Coffee Break French

Although I have yet to use a Podcast in my curriculum, I have heard very positive feedback from colleagues about their experiences in using Podcasts in the classroom.  I think that especially for foreign language educators, Podcasts allow students to have an extended period of listening contact with a native speaker of the language they are studying.  I believe that using Podcasts in the foreign language classroom would immensely improve students' listening skills, however I do think that there is more involved in using podcasts in the FL classroom environment than merely just playing the Podcast.  Students need to become familiar with vocabulary terms related to the Podcast before they even listen to it.  I also think that there needs to be supplemental activities included.  For example, students would need a "frontloading" activity, also known as an "anticipatory set" in which students would become familiar with the topic and related objectives to the activity.  Finally, there also needs to be a follow-up activity or an assessment, where students could show their understanding perhaps through a journal entry or through responses to comprehension questions in regards to the Podcast.  Podcasts can be great supplemental tools to use in the classroom but there should always be supplemental activities included.

While searching in the "Education" section of the I-Tunes store, I came across a very interesting and professionally sounding Podcast called "Coffee Break French".  Although the creators of this Podcast are not native speakers of the language, their accent isn't distracting when they're speaking French and their method of teaching important vocabulary terms, expressions, or verb tenses is quite easy to follow.  I listened to a particular Podcast that they created in regards to ordering food in a restaurant during breakfast time.  Since I teach this particular topic in my beginning level French classes, I decided that this would be a relevant Podcast to follow.  The dialogue takes place in Sainte Marie and as a "frontloading" activity, I would have my students do some research on this city and look up local restaurants.  I would also ask them to look at some of the menus associated with these local restaurants so that they could become familiar with what a breakfast menu in French looks like.  The dialogue itself is slower-paced so students would not have a difficult time following along, especially after they have become familiar with the associated vocabulary during class.  After each dialogue is completed, the creators of Coffee Break French then review what was said and what happened during the particular scenario.  They ask their listeners of their Podcast to listen again to different sections of the conversation to focus their listening skills.  Although the entire segment is 18 minutes long, I would probably only use the initial sections instead of the entire segment because my students would probably have the ability to listen through the dialogue twice without much problem.  Any issues that they had in regards to their comprehension could be reviewed by returning to the sections that they had problems with.  They would indicate their issues with the conversation during a follow-up assessment, responding to comprehension questions.  As a follow-up activity to this Podcast, I would ask my students to create their own dialogues related to eating out at a French cafe/restaurant and then have them role play their dialogues in class.

Podcasts have an incredible amount of potential to be used beneficially in the classroom and through my discoveries today, I have been convinced that this is an incredibly useful tool for the foreign language classroom.  Merci beaucoup Podcast!

ePals with Survey Monkey

Part of the attraction to ePals is that since it is online other tools and resources can be used while collaborating.  I mentioned in my last post that one idea I have for incorporating ePals into my classroom would be through a "Getting to Know You" activity in which students would write about themselves and ask their cooperating student questions about their own lives.  One tool that could be beneficial to this activity would be Survey Monkey.  Students could create a series of questions related to preferences in order to get to know their cooperating partner even better.  They could inquire about favorite past times, TV shows, types of music, musical artists, sports, etc. while using the Target Language.  This would not only again be beneficial to their language learning, but also to their understanding of a new culture as perhaps new musicians, TV programs, films, and even sports may be mentioned by their cooperating student.  This would also create more opportunity for dialogue between the partners as one partner may be curious about these new findings and the other student would be excited to share these things with his or her partner.  Instant collaboration is key to ePals' success and educators need to keep in mind the vast resources that are available to their students when developing an activity through ePal.

ePals

         I recently discovered a fantastic collaborative website based on intercultural exchanges.  It is called "ePals" and it is educationally based.  While viewing this site, I came to identify the intentions that ePals' creators had in mind when creating this website.  It is clear that they intended to create a space online for educators and their students where they could interact with other educators and students through collaborative projects or email exchanges and therefore would learn about another way of life.  Students would not only be given the opportunity to learn about a new culture and contrast it with one's own, but students would also obtain insight into commonalities that he or she shares with someone from another culture as well as creating a meaningful project that would serve their learning.  I was ecstatic to see this collaborative learning on the Internet and how beneficial this site could be for my students and their experiences in learning about French-speaking cultures.

