I put a few pictures of an activity that I did with my students on Facebook and Twitter. There was a lot of interest and several teachers asked for the template so that they could do the activity with their students. So, I figured it would be helpful to write a blog post about the activity and include the template.
This activity is what I call “Who is it?” or “Guess who? ” It is particularly useful for level 1 students who are in the novice mid-novice high range. At this proficiency level students are typically using chunked language and are at the beginning stages of creating some language on their own as they swap out some details of the memorized language that they have acquired. As a way to provide students with an opportunity to use this language authentically in reading and writing I created these “Who is it?” mini books.
The PDF includes directions for folding the paper along with templates to do the activity in English, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese and Chinese.
Students write in information about themselves on the topics of age, birthday, origin/ethnicity, preferences, free time activities and family. What is not included is their name. Once done classmates read the mini books of their classmates and try to guess who it is based on the information. This adds authentic reading to the activity as well. We also put the mini books on a bulletin board for other classes to engage with as well.
On the back of the mini book students put a selfie so that readers can confirm their guess of who it is. The addition of the selfie is a fun way to really get students excited. We took the pictures in class and I just printed them out and students glued them to the back of the book.
The great thing about this project, besides the effective use of novice level language, is that it can all be done with one piece of paper that is folded to make the mini book. This tactile part of the activity is also very motivating because students enjoy seeing the transformation of the paper into a mini book.
The PDF includes directions for folding the paper along with templates to do the activity in English, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese and Chinese.
Thanks for a great idea! I’ve created a German version for my students: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Iqcz-YH58cWJNgQm-bD2UxGrIFHhZMuH – feel free to share it on your blog.
I also used this kind of mini book – even with very young learners. We had one about colours, another about clothes … I gave one about once a month so the kids could take them home and show their parents. They are so cuteand fun to make!