Tag Archives: Sentences

Reading Stations in the Foreign Language Classroom

Students need to engage with a text to truly understand the themes, concepts, vocabulary and structures.  Reading comprehension questions don’t provide much engagement with text.  Here are some ideas for creating reading stations for your foreign language students.  These are activities that require students to engage with the text and make meaning.  These are general activities that can be modified to fit various reading proficiency levels.

Reading Station Activities for the Foreign (World) Language Classroom. (French, Spanish) wlteacher.wordpress.comHERE are some Spanish Reading passages that work well with these activities.

Station 1: Photos

  • Students arrange photos chronologically according to the text.

Sentences (individual or in small groups)

  • Students  arrange sentences chronologically according to the text. They should not be sentences taken directly from the text, but rather use different words.

Match Photos with Vocabulary (individual or small groups)

  • Students have a number of words from the story (familiar and new) as well as a picture representation of each word.

Station 4: Bingo in a Bag (small groups)

  • Students take a blank bingo card and fill in words that you give them.  All students have all of the answers to questions that you will put in a bag, but their boards will be different.
  • Students take a question (about the text) out of a bag and mark the answer on their bingo card. Play continues around with each player taking turns and adding the question back into the bag.
  • When a student gets 4 in a row, the teacher verifies and the student is declared the winner.

Drawing (individual or in small groups)

  • Students use pencils, markers, or crayons to draw a storyboard for the story

Writing

  • Given a choice, students will compose a written piece. They should have a number of options to choose from. You may want to consider giving them a RAFT, which is a choice of writing assignments in different forms and from different points of view. You can learn more about the RAFT writing process HERE.

Try these ideas out and think of some other ways to engage students in a written text.  Please comment on this post of you have some ideas to share, particularly for non-fiction texts.

HERE are some Spanish Reading passages that work well with these activities.

Writing Outlines for Foreign Language

writing-colorWhat to focus on most in foreign language classes (speaking, listening comprehension, reading, and writing or some other order or combination), is the subject of much research into language acquisition. However, exposure to all elements of language and increased confidence are unquestionably necessary. Regardless of your approach to language teaching and order in which you expose your students to the different mediums of language and culture, consider this writing exercise, keeping in mind that this model is easily adaptable to any level or theme.

It very helpful for the entire class to write together collectively before students work independently. The result will provide each student a chance to see that he/she was able to write a paragraph appropriately (albeit a collective one) before engaging in the task on his/her own. The paragraph produced by the class also serves as a model for the individual writing. In time, perhaps several months, students will no longer have to refer to the model paragraphs, but will rather be more able to engage the process on his/her own from the beginning.

  • Begin with an outline that resembles this (the handout should be in the target language):
  • Name: ________________
  • Age: He/she is ________ years old.
  • Class: 6th 7th 8th
  • School: ________________
  • Activity: ________________
  • Time: ________________
  • With whom: ________________
  • Where: ________________
  • Clothing: ________________

Put a copy on however many desks as there are students in the class, plus one for the teacher. Each student will begin with the paper on his/her desk and fill in a name (any name). All students will then rotate to another sheet and fill in the next piece of information. The class (and the teacher) will continue to rotate until all information is filled in. Students need to pay attention to what is already on the outline so that they add appropriate places, times, and clothing.

Once the outlines are done (collectively), students return to their seats and now have an outline completely filled in. The teacher will also have one. Ideally (perhaps in a follow-up class or immediately if the teacher has access to a copy machine), each student will have a copy of the teacher’s outline to follow as the class helps the teacher to write a paragraph based on his (her) outline. The teacher writes the paragraph on the board and students contribute and write down the model paragraph. Here is an example of what one of these initial paragraphs might look like (although in the target language):

  • John is twelve years old. He goes to Collins Middle School. He is in the 7th grade. John plays baseball at three o’clock. He plays with his friends Craig, Mark, and Peter. They play at the park. John wears a green tee-shirt, white shorts, and gray sneakers.

Students then take their own outlines and write their own paragraphs (from their outlines) using the model paragraph as a guide. Once the students are familiar with the process, they can fill in their own outlines in the future. It is helpful to continue writing a model paragraph together as a guide until students no longer need one.

These kinds of outlines improved student writing a great deal. Also, make the outlines as specific as possible: perhaps all written in the first person or in the present tense, etc. Students like to use funny names, make outlandish outfits, and have people doing amusing things.

It is beneficial to allow this freedom and allow them to enjoy the process. Once students are at a more sophisticated linguistic level, they can begin to combine.