IPAD: Proyecto de casa: Explain everything App

IPAD: Proyecto de casa: Explain Everything App:

I had student use the app Explain everything to do the following activity:

PART ONE:
They were to describe their house in detail and talk about the types of furniture they have in their main rooms, living room, kitchen, room, bathroom etc.... Each room could be done in a different slide as it was difficult to get all the drawings in one slide. Therefore students needed to record in different slides as well.

PART TWO:
Then they were to trade their  IPad with a  classmate and their classmate had to listen to their recording and draw out what their classmate had mentioned.

PART THREE:
The last component of this project was to have the partner that drew the pictures comment on what they liked about their partner's house that perhaps was different to their house.

I had a student who had a hard time drawing using explain everything because her partner provided a lot of information on her recording so, this students found it easier to draw on a piece of paper and then screenshot the drawings, she made by hand.  Most of the students had no problem using the drawing tool on explain everything.

Again what I liked about this project is that students are able to do oral, listening and writing.

TIME FRAME:  2 - 3 days



 

IPAD - Spontaneous Conversations

IPAD : Spontaneous Conversations using Bookcreator

One of my goals for this year was to provide my students opportunities to have spontaneous conversations.  So I came up with the idea of having my students use the app Bookcreator which they were now familiar with.  I tell my students that when you have a conversation with someone you don't write down what you are going to say to them...you may just think about your ideas, but you don't plan out every little word you say therefore they need to learn to do the same in Spanish.

First I had my students search for 4 pictures and the criteria of the pictures was: 1 was to be funny, 1 interesting, 1 weird, 1 beautiful and it could be related to the unit or not.  I didn't tell them what they were going to do with the pictures until they had found their pictures.

Once they had found their pictures, I asked them to choose one of the pictures they had found and then they were to find a partner and with their partner they were to talk about the picture for at least a 1 or more.

The criteria: They couldn't write anything down and they couldn't discuss about what each one was going to say, they were just to converse without planning.  They couldn't delete the conversation if they didn't like it. However they could record themselves twice [although some recorder themselves more than twice] and then choose the best conversation. Their conversation needed to be about a 1 or more if possible.

Challenges: Many students had a hard time having to produce a conversation on the spot and I needed to monitor some of them as it was very new to them to not be able to write a script or anything.
I had them do this activity a number of times and most became to feel a bit more comfortable as we did more of these.

I also did an activity in which I choose a picture for them to talk about in partners and they were to record themselves.  Again they could do two recordings and choose the best one.
This can be done with a commercial, a song etc....


I then had them use a rubric to assess their conversation and most were pretty good at assessing their level. I then marked them and gave them their mark.

It was great to see that those shy, quiet students were able to contribute a lot to their conversations compare to having to do something like this in front of the class or in front of the teacher.

Some talked about food, sports, movies, etc... Here are a few examples:

TIME FRAME:  about 20 - 30 minutes

Students choose pictures:





I chose the picture for them: I projected the picture to them on the document reader

Deportes...bailes y más...

Ipad: Commentators: Using Bookcreator

I love showing my students videos/commercials in the target language and since we were learning about sports, I decided to show them a video of a soccer game, because it is completely different to watching a soccer game in English.

Then I gave them the challenge of creating a video of a sport or an event they liked and comment on them as if they were actual commentators. They had a lot of fun with this!

Criteria: They needed to include the video screenshot/ video address [I haven't figured out yet how to they can include the video]  and it needed to  be about 1 min or less. This was the one activity in which I allowed my students time to plan for what they wanted to say.  So they could use a script but they needed to add emotion and passion to their comments.


Here are some examples two on dancing shows and one on sports


 y Fútbol:

IPAD idea using Explain Everything App

Monstruos en mi clase!:O)

In Spanish 10 we usually have a unit on health and body and normally when I introduce the unit we play a number of games...but since I had iPads I thought I would try something different. 

I had my students get into groups of 2 - 3 and I gave each group an iPad.  I had them use the app: Explain Everything [which is great!]

So students were to draw while I described a monster to them. They could help each other out with vocabulary and things. For example I would say: "Tiene cinco ojos morados. Tiene nueve brazos rojos" etc... after describing a monster, I had a few groups describe their monster to the class and the rest of the class needed to draw the monster their classmates described.  You could also do this in which small groups get together and they describe their monster to smaller groups instead of the entire class. 

