity’ es gravessin la seva pròpia veu i m’ho enviessin també. Finalment, el pròxim dia escoltaríem a l’aula tots junts algunes de les gravacions.

-Competències: Les competències que es poden aplicar utilitzant aquesta web i fent aquesta activitat concreta són:

- Competència comunicativa lingüística i audiovisual

- Tractament de la informació i competència digital

- Competència d’aprendre a aprendre

- Competència d’autonomia i iniciativa personal

WEB 2

-Enllaç escollit: http://www.prof2000.pt/users/estante/treasure_hunts/halloween/index.html

-Per què? He trobat interessant aquesta pàgina web ja que permet que l’activitat es faci amb parelles i dóna autonomia als alumnes per tal que ells vagin descobrint els resultats per si mateixos. Trobo important que sigui una activitat en la qual els alumnes hagin de llegir i seleccionar la informació rellevant de pàgines webs concretes. A més, crec que pot ser motivant ja que tant les preguntes en sí són interessants, com el fet de veure que les poden respondre i que ells tenen les eines per fer-ho.

-Com la faria servir a la meva aula? Jo demanaria als alumnes que es posessin en parelles (a l’aula d’informàtica) i els hi explicaria el funcionament de les ‘treasure hunts’. Aleshores els diria que han de respondre 8 de les 11 preguntes que tenen i que me les haurien d’enviar escrites en document Word via mail. Penso que és una activitat en la qual els alumnes han de veure’s capaços de resoldre les preguntes per si mateixos amb el suport de les pàgines webs que tenen.

-Competències: Les competències que es poden aplicar utilitzant aquesta web i fent aquesta activitat concreta són:

- Competència comunicativa lingüística i audiovisual

- Tractament de la informació i competència digital

- Competència d’aprendre a aprendre

- Competència d’autonomia i iniciativa personal

“Every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end”

Dear all,

I’ve just finished my dissertation of the MA (Estudis Anglesos Avançats: Literatura i Cultura) and the job in Cardona as a primary English teacher.

Now the summer is teaching me to enjoy the peace of not having to worry about anything related either to the dissertation or to the school.

BUT, in a near future I am really looking forward to teaching in a Secondary School; thus, I’d like to be able to improve the methodology, resources, activities, and everything possible related to education.

I’ll share some of my past experiences according to my teaching experiences and I hope to learn new things in order to improve them.

Moreover, as I love literature I will give my personal opinion on some novels and literature works in order to be able to use them for students or teachers themselves. My first one would be: 'On Chesil Beach' by Ian McEwan. A wonderful novella that makes readers think and reflect about the lack of communication in our era... Ian McEwan is a great contemporary British writer that does not leave readers indifferent.

My best wishes,

Irene

The end

Finally, the Practicum has finished. It has been a great experience and I think I have learnt through reality. In my opinion that’s the best part: learning through experience. Indeed, theory is really important and necessary; however, the feeling that something has been acquired (or not), or that something is interesting (or not) must be learnt through real facts. And actually, I am really motivated and encouraged to teach English in my future in a Secondary School or in an ‘EOI’.

Well, to summarise my last experiences throughout the Practicum, I must start by saying that the ASSESSMENT part of my didactic unit was something new and doubtful for me. I had always thought that the assessment method I should apply was a typical exam; however, in this case I did something really different. I divided the students into different teams of at maximum four people (in this case I didn’t apply the teams that had been working throughout the didactic unit). Then, I stuck in a part of the blackboard all the characters that we had learnt during the didactic unit; next to them, some crosses and ticks; next to it names of shops; and finally, a map with shops and specific places drawn in it. I gave each student a number (1, 2, 3, 4) and we did a dictation race. The aim was to pick up a sticker of each place, go to the map and look at the information provided and finally write sentences with the team such as: ‘Hermione didn’t use to go to the chemist’s, which was next to the factory’. After this activity, I asked them to give me back the sheets of paper with the answers.
Then, we did an individual activity, in which I told them a story; however, I asked them questions in the middle of it and they had to invent and continue (slightly) the story itself. Finally, we did an oral quiz from the whole didactic unit and I asked them to write their personal impression of it, such as a personal revision on how it worked.
To sum up, I am happy with the results as I have seen some things I did well, and some things I must improve. It is a process of learning, and I’m really sure it’s been worthy.

