Conversation Class
Lesson Summary

Language and Section: French Advanced

Date: 11.8.12

Class theme/topics discussed: Back to the future (and to the past)

Goal of the class: Make the students talk using past, conditional and future tenses + supposition

Structure of the class (unless you attach your lesson plan below):

WARM-UP (5 minutes)
We quickly reviewed the vocabulary the students learned the class before about elections and discussed the results of American Presidential Elections.

ACTIVITY 1 (15 minutes) – BACK TO THE FUTURE
Students worked in pairs. They were given a list of some items (see handout below) and they had to choose 3 of them that they would take for they trip in 2112. They also had to add 3 extra items that they think necessary.
Then they presented their list of 6 items to the class and the other students had to guess how they would imagine life in 100 years.

ACTIVITY 2 (10 minutes) – BACK TO THE PAST
Students worked in different pairs. They had to make a list of three items they would give to a person of 1812 to improve his everyday life.

ACTIVITY 3 (10 minutes) – BACK TO THE PAST 2
Then they worked alone and they went in 1950 and gave a message to the people in order to change History.

ACTIVITY 4 (15 minutes) – IPHONE 105
Students work in different pairs and had to imagine and to advertise the iPhone 105.

FUNNY VIDEO (5 minutes)
We watched and commented a funny French video about Apple products (Norman fait des videos).

What technology, media or props did you use? (satellite tv, internet resources, playmobiles, etc.)

Whiteboard, computer + TV Screen

What worked well in this class? What did not work?

They were really talkative and creative.

Warm-up: I had to be careful because on one hand most of the students really supported Obama and really wanted to talk about that but one the other hand I was afraid that one student voted for Romney and felt really uncomfortable. So I quickly ended the conversation.

Activity 2: this activity worked great but some students assume that the people they would help would have electricity and some other worked on finding a way to give them electricity, which was not really the goal of the activity.

How could this class be improved/ modified?

Concerning the second activity, I should have made the rules clearer and tell either that we assume that the people that they would help would have electricity either that they have to chose items that do not imply electricity.

*** HANDOUT – LIST OF ITEMS FOR ACTIVITY 1

Choose among this list three items that you are going to bring in 2112:

A camera
A car
Cash
Warm clothes
A laptop
A passport Food
A cell phone
Aspirin
A sleeping bag
Water
A credit card

Then add three items that are not in the list but that seem necessary to you:
–
–
–