 Do you ever go to conferences and realize there are 1000 people you want to see but not enough time to see them all? #storyofmylife That's one of the many, many reasons why I am THRILLED for March. I will have an entire WEEKEND with one of my favorites, La Maestra Loca. And you can join us! Mud season in Vermont can be a dreary time, but spending time with Annabelle Williamson is sure to help me smile!  On Friday, 13 March, Annabelle will give the keynote and several sessions at the annual VFLA conference. This year's theme is "Stay Calm and Become Biliterate." You can get more info and register for the conference here. Then, on Saturday the 14th, Annabelle will be at my school (Marion Cross, in Norwich, VT) doing a smaller, hands-on workshop: "Milking Your Favorite Resources with La Maestra Loca." I am super excited about this one, as we'll be talking about Clip Chats and Movie Talks, which many of you know are my absolute favorite. (If you're going to be at #NECTFL20, come and see me present at 8:30 on Friday morning!) There's a discount for the Saturday workshop if you attend the VFLA conference, so you can get two days of Annnabelle for just $175 if you're a VFLA or other NECTFL organization member. If you can't make it to either event but still want some PD with Annabelle, be sure to check out Comprehensible Online. She has several presentations, as do I. Sign up with the code ALLISON for $25 off registration!
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Nothing like having visitors the first day back from vacation! And what does an insane teacher do? Make up an activity on the spot! Well, at least my observers got to see my classes as they truly are! I had been thinking about a post in the iFLT/NTPRS/CI Teaching FB group from AnneMarie Chase about a game she played in which students were divided into teams, and they had to make sure that each person on the team understood the reading. Then one person from each team had to answer a question. (She had them come sit in the front of the room.) If they got it correct, they drew a card from a deck of cards, and the corresponding value was the number of points the team received. I printed this post out a loooooong time ago, but haven't done anything with it. I had been looking at it just before my visitors entered my room.  My sixth graders were doing one final reading activity with Dustin Williamson's Noël Madness commercials. All of a sudden, I had an idea. I collected the readings and wrote two things on the board: Migros and Argos (these were the two commercials that went head-to-head in the final round of voting). I read a sentence, and students had to write down on their individual whiteboards the commercial to which it pertained. They had five seconds to write it down, and then they held it up. I then randomly chose (using the random number generator app on my phone) the name of a student. If that student's team had gotten the answer correct, I gave them a die to roll. That became the number of points I awarded the team.
In the first class, it got a little bogged down. I had only distributed one die, and I had to collect it and pass it around each time a team needed to roll. That took up too much time. Additionally, this is a class that doesn't have a ton of energy, anyway. When I played it with the second class, I gave each team a die; that allowed the point determining to go much more quickly. The students were also much more engaged, which added to the enjoyment. Because I just threw this together last minute, I did not have the chairs set up in the front of the room like AnneMarie did. But I'm eager to try that next time. I'm pretty excited about this. I loved Anne Marie's idea of the points being completely random. I can see how a deck of cards might make it more interesting, since point values would vary so much. The dice made it so the scores were close, which heightened the anticipation. I'll try to play again soon, and post a video. Let me know if you try this, or if you come up with some other modifications! Bises. |
AuthorAllison Litten, the 2019 VFLA TOY, teaches French at the Marion Cross School, a public K-6 school in Norwich, Vermont. This is her twentieth year teaching, and seventeenth at Marion Cross. Archives
December 2020
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