A very special CLIL lesson plan for History & Geography

I've created this lesson plan together with Gaelle Farout for the capstone session of TED 2012.
During brilliant course (maybe you remember we talked about it in another post), we had the opportunity to work in groups, sharing opinions and experences with teachers coming from all around the EU and the US. During last session, each team presented a lesson idea - which was a huge boost for our creativity! Now, we all have lots of new lesson plans, lots of ideas for new projects... and lots of new friends.
So, there will definitely be a follow-up to this experience.

As for Gaelle and me, we worked on a simple CLIL lesson plan dealing with the topic of immigration. You will recognize the structure (thanks again Dr. Diana Hicks!), but I think you'll find the content and activities to be new, engaging and easy to customize to suit different topics and age range.
Note: of course you have to choose a specific aspect/period connected with immigration. I was thinking of the Italian immigration to America in the first two decades of the 20th century. It's up to you: and once you've chosen the specific subject, you can give more details to enrich the scenario.

Ok. Ready to become an inspector of the Immigration Service? or will you be a poor worker in need of a new home? Let the story go...

LEAVING HOME: WHY ?

about 24 students - 12/13 years old

subjects: History/Geography/Languages

Pupils working in groups of six

Instructions given in English - pupils can answer and discuss, when needed, both in English and in mother tongue.

Materials:

- 24 cards with States from Africa, Asia, Europe, USA (6 cards/continent, needed to make groups)

- blackboard / interactive board

- textbook.

And here’s what you will tell your students:

1) Pick a card, look at your image and at those of the others. Then form groups: you’ve to discuss how. The students will soon understand they have to divide into continents. Once they are in their group, ask the eldest of each one – who’ll be the team leader – to explain who they are and how they formed the team. Example “we are France, Italy, Slovakia, Spain, Germany and Finland. We are together because we are in Europe”. And so on. Check that all the students are in the right place. If one or more aren’t, their classmates will probably realize and tell them to move. Let them go to their correct group (this is a warming up, not a test).

2) - If your country belongs to EU or US, you are now 6 members of the immigration service.
Take a piece of paper and draw your immigration office, with your individual roles. Discuss your roles. The team leader is the member who takes the final decision. Who are the others? Find 5 important criteria according your taught about immigration.

- If your country belongs to Asia or Africa, you are the six members of a family. Take a piece of paper and draw your family tree. The team leader is the grandfather/grandmother, who rules the family. Who are the others? Remember there can be members of the family who are dead. Be as creative as you can: put names, dates, etc. And don’t forget to write in bold the family name above the tree! Think of a job for your character, if he or she is old enough to work. (This is supposed to be the motivating and amusing part, so leave them free as long as they’re actually into the role).

3) All the members of the family and the immigration service have now to introduce themselves to the others. Example “I’m Elena, the mother. I’m a journalist.” “I’m Fabio, the eldest son: I’m a singer.” "I'm Jaimie, the Director of the Immigration Office" etc.

4) - Families:
Suddenly, the two families are forced to leave their house and their country. They realize they can’t live in their homeland any more, and decide the only thing you can do is going away.
Remember, this means losing your house, friends, and much of what you have, so it should be something very serious.What has happened? Each student has to write five reasons why he could be forced to leave. Then, compare your list with those of your team mates. Are there any common ideas? Can you make up anything new together?
Write a “family list” – 10 reasons that could force your family to leave.
(They’ll probably think of natural disasters, spreading of a disease, war, etc. You’ll be surprised to see how close to real life they can get).

- Immigration service:
A family from Africa wants to immigrate in EU and a family from Asia wants to immigrate in US.
Remember, this means they've lost their house, friends, and much of what they had, so it should be something very serious.
What has happened? Each student has to write five reasons why he could accept this family in the country - what the family could do, how they can be useful for your country and its economy. And also what they have to do in order to be accepted. Then, compare your list with those of your team mates. Are there any common ideas? Can you make up anything new together?
Write an “immigration list” – 10 reasons that could convince your immigration service to accept this family.

5) Families and Immigration Services share their ideas. All of the ideas are collected on the board.

6) You’ve been acting as the millions of people who were forced to leave their countries during the 20th century and as the host countries that received them. You’ve been trying to understand their reasons, and you’ve been asking yourselves what can be so terrible as to have you leave your land. You've also tried to find out how immigration can be positive for the receiving country, and how to regulate it.
What did actually happen? Did you guess right? Let's take the book and find out together.

