USINGIN THE CLASSROOM!

This is a great webpage where you can create your own poetry or stories. Where you use pictures given by many artists. Once you have finished creating your story you can publish them for others to see. It is a great idea involving children to use the website, with this, you are encouraging them to read any kind of stories between them and the peers.
This could be done individually or in groups.

During the class, Raquel gave us a username and a password on a piece of paper:
Username: class201349
Password: xxxxxxx 

Later on we had to choose the images of a certain artist: The art of Alina Chau. Then Raquel explained to us the purpose of this activity and what type of poetry she wanted us  to write about. There were 4 types of poetries:

1.  Letter poetry: There are poems read as letters where you can think of writing in a formal or colloquial way, the subject could just be anything (a complaint, love letter, philosophical letter)..

2. Haiku poetry is the way of looking the physical world and see something deeper that really means a lot to you.

3. Guessing poetry are rhymes where you have to figure out what is the poem talking about.

4. Cluster poetry is poetry where you collect things in different ways.

Hope that you liked my poetries!
We could do so many things with students, could you give me more ideas?
Thanks a lot...

WORKING WITH FILMS ACROSS AND OUTSIDE THE CURRICULUM 

The other day we were watching Mulan, a warrior female of China who decided to protect his father from fighting with the Huns... Raquel gave us a handout filled with questions and we are going to work in groups to discuss about these questions. In my opinion, it is a great way of working with films, you motivate students in it is not just watching a film to waste the time.

I have also found an article in the Internet that says: New report shows how film in education supports teachers and educators in the learning development of students.

They say that film in education is improving literacy levels and the motivation of the students are also increasing.Watching films raise students to a better attention, creativity, cognitive abilities, cultural education and attainment. 

I think that it could be a positive way working with films but depends on how you deal and work with films. I didn't have a good experience when I was studying in London at Dunraven School. The first time I watched a film in the classroom it was in English literature at KS3 level. We were working with Shakespeare (Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet, Much a do about nothing..) My English was not very powerful and then I had to write essays about the plot and this was a nightmare indeed. 

The teacher never scaffolded activities and a lot of students were lost. They spoke English but I just spoke little English and Shakespeare language was so difficult because it was old English. For sure, it was a nightmare and no one tried to help us. More or less my oral communication was fine, but my writing was awful, so imagine writing an essay. I got frustrated and failed the subject. 

Next year, I had to retake the subject again, but this was different, because we had a teacher that really cared for us, she reminds me of Raquel. His name was Mr. Sumner, he was the headmaster of Dunraven school, and he was only 26 years old (outstanding) his speech was perfect and extraordinary. Mr. Sumner helped us a lot for this subject and it was so much fun. First, before watching the film, we did some activities, with the language, and the scenes, then we had to draw for each scene what we thought that happened. After drawing, we had to retell the story. And finally we did like a little drama, to understand what was the topic about. 

The point in representing the drama ourselves, helped us understand the situation of the film and that was amazing, seriously. I want to be be that teacher.

I'm still in contact with that teacher and I told him what I was doing in my teaching trainee degree. I told him what was the meaning of CLIL, the different approaches that we had studied and applied in presentations...the way we work. And he didn't know about it, he told me that he wanted to hire me in the future. lololol

Anyways, some teachers apply different methods without knowing that in the future is going to work, and this is the beautiful part. With my students that I teach in the extra curriculum time, I've been working with them, the film of Mary Poppins. First I asked them if they knew about Mary Poppins, then I gave them some vocabulary and structures to discuss about the musical film. Only one girl out of six new about this character.

I spent three sessions on watching the film, but for each section, we had to work in different tasks. For example, in the first section of the film, the students had to draw their favourite scene of the film and the majority of them drew a picture where the children were tidying up the room with Mary Poppings in a fun way. In the second section, I told them to print out one of songs they most liked from the film because we were going to sing it. It went well, I spent one hour focusing on the pronunciation. When they felt ready, I recorded them. It was the first and the last time recording, because we didn't have enough time to record a second time. Students were motivated and anxious so the next time they wanted to sing another song from that film.

At the end I disappointed them, I wanted to work in other thing. At the end of the last part of the film, I wanted them to think by themselves by formulating this question: What things would you do if you had a Mary Poppins in your lives? They were great answers, they were very creative and participative. 

My thoughts at the beginning were quite negative: I thought that the tasks that I tried to do with them were going to be difficult but you can't expect things if you don't know how  it is going to work with certain groups.

I want to share with you the song...If I can!

MY STORY RELATED TO TRADING CARDS

I wanted to outline one of my projects done with three students aged between 9, 10 and 11 years old.

This year 2013, it has been a glorious year for all my students and myself as a teacher. The idea of the project 'English Class Production', was about creating and building a story with the students. First, they had to organize themselves by talking about the characters. Then, I gave them  a handout with some questions: What is the name of your character?, Is he/she/it a good or a bad character and why? What is he/she/it wearing?... With this activity I have related it to the Trading card creator that we did in the previous classes with Raquel. Now I know and I can use the trading card in the future with the students.

First, they started to create the story, then they built their characters and the scenes. After building the characters, we recorded the audio for the film and also recorded the whole story with a video camera. When we finished everything, I created a trailer of the story for the parents as a feedback.

After all, as a teacher I saw a great progress and development in the students' oral communication, reading and writing skills. It motivates not just children but also adults by working in this way because you make them feel protagonist of their story.

Here is a good example of the trailer, I hope that you enjoy it:

TRADING CARD FOR YOUR CHARACTER!!

HOW TO BUILD YOUR OWN TRADING CARD

Trading Card

On Thursday morning, we had to start thinking of our main character to create a story. In my opinion, it is a good way of creating a trading card, because you go step by step, thinking of qualities, likes and dislikes, adjectives to describe your character. These are the different steps:

                            Source

• I saw Cavy for the first time in London in a friend’s house.

