Conversation Class Lesson Summary

 

Language Resident Name: Rosina Desimone

 

Day and Date: Tuesday, September 23rd

 

Language and Level: Spanish Advanced

 

Class theme/topics discussed: Crime

 

Goal of the class: For students to learn vocabulary about crime and security.

 

How did you structure the class:

 

Ice-breaker: Short Game “Flipping”: a student thinks about a word in Spanish (an verb, an adverb, a noun, etc.) The rest of the class has to guess what is the mystery word by asking “Yes-No” questions and replacing the mystery word with the term “flipping”, such as in the following:

 

Q: Is “flipping” an action?

A: Yes / No

Q: Is “flipping” a sport?

A: Yes                                                  (Flipping word: running)

 

Warm-up: The students brainstorm about words in Spanish that are related to crime. Then, the teacher gives them a handout in which they have to classify the words in the different columns. After that, they number the crimes from serious to less serious.

 

Now, the students watch a video in You-tube without any sound and they have to infer what it is about. Then, the learners watch it again with sound and, with the help of the teacher, they check if their assumptions were correct.

 

Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iudb0amH0sY

 

The students discuss what happened in the video by answering the following question: Why do you think the guy was about to be mugged? What did he do that made him a potential victim? After that, the students move on to answer the questionnaire in the handout, and see if they take precautions as regards safety or if they are really unconscious about security. (ANSWERS: More than 8: UNSAFE!; Between 4 and 7: safe but you should take some precautions; 3 or less: Good job! You’re really conscious about security.)

 

Finally, the students play the game “Detectives”: One or two students must go outside the classroom(“Detectives”). Two other students are chosen as “criminals”. Once the “Detectives” return to the classroom, they have to ask “Yes-NO” questions to their classmates to find the criminals and the object which was stolen and previously hidden in the classroom (for example: a ring). Classmates cannot lie to the Detectives!

What technology, media or props did you use?: Handout on Crime, TV set and my laptop.

 

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

 

The class got really engaged with the topic after working with the video. They also loved the quiz and playing “Detectives”!

 

How could this class be improved/modified?

Maybe, the handout could be introduced at the end of the class, as a revision of all the vocabulary that has been dealt with in the class. Working with the handout at the beginning was not as engaging as I expected it to be. It certainly works for reviewing all that we have seen in class.

 

HANDOUT Crímenes