(...thank you Gaelle !!!)

CLIL, assessment, and student presentations

In our CLIL lessons (and also in monolingual ones) student presentations often play an important role in the assessment procedure. They may also be a homework, given to an individual student or to a group, after a series of lessons. 

The problem is, while they are an exciting moment for the involved student(s), they can be quite dull for the rest of the class. And if the class is bored, this will sooner or later lead to misbehaviour, with lots of disappointment and frustration both for the teacher and for the presenter students. Not to mention how frustrating it can be for your pupils to speak to a sleeping audience - now, wait a minute: thinking about it, that can be a nice idea after all. They'll eventually understand how we feel at times! life can look pretty different when seen from the other side of the teacher's desk...

Ok, back to the point. We discussed this issue with Dr Diana Hicks while attending her lessons in Cheltenham, and she gave us a very sensible answer: students in the class get bored because they feel they've nothing to do. They are not sure what they should be listening for and they are not given any active role in this phase of learning.

So she suggested we turn to peer assessment of presentations. The key of success, in fact, is transforming the passive audience into an active participant in the lesson. And here's her battle-plan:


1) First of all, divide the class into groups of five (give each member and number from 1 to five). Each of the five members of the group, depending on his/her number, has to concentrate on one specific aspect of the presentation, make notes and report back to the rest of the group afterwards, suggest possible improvements or comment positive features.

Student 1: Content
was there any new information?
which information was new to the listener and which was old?

http://www.school-clipart.com/

 Student 2: Visuals
did the visuals help or hinder the information?
would other images/graphs/etc. have been better?
How did the visuals match the speech?

Student 3: Structure and organization
Did the presentation follow a logical sequence?
Did the examples help to clarify the content, or did they generate confusion?

Student 4: Language (grammar, vocabulary, personal style)
Was the language clear?
Did errors hinder communication?
Was the language appropriate? was it too informal or too formal?
Was there a correct use of specific vocabulary?

Student 5: Aims - consistent, coherent, cohesive?
Did the speaker present the purpose and objectives of the presentation at the beginning?
Were they clear?
Did he/she achieve them?

2) of course, all the students have to listen to the presentation
3) each student grades his/her part of the presentation in a scale 1-5 (choose the scale depending on how marks are given in your school system). In this case, 1 is unsatisfactory and 5 is excellent
4) all same number students gather and compare their grades with those of the others. They discuss, share opinions and eventually agree on a common mark
5) students return to their groups and inform the others
6) feedback is given to the presenters.

I liked this strategy and actually tried it with my students. It can be quite a surprise for them when you first introduce it - presentation time is usually understood by the pupils as relax time. So they'll be partly intrigued partly annoyed "what? are we supposed to do something? even now?"

You have to be sure to allow enough time to explain what they're going to do, how and why, how groups will be organized, how they will work, and - most important - what will be the impact of the peers' grade on the final mark. Be careful - too little, and the class will think you're cheating, too much, and the presenters will try to bribe the audience.

Are there any other strategies or activities you use to make presentations more motivating and engaging for the whole class?

As for this one, try it with your class and have fun. After all, a student presentation doesn't have to be sleeping time for the rest of the class!

Bilingual Lesson Planning

All lessons need adequate planning, and planning is particularly important in CLIL/bilingual lessons, since a delicate balance of elements is needed.
In another post we were discussing the importance of collegiality, seen as the greatest challenge in CLIL: teachers have to work together and keep on the same wavelenght to truly meet their pupils' needs.
But in order to work effectively together, we need to plan together.

I'm sharing this time the "Balance Planning Model" given us by Dr Diana Hicks during the course in Cheltenham. Of course, as usual, you will find these papers uploaded in The Next Generation TwinSpace, under "useful materials". But this time I'll share them here as well as images, so that we all can see what we are talking about.
You'll see they are two versions of the same model: the first one has some annotations, to give you an idea of how to use it. The second one is blank: you can choose to use it as it is, or customize it to suit your needs.

 So, here's the scenario: talk about your lesson idea with your colleague(s) - remember subject teachers(s) and language teacher(s) need each other here - and then share this paper and try to fill it together. You need to be very clear to each other about some core points: your goals, how to reach them, the role

 of your students in this process, your role in this process, how to assess the pupils' work.

This model can be shared with students as well, so that they understand what they are going to do and why, and where they are supposed to go.