Secondly, I’d like to tell you that I have been in a ‘Claustre’ session and in a ‘Avaluació final’ session.
According to the ‘Claustre’, I must say that it was impressing and I found it really interesting. All the teachers from the Secondary School were there and the Head teacher was placed in front of everybody with a secretary next to him writing down the most important things said in the session.
The first thing they did was an election for the representatives of the ‘Consell Escolar’. Then, they talked about different points that were necessary to be dealt with. For example, they talked about the organization of the new buildings that are nowadays being built for the Secondary School. Afterwards, they talked about the final assessments. Indeed, in this part I was somehow upset because a teacher claimed that she wasn’t happy with the fact that students had the right to do an exam another day in case they were ill or had any problem the actual day of the exam. They had a short argument/discussion dealing with it, and finally, they agreed (by a hands-up voting) that if students had an official document saying that there was something important; they had the right to do the exam another day.
Finally, they talked about some prizes that were won by some teachers from the institution, and which was really encouraging for them. And they provided an open-turn discussion in which teachers could expose their own thoughts or proposals. In fact, someone said that it would be great to have proper speakers in every classroom; or that there had to be improvements according to the computer labs. In the very end, there was a talk about new technological advancements that teachers could (or should) use.
In my opinion it was an important meeting. The fact of having so many teachers involved in the education of so many students requires a good organization and a proper politeness and competence in order to deal with anything that could fortunately or unfortunately happen.

Thirdly, we went to the ‘final evaluation’ which was related to ‘our’ students. There were all the teachers involved in 3rd B of ESO in the meeting and the main tutor of the group started by exposing a brief summary of the statistics of the ones who passed and the ones who failed. Thus, he asked for a quick checking of the marks of the students, in case there had been any computerised mistakes.
Afterwards, they started talking about each student (one by one); firstly checking the marks and then commenting on the important things that had to be agreed, disagreed or discussed as a team work.
The things that impressed me most were that some students had many ‘faltes d’assistència’, and unluckily, most of these had some familiar or integration problems. Furthermore, I thought that there were really huge differences according to the whole class-group. Some (the minimum part of the students) passed all the subjects with good marks; however, more than half of the students had failed different subjects. There were many problematic cases in which teachers had to talk for more than three minutes, and the final decision was somehow hard to take, because in spite of having to assess and put a mark in a piece of paper, I think I am aware that each student is an individual world. It might not be easy to judge and establish a FAIL or a PASS mark just with an exam or some marks from participation and so on…
To sum up, as a team work, cooperation and respect must be involved in it; and I thought that it is not always easy… In some cases there were different points of view, and in spite of trying to be properly objective, some teachers subjectively had a point or another. I do agree it is a hard work, but I am sure it is really satisfying too.

Finally, I must say that I attended a special lesson from an English assistant which works in the Secondary School for a period of time. It is really important and useful because due to an innovative project that the Secondary School is involved in, there is the opportunity to have an English native in the classroom in order to deal with some activities. The lesson which I attended was interesting because after correcting some exercises they did a communicative activity in which students had to write a biography, and they used the teacher as their objective. Indeed, as he is from another country and he can expose many different things from there, I do believe it is an interesting way to learn the identity and culture of the English speakers. In this way, students learn that a language is something real and alive.

To sum up, both me and my CAP mate have finished our Practicum. I think we have been really lucky due to our supportive and helpful tutor; due to our own cooperation and union; due to our Secondary School; and due to the fact that we have been faced up with reality. In my opinion it has been a really positive and encouraging experience. I must say that I am looking forward to teaching as a real teacher in a Secondary School and leave apart the private language schools or private lessons that nowadays I am dealing with. It has been an intense trip, with many things, many moments, and many thoughts. Just a great teaching experience.