                         Appearance

• She is broader than a rat, smaller than a rabbit and she has a chubby face with long whiskers.

                         Personality

• She is always sociable, funny and nearly always happy.

                             Thoughts

• Her most important thoughts are traveling, creating music and art, and finding food.

                             Feelings

•  Her most important feelings are happiness, well-being and excitement 

                              Problems

• Cavy’s challenge is to visit the seven South American countries (Argentina, Peru, Colombia, Bolivia, Chile, Ecuador and Venezuela) and travel along the highlands of the Andes.

 Goal 

• Cavy wants to walk along the Andes, see the seven South American countries and to meet new friends during her journey.

Outcome

• Cavy succeeds in her goals. As a result, she ends up meeting new friends.

Quote

• “If you don’t start somewhere you’ll never get anywhere.”

Action

• Cavy jumped out of the cage and run to throw me her favourite colourful ball. I then had to throw the ball away. It was getting dark and before heading back home Cavy hid my house keys in her cage.

                           Interactions

• She got along with most of the characters in the story but on the other hand she found trouble with some people.

Personal Connection

• Cavy is a globetrotter and she is an interesting and happy rodent because she knows how to manage herself in the big wide world. Cavy reminds me of myself because I’m a globetrotter like Cavy too! I consider myself a happy and independent person and I know how to take care of myself anywhere I go.

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THE ART OF STORYTELLING

8^th of October 2013 

For this week we had to create our own storytelling by following the structure seen in class (“The Princes and the Dragon”):

Once upon a time there was a brave knight. One day he was riding through the forest when he met a beautiful princess.

-   “What is your name?” he asked.

-   “My name is Penelope” replied the princess.

-   “Where do you live?” asked the brave knight.

-   “I live in a big castle” the princess replied.

Suddenly a huge dragon appeared.” I am a dragon. I am going to eat you!” said the huge dragon.

-   “Oh no!” said the princess.

-   “Don´t worry” said the knight. “I am strong, I am fast and I am clever. I will fight the dragon”.

So the brave knight took his sword and fought the dragon. They fought and fought and fought and finally the brave knight killed the dragon.

The brave knight and the princess got married and they lived happily ever after.

Before starting to build our story, Raquel demonstrates us some talks of storytellers. The first one was about If I should have a daughter… by Sarah Kay.

http://www.ted.com/talks/sarah_kay_if_i_should_have_a_daughter.html

“If I should have a daughter, instead of “Mom,” she’s going to call me, “Point B.” Because that way she knows that no matter what happens, at least she can always find her way to me. And I’m going to paint the solar systems on the backs of her hands, so she has to learn the entire universe before she can say, “Oh, I know that like the back of my hand.” And she’s going to learn that this life will hit you, hard, in the face, wait for you to get back up just so it can kick you in the stomach. But getting the wind knocked out of you is the only way to remind your lungs how much they like the taste of air.”

It is a great way of telling us a story, through poetry. The way that Sarah Kay expresses herself is quite affective. She talks about how would she raise her daughter by adding some trust and vulnerability through her actions. We should all think positively in opening ourselves up to being hurt, to always love others and of course, to always presume that everything occurs because of a reason.

The next storyteller’s name was Michael Rosen’s Chocolate cake. Michael Rosen is one of the best-known figures in the children’s book world. He works as a poet, broadcaster (journalist), performer and a scriptwriter.

We have thought of many ways in telling stories, which have been written by another person, written by you written by students or just made up in that moment. 

Then, we watched another video of the same author “We’re going on a bear hunt” The song is about four children and their father going on a bear hunt. The family slips down a grassy slope, swishes across a river, smudges through mud and finally sees the bear, who chases them all back to their home.

With the whole class we did a fantastic and outstanding representation of the song by doing scaffolding. We were divided in groups and each of the groups had some words of the song, for example: grass, swish, swash, swishy. First of all, we had to remember the whole song, and then the different verses. So, with these words, we knew that belonged to the first verse. Once the group did the movements we represented outside. We broke the story into pieces and then we rebuilt it by adding some movements. It was jolly good!

Later, we practiced working with the story of the very hungry caterpillar on YouTube.

The 8^th of October we presented our story by using some movements and showing the pictures via PowerPoint.

Conan, the butterfly

Once upon a time there was a colourful butterfly. One day he was flying around an oak, when he met a hairy caterpillar.

-   “What is your name?” asked the hairy caterpillar.

-   “My name is Conan, the butterfly”

-   “Where do you come from?” asked the hairy caterpillar

-   “I just got out of a pupa” replied the colourful butterfly.

Suddenly, a starving, angry bird appeared.” I am a bird. I am going to eat both of you!” said the starving, angry bird.

-   “Oh no!” said the hairy caterpillar.

-   “Don´t worry” said the colourful butterfly. “I am strong, agile and I can camouflage in the oak. I will fight the bird”.

So, the butterfly used his muscles and his wings and fought the bird. He flew, hit and fought and finally Conan the butterfly scared the dragon.

During the fight, the hairy caterpillar started a pupal stage. Conan the butterfly was very sad because he felt alone. Conan the butterfly waited for weeks and finally, one day, the pupa broke and another colourful and big butterfly appeared. Conan the butterfly and his big friend lived happily ever after as friends.

This is another video of other groups

Previously I had invented one but it didn’t really follow the structure of Raquel's The princess and the dragons story model. 

The wonderful mama pig and her eight little piglets

I really liked the activity, therefore I put it into practice with my students, each of them had to invent a story. It is unfinished but here is an example: 

The Frog and the Monkey

Here you have the video of once upon a time with my students, hope that you like it!