The advantages:

- it creates a shared language for collegiality

- it offers a scaffolding for creating activities integrating language and content

- it enables teachers to plan more quickly, efficiently and effectively

- it enables teachers to work towards appropriate assessment activities
- it enables teachers to realize they have to include different activities for the different learners' styles
- it defines the role of "other actors" in the lessons: experts, visitors, parents etc.

- it provides a checking mechanism to ensure that neither language nor content get lost during a lesson or unit

We are used to templates and models when planning in our subjects, but CLIL planning is often perceived as a "free field".

So, sometimes, activities are not structured in detail, or come from an ex-tempore collaboration between teachers. Any kind of collaboration is great of course: but if we want to be efficient, we have to give a structure to what we do.

Whe have to work within a framework - which is easier and much more practical: we don't have to invent the same activity twice, we can capitalize our experience, and the work we already did.

Personally, I used this tool - with some customizing - and found it very useful and understandable, for colleagues and students as well.

Well, what do you think?

Do you have any other model or templates to share? Or any other experience in bilingual planning?

Always looking forward to getting to know more :)

Collegiality - the CLIL challenge

Collegiality between subject and English language teachers is the key element of any successful CLIL pathway. I'm sure we all agree on this point.

In a popular post of last summer, we dealt with the "subject teacher/language teacher" question. Now, while collecting papers for a presentation about team teaching, I ran across Dr Diana Hicks' guidelines for collaboration in the CLIL classroom. She suggests we should take into consideration some key elements for a successful cooperation with our colleagues:

• Relationship: we are individuals, and let's face it, we don't get along with all of our colleagues. Before planning any collaboration, we should consider whether we are compatible or not. In my ten years' experience in the same school, I've met colleagues who've quickly become friends - and when you make friends, you immediately want to do something together: lessons, projects, experiences, school trips... Guess what? Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. It's just like a love-story not meant to be: sorry, no sparkles. And then, of course, there are those people you don't want to work with because you don't trust them. So, think before you plan.
• Rules of behaviour: ok, you believe in this relationship and you want to give it a try. Now you have to think about how to work together without ending up hating each other (with the obvious consequences on your students' learning process). You can work formally or informally together. Obviously, I would suggest working formally. And obviously, especially in eTwinning CLIL projects, we end up working informally 90% of the time. We all do this, and we all know it's wrong. Please, do yourself a favour, and at the beginning of the school year sit down with your colleagues, write down your working plan, and have it signed by your Principle/Headteacher/whoever it is that can recognize your efforts. Remember: informal won't last. Plus, you and your colleagues will feel more committed when working formally together.
• Responsibilities: Dr Hicks was very clear on this: teachers have to mark their specialist territory (personal note: invading that of the others is the best way to spoil your CLIL project and make them hate you). As for individual responsibilities of the Language and Subject teacher, have a look at the chart and let me know what you think.
• Organization: that's the when/what/how moment. We should discuss timetable (how many lessons? when? with the teachers being together in the classroom or not? how will they be paid? etc), resources and preparation time, and, above all, assessment. To be honest, in Dr Hicks' brilliant course, the assessment part was the weakest. It was more like a question than a solution: what would you do? I wish I knew. Anyway, in my experience I've often found it better to give two different marks to the students' products (Language/Content). But it's my personal - maybe wrong - opinion. No evidence, no expert's support here.

What do you think? What's your experience in CLIL courses?

Looking forward to getting to know more!

Laura

PS and as usual, don't forget you can find all of our materials and worksheets dealing with CLIL in The Next Generation TwinSpace, "useful materials" section.

CLIL: cooperation, cognition, context... and eTwinning!

I was given the guidelines for CLIL activities I'm going to share with you today, during two different training courses I was able to attend in the past. And this time I've not only to thank Dr Diana Hicks, but also Mrs Cathy Pickles: she was my teacher in Cork, Ireland, in a brilliant CLIL course that was a turning point in my life as a (CLIL) teacher.

When talking about CLIL activities, we usually wonder what kind of tasks we should give our students.
Dr Diana Hicks started by introducing to us Jim Cummins' theories, then gave us examples of how to apply them in the everyday lesson.