Literary didactic unit!

I have almost finished the implementation of my didactic unit! I cannot believe that! It seems impossible and I feel I’ll miss teaching these students! Nevertheless, I will continue in the Secondary School for some more days and I’ll finish it at all in the end of December.

I’ll start by summarising a bit the different sessions we did according to my didactic unit:

Second session: FRANKENSTEIN Last Tuesday we worked on Frankenstein. It was interesting because the monster is a character that is usually known by everybody; however, I feel that my students were able to know much more things about this work and could enter into it in a different way.
Firstly, the team that was in charge of ‘Frankenstein’ went to the blackboard and exposed the brief summary that I had given them the very first day, to the rest of the classroom. Then, we read a letter that Victor Frankenstein had supposedly sent to Elizabeth. I showed them how to write a proper letter, and having the students divided into groups, they wrote a letter following some funny instructions they were given. Indeed, there were four main letters to write that were related to each other, however students didn’t know that. In the end, I asked them to give me back the letters or to finish them at home for homework.
Actually, there was something special in this very first implementation of my didactic unit. I went to the Secondary School both in the morning and in the afternoon, because the students were divided and had ‘hora b’. As a consequence, I applied the same activity in the afternoon with the other half of the class and I did the same; however, I changed some things that I thought that could be improved. In fact, I think it was positive, because the experience in the morning allowed me to think about it and modify some things that could be applied differently, and maybe better.

Third session: PRIDE AND PREJUDICE
Last Wednesday we dealt with ‘Pride and Prejudice’. Indeed, I was a bit afraid of this novel because it is about love and there are some prejudices about these kinds of books. Nevertheless, I tried to do my best and I tried to show them that it is not just a love story, however, there are many other cultural things implied in it.
The first ten minutes, the team which was responsible of it appeared in front of the classroom and told to the others the brief summary of the story. Afterwards, I explained them that it was a novel which was published throughout the Victorian era. Therefore, in order to make it accessible and participative, I gave each student a picture and while I was following a poster I had in the blackboard about the Victorian era, they had to come to the blackboard and stick the picture if it was something that people ‘used to do’ in that period or something that people ‘didn’t use to do’. In fact, the activity was related to love, marriage and appearance/clothing issues.
Afterwards, we did an activity using ‘shopping’ vocabulary and discussing whether people in the eighteenth century used or didn’t use to do specific things or buy in specific shops. In the end, we listened to a love song, and having the whole students divided into the four established teams, they had to order the pieces of paper that the song was cut in.
To sum up, I was really impressed and happy this day. It was an hour in which all students were there and I think it was a successful lesson. Actually, my tutor said that students were really nice and she was surprised and happy for the collaboration of everybody and due to the effort that was put into it.

Fourth session: OLIVER TWIST
On Monday it was Oliver Twist’s time. Most of the students knew the main character; however not all of them knew the story. Therefore, the first ten minutes of the classroom the team in charge of it went in front of everybody and exposed the brief summary of the whole novel. Indeed, we had a discussion on how was London perceived in the eighteenth century and how people and children lived in that period. It was interesting and I really enjoyed being able to have, at least, five minutes of open discussion in which some of the students were not embarrassed at all and exposed their own experiences of travelling to London; and who agreed or disagreed on some things I explained them (such as the fact that children had to work as adults or live in workhouses).
Then, the main activity this day was a listening. To start with, I gave each student an orange card in case they were lost. Therefore, I could see whether they were following or not my instructions, the listening or the lesson in general. We agreed that they would be bringing the orange cards every day from now on.
I asked them to listen carefully and complete the missing places that were provided in a map. In fact, the listening was a conversation between Oliver and a woman in the middle of the street of London talking about directions, as Oliver was lost. Afterwards, there was another listening in which Oliver told his own experience after having arrived to his destination: the market. He said some things about his life in London, his feelings and a problem he faced up with and which was solved successfully. Then, students had to answer some clear and short questions with a partner.
For the last ten minutes, we did a speaking activity using expressions such as ‘I agree’ or ‘I don’t agree’ through the using of the orange cards (if they agreed they raised the card; if they didn’t agree they didn’t do anything) while I exposed some questionable affirmations. Then, students gave their opinion such as: ‘I agree because…’ or ‘I don’t agree…’