Criteria: they needed to include colors and numbers between 1 - 10. 

Helpful tip: Don't make groups bigger than 3 otherwise there will be students who aren't participating. 

At the end  I had them decide on what monster they liked the most and why, they needed to write a few sentences, you could have them record instead of write.

My students really enjoyed doing this and they were practicing comprehension, oral and writing.

Time frame: One class

Here are some examples:

IPAD - Clothing project bookcreator

IPAD - Proyecto de Ropa using Bookcreator

Using the app: book creator: I have done a few activities with my students. Here are two project I had my students do around the theme of clothing

Activity 1: students were to find five pictures/photos on the web of clothing that they found interesting and write a description about what they saw.

TIME FRAME: about a week

Example:

I also did a three part activity, again using the app: bookcreator

Activity 2:

Part 1: Using the recording: I had students pretend they couldn't go to the mall because they had a huge test to study for or they were grounded, so they had to leave a voicemail for their friend who was going to go shopping because it was boxing day. They needed to let their friend know which items they wanted/prefer and the color, and price [they needed to use the vocab and grammar we had learned] The hardest part for them was not being able to write down what they were going to say I only allowed them to write down the items/prices/colors but nothing else. They spent at least 5 minutes thinking about how they were going to start and what they were going to say. I think that if I do more activities like this it will help them develop their oral skills which in turn can help them be able to have a spontaneous conversation.

Part 2 : Students needed to bring pictures of the items they had mentioned and they posted them around the classroom in the corresponding colours. So their item needed to be in the colour and the price they mentioned in their recording. Then they needed to exchange their ipads with another classmate, their classmate was to listen to their recording and go around the classroom and take pictures of the items their classmate had mentioned in their recording.

Part 3: their classmates had to make an ibook, in which they used the pictures they had taken and write sentences about what their classmate wanted but what they preferred instead [Tomas quiere la camisa amarilla pero yo prefiero la camisa blanca]

What I saw was amazing....my students were learning a lot, they were practicing listening, oral, written and visual. I thought this was a fabulous activity, I never imagined that I could incorporate so much in one activity.

To finish it off, I had students do a peer evaluation, they were to evaluate the partner they had worked with: on both written and oral, for the most part this was done well. Some even provided examples of what their partner had done well or what their partner could improve on. 

TIME FRAME:  about a week

Scrabble anyone?

I love for my students to have fun with the language and what better way for them to use and practice their vocabulary than by playing scrabble. At my school we have been lucky enough to get a few scrabble games.  At first some students have a hard time playing the game or some have never played scrabble. But usually there are a few students that know how to play the game or once you show them they get the hang of it quick. Students enjoy playing scrabble and look forward to days in which we just sing songs and play games. :O) 

WATCH OUT: sometimes students will make up words that are not Spanish so you can either have them check up the words in the dictionary or you can let them know. I usually have no problem with this but occasionally I will point a word out to them that's on their game that is not Spanish but I think it's great that they are inventing words that seem Spanish to them. 

Grade 10 students:

IPAD and EDMODO

IPAD AND EDMODO

I didn't expect that I would love using the iPads as much as I do and so do my students.  Using the iPads has allowed me to be able to have my students practice various aspects of the language, which I often found a challenge when using a laptop.

I have used the ipads for a number of activities: The first activity has been using EDMODO

Edmodo: I start by showing students a picture, a commercial or a video and they have to write about: lo que ven, lo que escuchan y lo que piensan [what they see, what they hear and what they think]

students brainstorm their words to a picture[video] and I give them feedback as well as participation marks for this. I had students start by writing five words about the picture. It was amazing how the following day I had a student ask if he could write more than five words, which I thought was fabulous!!! They were engaged and eager to learn...they even started to ask more vocabulary words such as how to say stripe...etc...I had a student ask what stripe was in Spanish and the student has used the word stripe a number of times both written and verbally.
I had other students write sentences instead of words and some even started to add questions....this is showing me students who are taking it to the next level, students are taking control of their learning. I never imagined this would happen and they did this on their own.

I also occasionally would post a survey or a question or sometimes a comic strip and would ask students their opinion.
Normally I would have students do something on Edmodo when they had a project on the iPads, so that would be our starting activity.

I love all the incredible work my students have done! Here are a few examples: