Facing the currently unknown

Shelterbox for year 8

What do you really need to live contentedly?

What would you do after a disaster? How would you cope and how would you feel?

To be honest those were my basic premises for putting together a unit about the Chilean earthquake of 2010- a disaster that struck a beautiful part of the country that I'd visited only a few months before. I'd put together a unit on Haiti a few years ago for French so wanted to see if I could do something similar in Spanish and really challenge my year 8s to think about how fortunate they really are, even just to have a solid roof over their heads, decent food and, although they often don't accept the point, a good education provision. 

Again I wanted to focus on discussion and debate in this unit as well as creativity and empathy- hence why the unit was building up to a reading image task to be shared on Voicethread - a site which I often feel is very underrated simply because it doesn't offer all the whizzbangs but which is great for sharing discussions and encouraging peer assessment.  

So here it is. Nothing special but hopefully a tad thought-provoking...

Download 2- Shelterbox

Health- getting controversial?

I hate teaching about healthy lifestyles. There, I've said it. I find it boring and too often it actually becomes mildly patronising. Yes, it's ok for me to enjoy a beer or a glass of wine (which are both bad for the health, depending on which study you read, of course) because "I'm a grown-up". Yes, even though I really don't like cucumber you should always eat things that are healthy. Yes, you should drink lots of water. We all know it. But what's worse is that our students are so blinkin bored of hearing it every year that they no longer pay any attention whatsoever.

So I wanted to do something a bit different. Because I'm stubborn like that. And because I could. And because I'm stupid and wanted to create loads of extra work for myself.

And because I wanted to actually get my students thinking. Oh, and I wanted them to learn something about the world, not just some words in a strange language. Ah, Intercultural Understanding.

Colombia. Land of drugs and violence AND THAT'S IT. Well, in the eyes of your average year 8, anyway. Having taught some absolutely lovely Colombians a few years ago I know that's most definitely not the case. It's a beautiful country that's been deeply, deeply effected by the issues connected to the drug trade that stretches well beyond just "people take drugs". In rural areas there are real issues to do with lack of infrastructure and health provision where the authorirites simply can't reach out safely. So that was my first thought. 

But then I got sidetracked. That happens quite frequently when i'm trying to devise modules.

Did you know that Uruguay, the relatively small and underappreciated nation sandwiched between the powerhouses of Argentina and Brazil, is proposing to becoming the first nation in the world to legally approve the selling of marijuana? They're convinced that current policies across South America and the world simply don't work. Beyond that they're also scared that the drug violence and culture sweeping the continent will reach them soon. 

So what do ou r students think about that idea? Let's discuss it. Yes, let's learn a wee bit about how to be healthy, but only as a springboard on to something far more meaningful. I love using Eva Lamb's idea for wordmats to allow students to have all the language they'll need at their fingertips before you start teaching, saving time on pointlessly introducing it when thanks to their phonics work they should already be able to say it!

Yes, it might be a bit strong in places- I think the Spanish government's campaign materials on the subject are superb (they're in one of the folders in the unit below) and would make great display materials supporting a strong PSME anti-drugs message. When I discussed the concept with some year 8s before writing the module they were blown away that any country would be "crazy enough" to legalise any drug. But then they really started to give me some very thought-provoking opinions- exactly what I want classes to do, just in Spanish.

So this is one that I didn't get to teach in my short time in the school, but really would love to and will do so as soon as I get the chance (if I head back into the classroom!). All feedback HUGELY appreciated. (apologies for typos + Word autocorrects by the way!)

Download 3- health

 

Year 7- getting them to WANT to tell you something

The year 7s all studied French throughout the year. However, they were then split into 2 sides of the year. Each side study Spanish for a term and a half and German for the other half of the year. At the end of the year they choose which language they would like to continue with alongside studying French. Although it seems that each language, allowing for year by year variations, seems to have been equally as popular in terms of uptake, the more concerning element for me was that there was a huge division in terms of uptake for KS4, with French being more popular by a ratio of at least 4 to 1. So how could that gap be shrunk- this was obviously not just an issue of students having had an extra term and a bit of French, or even many having had the joys of primary French before they came up to secondary school. The French Schemes of Work made students feel more confident and more able.

Things I felt were important:

1. giving the year 7s material that they wanted to talk about- the differences between their lives now and their lives at primary school. They were told that at the end of the unit they would have to make an HONEST presentation to explain their new lives to the year 6s at their old school. So what would they want to be able to say to tell year 6s about their new lives?
2. give them the tools to communicate in a way that they felt comfortable with

            -    phonics from the outset, making the most of Rachel Hawkes' superb materials and using her amazing Spanglovision idea. If you've never tried it, please, please do. It's amazing what the classes achieved after only a few lessons and with minimal teacher support. The sense of achievement they felt was immense. Especially as we shared the recordings on the VLE and allowed the school to vote for the "best" video (dance routines were obviously crucial). A small trophy also helped show SLT what we were up to as well as providing a tangible something for classes.

            -    learning from Greg Horton and building in a variant of Group Talk- giving them the tools to communicate semi-naturally from the outset.

            -    basic tenses from the start- using a blend of simple but multi-purpose imperfects alongside key present tense verbs.

            -    working at sentence level not word level. When I started out teaching I was working at the "here are 9 nouns" level, yet my students couldn't actually DO anything.

            -    encouraging everyone involved to be very upbeat and positive. The unit contains lots of games and mini-whiteboard activities to create a buzz of enjoyment and competition- as well as allowing for AfL wherever possible.

 

So there are lots of big creases to work out in this unit. When I was first settling in there was of course a need for more control in my lessons than there was by the end of my time there. As such, if I had been teaching the unit again in September I would have built in far more open-ended, group based speaking tasks such as "Just a Minute". But hey, it's a start...

Putting words into action

I had always said that I didn't want to be out of the classroom for any longer than two years. I talked in presentations at conferences about things I'd done and was passionate about- not just things that I'd thought about or heard about, so I was keen to get back in and not only see if I could still "do" it but also put into practice the theories that I'd developed, learning the lessons from the inspirational people that I've worked with over the last few years.

As such, in January I took up a new post near Southampton for a 7 month blast at seeing how much change I could help to bring about, primarily in a Spanish department but also by bringing new ideas into a language department overall. I've no idea how much impact I had, but I'd like to hope that I helped my students to learn and helped other teachers to learn too. Cos I sure know that I learnt a lot from those students and teachers and that the feedback I got was very positive.

I feel like I'd lost my passion a touch at first, but seeing some of the things that I'd thought long and hard about becoming reality helped rekindle it. What's next? Who knows. But before I step out into the big scary world again I'm going to try to write a few reflective posts and share some of the lessons I've learned, some of the materials I created and some of the thoughts I've got about what worked and what didn't. So hey, here goes... 

The word is spreading

I have finally realised that the blog idea is actually having an impact at school when one of our PE teachers, previously considered a Luddite by all and sundry, suggested that we set up "one of those blogging thingumybobbys" for the PE department to be able to share all of their photos online, detailing the huge number of events they take part in. Wow.

So we're now up to 7, I think. Many are in the formative stages, but hopefully in January they'll start to develop- they'll have to, because I'm planning on putting a link into the Spanish blog to them all, meaning no longer can they hide!