Fifth session: HARRY POTTER Finally, we dealt with Harry Potter and the series of books of J.K Rowling. It was really interesting because students had almost all read a novel or seen a film of Harry Potter. Therefore, they felt much more involved within the activities.
Indeed, we started the lesson by having the Harry Potter team in front of the classroom telling a brief summary of the story. Then, we did an ICT activity which was related to Harry Potter. Students were in ‘hora b’, so consequently, there were just half of them. Thus, I asked them to work in pairs and they worked on a treasure hunt I did in the computers lab.
I really enjoyed this lesson despite being at the beginning a bit afraid of it. I didn’t really know how it would work because I had some doubts according to the material I put in the treasure hunt, the level and so on. Nevertheless, I think it was successful and both me and the students enjoyed the activity a lot.


That’s it! My didactic unit has almost been implemented and done and I’m up to the end of this trip!

My first week teaching the didactic unit!

The truth is that I am really happy and satisfied with the going on of my experience!!
I must say that during last weekend I was really nervous thinking of the way that my didactic unit would work. Nevertheless, I was really excited while creating the materials for the implementation of my unit. Maybe, first of all, because I am working with literature and I really love this topic. And secondly, because I noticed that I really enjoy designing and creating the activities (in spite of the amount of hours I have been thinking and working with it!).

The first thing I did was to think about the objectives I wanted to reach at the end of it. My first idea was a ‘Trip through Literature’; however, I needed to find something accessible for the students I was going to teach. They are young teenagers who may feel (or not) interest for literature, and who may think (or not) that English is important in their lives. To start with, I thought that the main objectives to transmit during the implementation of the didactic unit were:

- to speak about literature
- to be able to tell a story
- to value or appreciate the activity of reading
- to understand the language as a key for the own cultural identity

Afterwards, I kind of planned the six different sessions I had in order to implement the didactic unit, by establishing each day for a specific and different purpose. Moreover, each day was going to approach a different literary work that I thought that was adequate. In addition, I set up the basic competences including them through the different content I was going to teach, which was: the past continuous tense; some new vocabulary related to shops; the discourse of giving directions; and the structure of letters.
I planned some classroom rules I wanted to apply within the days I would be working with students and I made a clear and practical outline of the variety of formats and strategies I would apply in every session. Furthermore, I set up a proper and similar timing for each day, so that students could feel that we were doing something such as a project, in which each day had a clear relationship with the following one; and that lessons were organized not by chance, unless due to a specific purpose.
Finally, I decided on the different materials I was going to need and I started working on the creation of the didactic unit. Just to summarize the whole didactic unit, I was going to work with my students dealing with ‘Frankenstein’, ‘Pride and Prejudice’, ‘Oliver Twist’ and ‘Harry Potter’.

On the very first day, I introduced my students the PROJECT we were going to deal with altogether. I brought some books into the classroom and I asked them whether they liked or not literature, and which their initial thoughts about it were. Then, I showed them an oral presentation which exposed the rules and the working that I would be implementing on those days. Afterwards, I divided them into four different TEAMS (each group would be dealing with a specific literary work) and each team would be responsible to tell and deal with that work in a deeper way.

Consequently, I gave each team summaries of the books they were going to work with, and they had to order the pieces of paper that were disorganized. In the end, we made a ‘Quiz’ altogether which stressed the main elements of each book and which gave to the whole classroom some basic ideas of the four literary works we were going study.
I finally thought that they really enjoyed it. At the beginning, I was somehow nervous and afraid of their reaction, but at the precise moment I was in the ‘stage’ of the classroom, being the teacher, I really felt comfortable and I started working on the whole things I had already prepared.

I must say I was really happy at the end, and the motivation and cooperation of the students helped me a lot!