In a task, we should pay attention to context (embedded/reduced) and cognition (demanding/undemanding). Now, if we look at the different combinations, a task can be:

1. context embedded (students have some support - map, picture, chart, etc) + cognitively undemanding (not much thinkink needed). An example of this can be matching tasks (matching words and pictures for instance)
2. context reduced (no support for students) + cognitively undemanding. Examples of this can be listing tasks (list the causes of global warming/the causes of a war... list the different sources of energy you know... etc)
3. context reduced + cognitively demanding (it needs a strong effort of thinking on the students' part). The typical task here is writing essays.
4. context embedded + cognitively demanding: Dr Diana Hicks called this "the Holy Grail". This is the perfect kind of CLIL activities. Those ones where the students are given a context and asked to work on it by thinking. Examples of this are transfer of information/genre. Students have to use what they learnt in a different context.

Do have a look at Dr Hicks video (of course she's much better than me at explaining)! (thanks a lot to the teacher who recorded this and shared it on youtube, and to my colleague Frederique Cayrier who found it on the web!)

Dr Diana Hicks said that the ideal CLIL activity should include cognition, context and cooperation. In the simple and direct way that is typical of her, Mrs Cathy Pickles said that students need scaffolding. What I learnt there (and I always try to keep it in mind, in the activities I make up for my classes - and later share with you) is that we cannot build on air. CLIL activities are more complex than monolingual ones, that's why our students need more support than ever (read: context embedded tasks).

That's where eTwinning comes, providing us with that element of "reality" (it's a real-life context) and cooperation (the do-it-together factor) that can help our students feel involved - and enjoy their learning. 

No holy Grail for me to be honest. Still, I think we're moving in the right direction.

CLIL, eTwinning and more: most popular posts of 2011

2011 has been a very busy and surprising year in my life as a teacher. I've had lots of "surprising problems" and lots of "surprising rewards" as well (not meaning the big awards here - though they were more than welcome of course! - but the tiny everyday success stories, half smiles of my students, little exciting "I can" moments, and so on).

This blog is definitely one of the surprising rewards. The people I met here, the support I got (and I'm getting right now), the ideas that were born here through sharing.
Yes, 2011 was a great year for LifelongLearningTeachers.

And I'd like to welcome the new year by having a look at the posts that were most viewed, commented on and discussed in 2011. Now, let's see what all the buzz was about!

1) eTwinning Conference "Leading 21st century education" part 1, part 2, and conclusion
the before during and after of a challenging event...with most etwinners being rather skeptical I'm afraid (but maybe we'll be surprised, who knows?)

2) structure of a (CLIL) lesson - start with the pupils
the basic structure of a (CLIL) lesson as presented by Dr Diana Hicks

3) CLIL: language teacher or subject teacher?
still the burning question...

4) my best CLIL lesson of 2011 and CLIL lesson for Science/Geography
practical tips for the everyday lesson: I'm glad you liked this, and I'm planning to share more!

5)  how do you fight boredom in the classroom?
well, it looks like we all have a common problem to deal with!

I'm closing this post, wishing you all a very happy and successful 2012, with the most viewed post of all times. It's a post about traditions, celebrating and children (and adults) having fun: Gigantes y Cabezudos ! Thank you Elena!

And I'd  like to thank here all of the great teachers who lived with us the LLT adventure from the very beginning. Thank you everybody.

Have a great new year!

IS THAT THINKING OR KNOWING? - teaching Vs testing

Being a teacher is one of the most thrilling and exciting risks one can choose to run. It's so rewarding, funny, amazing, never boring, yet so difficult. You are never 100% sure you're doing the right move at the right moment. The very first rule I learnt as a teacheryoungling, years ago, was this one: rest assured, you'll eventually find out if what you did was right or wrong for your students - only, you'll find out months, or even years later (when it's too late!).

I told Dr Diana Hicks my doubts about being successful in my job: how can I be sure my kind of teaching is what my class needs? her answer was another question

"is that thinking or knowing?"

And this question has been my mantra through my job ever since.

If what I do is about knowing, if there's just one right answer, then it's not teaching, it's a test.
Teaching activities have to do with thinking (how?).
Testing activities have to do with knowing (what?).

It may sound ovious, but it isn't - at least, not for me. And I think all teachers run the risk of misunderstanding this difference. Of course assessment is an important (and difficult) part of our job, but if our teaching is not successful, if we are testing our pupils all the time instead of making them think on their own, our pupils are doomed to failure.

That's another reason why I love EU projects: Comenius, eTwinning, Erasmus, and all kind of real-life educational experiences that let pupils (and teachers) meet the unexpected - school is so boring otherwise. Through these programmes, we meet new people and ideas, and we (pupils and teachers) are forced to think, as what we know is not enough. That's how we get to know something new by thinking. Together.
So, teaching first, then testing. And teaching in a way that makes pupils think, not learn by heart - and forget the very next minute after the test.