       While exploring ePals, I noticed that a lot of users had already posted creative projects and ideas for using ePals in the classroom.  I think that this is wonderful as educators who are unfamiliar with this website, such as myself, could benefit from ideas and projects that have already proven to be effective activities in regards to students' learning.  ePals has six main headings on their site that help guide users to resourceful tools that ePals has to offer.  These include: Focus Areas, Projects, Connect, Forums, How To, and ePals Tour.  The How To section is very helpful to users of ePals in that it provides answers to any questions that a user may have in regards to this website.  The ePals Tour provides additional resources to the site, including a blog that provides educators with ideas connected to the use of ePals that will help enrich students' learning and help in acheiving academic goals.  This section also gives up-to-date news regarding ePals achievements.  Users of ePals can connect with other classes through the subtopic Connect, where users have the opportunity to select a location on a map or to refine a search by searching for a particular language or area.  Users can also connect with classrooms by searching through Projects.  Here users can look through a list of projects and select one as a means of specifying a collaborative project.  Through Focus Areas, users are given additional resources and links to a specific topic.  Finally, Forums allows users to post requests, ideas, or other information regarding the use of ePals that will evoke interaction with other users.  Under the heading of Forums, there are sub-Forums related to specific users, such as: students, teachers, and family members, as well as Project based forums and Focus-Area forums.  This amazingly innovative and collaborative website is user-friendly and provides its users with an abundance of resources that makes the cultural exchange more productive.

      After exploring this website, I felt very inspired.  I often feel as a foreign language educator that my students are lacking in authentic experiences that I know would only make their learning more personal and therefore would provide them with more motivation in learning a foreign language.  It's difficult to provide students with face to face contact with native speakers of French when there are very few in their region.  The Internet however has provided foreign language educators with an abundance of authentic materials, and now through websites like ePals, Taking it Global, and iEarn, students have the opportunity to interact with other students of different cultures in a more personal way.  The following are a list of ideas that I have in regards to incorporating ePals into my classroom:
1. Getting to Know You
          Simply put, students would have the opportunity to use their foreign language skills in getting to know a person of the Target Language culture.  They could explore the similarities and differences that they have with one another and begin to form an online relationship that would be productive to not only their language learning but also to their cultural understanding.
2. Digital Storytelling
           Students would be able to refine their language skills by creating a story with a student of another culture.  They would be given an image with which they must create a narrative that would describe what is happening in the picture and who the characters are.  Perhaps they could collaborate with a student from another culture by both providing a different narrative and then responding to each other's story.  Or perhaps they could make a collaborative effort in creating a story together by taking turns writing.  One student could start the story and then the next student could continue the story and so on.
3.  Writing Prompts

           Students could be given a topic to share with another student from a foreign classroom based on cultural aspects, such as: family, holidays, traditions, school, free time, food, etc.  They would then be able to learn about an individual's experience in another culture as not everyone within a certain culture shares complete commonalities with each other.

         In regards to ePals, the sky really is the limit.  The interactional cultural experiences that this site offers is priceless in regards to students' cultural understanding as it provides personal insights into another way of life.  I am excited about sharing this program with my students and I look forward to the insights that they will gain as a result of our collaboration.

La Vie en Rose

    Choosing appropriate and stimulating visual supplements to enrich curriculum is key to an educator.  This is true for all educators but particularly for foreign language educators as most of our students do not have the real-life opportunities to experience foreign cultures.  Through the use of YouTube, VideoJug, TeacherTube, and other video websites, educators now have an enormous amount of resources to choose from when selecting visual supplements for the foreign language classroom.  As amazing a resource as the World Wide Web can be, it can also be extremely overwhelming.  Therefore, before approaching any online video website, it is advised to have some concrete ideas in mind, otherwise, it may take awhile to choose.

During my search on VideoJug, I came across a "how to" video related to making crepes.  This was a great find as food is a consistent topic in the foreign language classroom.  I often try to bring in unique foods for my students to try and they are always curious about making these recipes on their own.  That is why I was especially excited when I found a video related to this topic.  I could post this video on my individual teacher website and students could watch it and then make it on their own.  It included ingredients as well as step by step instructions in how to make delicious crepes.  After I found this video, I decided to keep searching for related videos on YouTube and found one of a French creperie.  There were people speaking French throughout the video and I feel that this video would give my students the unique opportunity to see the same process done in a French creperie where the equipment and timeliness of this process can be quite different.

       In my curriculum, I also do a mini-unit on "les spectacles" in which I show French videos, music, artwork, and other related topics.  Since seeing the movie, "La Vie en Rose" with Marion Cotillard as Edith Piaf, I have been smitten with showing this movie in class, at least parts of it that lend to the understanding of Edith Piaf's life and French music from that time period.  I found some footage of Edith Piaf's performances on YouTube and added that to my video list as well.   These videos would be great to show in comparison/contrast to that of "La Vie en Rose" movie.

       I think that anything that makes learning more engaging and real to learners is key to their success and finding valuable visual resources online can be so crucial to enriching students' learning.

Bubblr Meets Flickr

Paris Stills by Boheme77

The link above is an example of how you could use Flickr along with Bubblr to create comic strips to be used in a Foreign Language classroom.  Typically I show students one individual frame or image to review expressions or common phrases that are used in the French language.  I created three different frames through this website and the link above will take you to my first creation on Bubblr.