I'd like to close 2011 with these pictures of the eTwinning Camp in Budapest. A place for teaching and learning, and for sure, a place for thinking.
I'm saying bye to the adventures and experiences of this year with the images of students happily engaged in learning and having fun.

Thank you eTwinning, Comenius, Dr Hicks, and thank you friends all over Europe.
Have a great 2012, full of satisfaction, success, and fun.

After all, despite the tons of bureaucracy and boring papers, ours is still the best job in the world :)

..and now, that's thinking

(and then knowing!)

CLIL lesson for Science/Geography

This lesson plan is another "present" by Dr Diana Hicks. Brilliant course and brilliant teacher indeed. So, once again, thank you Mrs Hicks and thank you Comenius :)

I was planning to try this activity in one of my History courses, as it can be adapted to suit different subjects. But in the end I never actually had the time to try it with my students since, as it often happens, we had to rush through things during this first semester.

But rest assured, it will be for the new year! And for all of you who asked me for some scientific activity, why don't you give it a try? You could have fun and, why not, find some interesting variation to this lesson. Let me know!

RIVER NILE - THE GAMBLING

about 20 students - 12/13 years old

subjects: Science/Geography/Technology/History (or better, all of them! these disciplines are connected)

Pupils drawing on their own, then working in groups of 4/5

Instructions given in English - pupils can answer and discuss, when needed, both in English and in mother tongue.

Steps:

1) Take a piece of paper and draw a river - this will be river Nile

2) Draw lots of fields close to the river (drawing squares of different sizes will be fine) - these are your fields

 

3) You're a  farmer and you wait for the water to come to the fields, so your crops can grow

 

4) Take your drawing with you and sit in groups. Each group will be given a dice.

5) Now, the members of the group roll the dice 5 times each

6) Each time, after rolling the dice, put a cross on your fields corresponding to the number you got on the dice (example: you got 5, you put a cross on 5 of your fields; you got 3, you put a cross on 3 of your fields, etc.)

 

7) When all the members of the group have rolled their dice 5 times, count your crosses. If you're under 20, you're DEAD.

 

8) Now, rolling the dice 5 times corresponds to 5 years. If you made less than 20 crosses, that means the river didn't reach enough of your fields, you didn't have enough water, and you couldn't grow your crops. You and your family were destined to die. Now you understand: living there is a gamble.

 

9) What could the people do to help the situation? Discuss with your group (English or mother tongue), then write down a short list of possible solutions: begin the sentence with "they could..."

 

10) All solutions are collected on the board

 

11) What did they really do? Let's take the book (or pc, or anything) and have a look together.

 

Well, I loved this activity when we tried it out at the training course (I always love role play, and I adore being the pupil !!! It's definitely less stressful than being the teacher... ok, points of view, I know). So I'll take advantage of this with one of my classes in the near future.

What do you think, can it be for you as well?

my best CLIL lesson of 2011

If you've been following my summer CLIL-soap, you'll know by now I've been reflecting on (and practicing) CLIL quite a lot during these months.
All of the people who regularly come to visit me in this blog (thank you!) helped me a lot here. We've been discussing theories and different approaches together, we've shared experiences and we've tried to overcome our empasse points. I've often been asked to share some practical tips, worksheets or lesson-plans of my everyday teaching. Part of them are, as usual, uploaded in the TNG TwinSpace.
But since we are reaching the end of this 2011, I'd like to share here my favourite CLIL lesson of this year. Important: I didn't make up this lesson on my own, I worked on a structure suggested by Dr. Diana Hicks during my summer course. Anyway, it turned out to be so nice and motivating after being customized to my case, that I think anyone can take advantage of it.
So have a look at it, and see if it can work for you as well!

THE BACK-HOME PLAN

about 20 students - 12/13 years old
subjects: History/Literature/Languages
Pupils working on their own, in pairs when asked
Instructions given in English - pupils can answer and discuss, when needed, both in English and in mother tongue.

Steps:
1) Take a piece of paper and draw a country - not an existing one, just make up your own. Place a capital city. Draw a river across the capital city. Give a name to the country, the capital city and the river (that's the funny part: pupils can be quite creative at times)

2) In the capital city, draw a Cathedral and a Town Hall (this will be useful later, when we'll set the story in the Middle Ages)

3) In this country there are two political parties. You're a politician of the leading party (if you want, you can have fun here again letting them name the parties). One day, you're sent on an important mission to the Pope, in Rome. While you're away, there's a rebellion in your country. The enemy party takes power, all of your friends are imprisoned or killed and you are exiled. Now, your family is still in the capital city, you love them and your city and you miss them. You want to go back. What would you do?

4) Write under your drawing at least 5 things you would do in order to go back home. (They have to start each sentence with "I would", then they can end it in English or mother tongue). Remember, if you go back and they catch you, you'll be executed.

5) Now work in pairs. Compare your answers with those of your partner. Are there any common ideas? Can you make up anything new together?

6) Now: the story is set in 1300. Please delete all of your ideas that don't suit this age (rest assured, there will always be plenty of bombing, alien-invading, and monster-related options).

7) All of the remaining ideas will be collected on the board.

8) Ok, now I can say: this is the story of Dante Alighieri, and you were acting as Dante himself. What did he actually do? Let's take the book and find out together.

That's all. It turned out to be a very active and involving lesson, and even the always-sleeping students had for once something to say. We had fun, they managed to speak a lot without the usual fears, and to their surprise they found out they would do lots of things Dante actually did. And even if they wouldn't have written the "Divina Commedia", believe me: they won't forget Dante and his story from now on !!!

how do you fight boredom in the classroom?

As a teacher, my worst enemy in the classroom is boredom. If my students don’t understand what I’m saying, they’ll ask – or I’ll notice and try to fix things. If they’re shy, angry, tired, or just puzzled, I’ll help. But if they’re bored, there’s no way out. They won’t listen to me, they’re actually not with me. And if it’s me being bored – it happens to teachers as well – I’m not with them and no matter how experienced I am, a barely-there teacher is the worst possible teacher.


Now, you cannot possibly come up with something new, engaging, challenging, every single time. But European projects (eTwinning, Comenius, self-financed) can. That’s what they do for me: they actually bring people in my classroom – new pupils, new teachers, plenty of new ideas. Interest comes from novelty, learning comes from sharing.

It’s funny to see how the partners, thousands of kms away, are actually with us all the time. I can remember the warm feeling experienced during a History lesson, when one of my pupils suddenly came up with a bunch of questions “What are they doing now? Are they studying this as well? Our same History?”. A reflection started from there and has never stopped since.

Conferences, meetings - and awards as well - came through the years. We met other teachers and students, experienced different teaching styles, different ideas and realities. My teaching developed and widened, as I met and shared ideas with lots of teachers, experts and especially with pupils.

You can’t enter a community and keep unchanged, and this applies to the pupils as well. A bored student/teacher is isolated, while in a community you’re never alone. Via Comenius and eTwinning, the whole school system (including parents) could experience the power of team working and the importance of building bridges between individuals. Now we don’t just have lessons, we make experiences. And “experience” and “boring” just won’t go together. “Experience” means actually being there – together.

Now, here's the funny way Dr. Diana Hicks represented the student's school day:

What about you? Do you agree with her? And how do you fight boredom and keep your pupils involved?
Looking forward to reading your comments!

Laura



[more about this in my articles in Voices of eTwinning - European Schoolnet 2011]

Planning for Excellent Learning

At the beginning of any new school year, all of us teachers come up with new ideas, hopes and projects to improve our teaching. We want to be better teachers, we want to give more, we want to achieve new goals together with our pupils. We want to make up new strategies and activities to keep our pupils - and ourselves - from getting bored.
I'm no exception.

And after this engaging CLIL summer, I have even more to think of. That's why I want to share with you an interesting document: it's a lesson planning form I was given in one of the English schools I visited. I met this brilliant young Geography teacher who told me he had been working there for just a year; since he was very young and he just left University, he had been trained to perform a new kind of teaching, which he believed was not perfect, but still good. Then, he was so kind as to give me one of his lesson planning forms.

Now, if I've learnt anything in the UK, is that being a teacher there is very stressful. They're very strict as far as the teaching is concerned - and then, do you remember? there's that hard part "the pupils should be speaking 90% of the time".

So, have a look at the form and let me know what you think of it. I'm uploading it here and in the TwinSpace of The Next Generation as well. By the way, you'll find lots of new materials there, so do have a look.

Have a successful new school year you all. Enjoy your job, and have fun with your pupils!

more on CLIL? visit TNG TwinSpace !!!

Hello everybody! Here are some of the references Dr Diana Hicks gave us during the course, as well as some links and info I got on my own, or during different CLIL courses (so, please note: you may find not all of the links are updated!).

Important: together with Monika, we're trying to upload all of our materials (including activities, links to websites & so on) in the TwinSpace of  The Next Generation - the link is here, and a permanent link is just under the blog title. You may want to go there from time to time and check if there's anything useful to you.

As for me, I'm very interested in the EU files - that's why I put so many. In this difficult period for Italy (and for Europe as well) I find it very important not to forget the direction we are taking together as European teachers, in order to build a coherent educative system. Ok, have a look and let me know!

Note: we use The Next Generation Twinspace as a teachers' playground for newbies in eTwinning. That's why only two folders are public (we suppose you won't be interested in how to use a forum/blog, how to open a folder & so on).

Ok, so here are some of the CLIL references I found:

http://www.onestopenglish.com/clil/   (not my favourite, since it's mainly just English Language exercises; still, it can be useful)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbctwo/  and  http://www.channel4.com/  (of course Language teachers will already know these. Well, they can be of use for CLIL lessons as well. Give them a try it if you need materials and videos for your lessons - you've got to pay but it's not expensive)

http://www.collaborativelearning.org/  (looots of useful stuff, games and ideas from teachers to teachers! I loved this. And there's a special section with all materials from the Cheltenham course as well)

http://www.aquila.co.uk/  (it's a children's - 8/13 years old - magazine with lots of materials for subject teachers... and lots of fun for students)

http://grahamworkmanbili.wikispaces.com/ (Graham Workman wiki for Bilingual teaching: plenty of links and ideas... I'm still exploring it)

http://clil.wordpress.com/ (great teachers' blog... if you know Spanish !!! I found some interesting info here, but I leave the rest to my Spanish friends!)

http://historiola.info/wordpress/  (for History teachers who want to steal some ideas... the History Website of Hounslow Homeschool Group)

and eventualy, in case you decide to take the Teaching Knowledge Test ...

http://www.cambridgeesol.org/exams/tkt/index.html

Have fun you all, and enjoy the rest of the summer! And do come back from time to time :)

Characteristics of successful bilingual teaching

Here I am again... and with plenty of time, since doctors told me I have to stay perfectly still not to worsen my ankle's problem. What an exciting summer vacation :(

Back to CLIL. Here are the points Dr Diana Hicks considered to be the basis of successful bilingual teaching (as usual, I'm adding my reflections as well):

1) boundaries: teachers and pupils have to know what they're expected to do - who does what
2) balance of languages: what can we do in MT and what in FL? decide before, please.
3) all skills should be integrated in tasks: as we already said, CLIL lessons are about thinking how, not knowing what
4) content knowledge targets should be clear: that was great! we are not supposed to lower our standars - or our lessons' contents - just because using two languages. A CLIL lesson is not an easier, summed-up subject lesson. We just have to be careful in how to choose the content, and how to have the students work on it.
5) prior understanding of grammar needs: another great point. Language structures are like tools in a box - Dr Diana Hicks said. You never need all of them at the same time. So, once chosen the subject, be sure to know which linguistic tools your students will need to work on it (past simple? passive form? etc.). The Language teacher will have to provide the students with this tools. The Subject teacher will have to deal with the content.
6) three times as many visuals than in momolingual classes: images play an important role in any lesson. Much more in a CLIL lesson, where we can't leave everything to words.
7) different learners' styles should be catered for (already examined this point)
8) prior awareness of lexical needs: don't be dictionary-dependent, and don't obsess your pupils into being. You've to plan your activities so that your pupils gradually acquire what they need.
9) intention of tasks should be clear to students: this is not anything special of a CLIL lesson. Students always need to know why they're doing something. Anyway, I do agree CLIL lessons, if not properly structured and explained, could be quite mixing up for pupils, more than a traditional monolingual lesson.

(note: there could have been a number 10, but I'm afraid I didn't have time to copy it down...)

Now, what do you think of these points?
Mariella, looks like there's plenty of collaboration needed, and plenty of time. No idea of when and how the Language teacher and the Subject teacher(s) will find the time to meet, share ideas, and actually be on the same page so as to structure a successful project. But obviously they'll have to.

I promise I'll upload all materials as well. Dr Diana Hicks gave us some interesting sheets for the planning. I'm just considering how I could upload them, and the activities as well. Maybe I'll create a public folder in one of my eTwinning project, and just put a link here. We'll see.

Meanwhile, does any of you know anything about the CLIL eTwinning Group? I'll be interested in getting to know something about it. I just didn't join as I'm not supposed to be an "official" CLIL teacher. At least not for now :)

Well, enjoy your summer everydody... and to the next episode!

CLIL - ready, steady, CHANGE !

After a short break, due to an accident (I fell from a sidewalk! I'm worse than kids... sometimes I think I shouldn't be allowed to travel alone!!!), here I am again sharing ideas, hints and doubts of my CLIL course.

That's how Dr Diana Hicks introduced the subject to us: you can't do something different (a CLIL lesson isn't monolingual methodology given in second or third language, remember?) and keep the same attitude. You've to make changes. So, that's it: feel confident enough to welcome the change and rethink our role and our strategies.

We need to make changes to

1) Teacher Language awareness
2) Student Language awareness
3) Tasks
4) Assessment strategies
5) Working relationship with colleagues
6) Relationship with parents
7) Our view of language "success"
8) Our view of what learning success is
9) Our view of how learning takes place
10) Lesson planning

We have already discussed some of these changes in other posts. Anyway, some of them deserve to be paid further attention. Of course, the first point is very controversial: we are working in two languages, MT and FL. But we can't take it for granted that students will only have problems with the Foreign Language. Maybe they'll struggle through the topic. Or maybe they don't have the host country language. How can we provide support for them? (burning question for me: in one of my classes I've 8 students out of 20 whose mother tongue is not Italian... and still no answer found).
Tasks and assessment: according to Dr Diana Hicks, most tasks should be shared and open - students should be allowed to bring their own ideas to add to the outcome and/or process. And as for the language, we have to make sure they know which language they can work in and what they're expected to produce.
Assessing (please note: the assessment part of the course was in my opinion the weakest... and for a very simple reason - we didn't have enough lessons and we had to rush through things) is connected to the lesson planning: when planning - and it will be a shared planning, subject teacher + language teacher - we'll have to discuss about assessment as well. What's important is to pay attention to the "how" more than to the "what": that means designing activities and tests that require thinking/understanding, not knowing. It sounds beautiful put like this, but don't ask me if I could do it in real life. I try.
We've been speaking about collegiality, and the challenge to work together, quite a lot now - so I won't examine this point again. What we can add here is a reflection on what "language success" means to us, both in MT and FL. We usually think in terms of accuracy, especially in MT, but maybe we have to pay some more attention to the students' awareness of the context: they should be aware of the differences between BICS and CALP. Language success may have to do with understanding when we can speak/write in a certain way, and when we have to change. Again, this has to do with thinking.

Enough for now... but just to keep you intrigued... I'll leave "characteristics of successful bilingual teaching" for my next post.

So enjoy your summer, but come back here from time to time!

Laura

structure of a (CLIL) lesson - start with the pupils

I really found the whole workshop to be great, but one of the most useful tools Dr Diana Hicks gave us is the “skeleton” of a (CLIL) lesson. I put CLIL in brackets as I ended up believing it could be a good structure for any lesson, even in mother tongue.

We started by examining the traditional, most common structure of a lesson:
1) Stage 1: presentation of subject by the teacher
2) Stage 2: activities/exercises (practice)
3) Stage 3: production – bigger activity
Well, forget this. Gone. Outdated. And – most important – boring! This top-down structure is teacher’s centred, while we need a bottom-up, pupils’ centred structure. Otherwise, we’ll end up losing 80% of the pupils on our way.

So, here’s the structure Dr Diana Hicks introduced to us.
“Start with the pupils” she said. I won’t forget this. Definitely.

1) TUNING IN: diagnostic, introductory activities (for the teacher to understand the students’ needs, their use of language, their knowledge of the subject pre-lesson, etc. / for the students to be introduced to the subject in a motivating and playful way).
2) FINDING OUT: this is the “meat” of the lesson – content
3) SORTING OUT: organizing information
4) REFLECTION – EVALUATION – SELF EVALUATION
She suggested to have the students work in groups, so as to allow each pupil to give their own contribution, and to use both English (or other L2) and Mother Tongue, so that they feel safe and do their best.
And she also reminded us of something we all know – but usually forget: we must take into consideration the different learners’ styles (visual, verbal, interpersonal, intrapersonal, kinaesthetic, manipulative, logical, auditory, musical, experimental). Our activities and tests are usually meant for verbal and logical learners: what for the others?

Enough for tonight. I’ll share an example of lesson in another post. Hope you’re intrigued by all of this as much as I am…