an archive of lesson plans

Author: Tilman Vietor

DE S20 INT: Traveling (Zoom class)

Language Resident Name: Tilman Viëtor

Day and Date: Monday, 04/27/2020

Language and Level (intermediate or advanced class): German, Intermediate

# of Students: 3

Class theme/topics discussed: traveling

Goal of the class: Students repeat traveling vocab, practice a common German grammatical construction, practice presenting information.

How did you structure the class?

  1. Warm-up (Prior knowledge):

I put questions in the google doc, that the students talk about in pairs in breakout rooms. 1. What was the best trip that you ever went on? What was so great about it? 2. Can you imagine living in a different country one day? Where would that be? 3. Where would you travel to if money was not an issue? 4. Is traveling important to you? Why/why not?

  • Activity 1 (Input):

The students brainstorm as many terms that are connected with traveling as possible. After two minutes, we look at all the terms together and talk about them.

  • Activity 2 (Guided Practice):

The students answer the question “Why do people travel?” with the “um…zu”-Construction (in order to). Together we collect as many reasons to travel as possible. When the students run out of ideas, we look at a website together that gives ten reasons for traveling.

  • Activity 3 (Task):

Students prepare a mini-presentation about the most interesting trip they ever went to. They explain where they went, for how long, how they got there, what they did there, what was most interesting, etc. They also explain, why traveling is important to them. They can also show pictures with the screenshare function. After about 5 minutes of preparation time, they get together in breakout rooms and present to each other.

  • Activity 4 (Follow-up):

We meet in the main room, everyone quickly summarizes what they talked about, before we say our goodbyes.

What technology, media or props did you use? (Internet resources, playmobiles, handouts, etc.)

Google Doc, DeepL, website : https://www.auslandsjob.de/10-gruende-reisen.php,

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

The class went pretty well. The students talked a lot and were active and engaged all the time. The activities were not as dynamic as I had hoped, but I think that was because half of the class was missing. Also, I had one more, pretty big task prepared for the students, but we did not have the time to do it. But because I did not try to squeeze that activity in, the timing worked out very well.

How could this class be improved/ modified?

Finding a short video or some other kind of input with travel-related vocabulary would have been good to stimulate more ideas in the brainstorming activity.

DE S20 INT: Impressions

Language Resident Name: Tilman Viëtor

Credit to Katherine Pérez, Mariia Glukhova

Day and Date: Monday, 02/03/2020

Language and Level (intermediate or advanced class): German, Intermediate

# of Students: 6

Class theme/topics discussed: Physical appearance

Goal of the class: Learning vocabulary to describe someone’s physical appearance.

How did you structure the class?

  1. Warm-up (Prior knowledge):

Focused Freewriting: What do you think about when you think about physical appearance? How would you describe your closest friend? How would you describe yourself? (3-5min) We talk about it and come up with categories for describing physical appearance. Then the students get to the board and fill the categories with as many expressions as possible.

  • Activity 1 (Input):

I show students a picture of me and friends of mine. I then describe some people in the picture, before I have the students describe the remaining people based on what they see.

  • Activity 2 (Guided Practice):

While the German music is playing, everybody walks around the room observing other people’s clothes, hairstyle, etc. As soon as the music stops, each student pairs up with the person standing nearest and they stand back to back. Each of the students makes statements about the other’s appearance. Repeat a couple of times.

  • Activity 3 (Task):

Detective role play: Each student gets a picture of someone who “has gone missing”. One of the students is a detective and the other one has to tell what the person missing looks like. The “detective” draws the person who is being described. Both students get to be a “detective” using one different picture each. After having done this, each group describes their partners’ picture and we all get to compare and see how accurate the description was (15-20 min).

  • Activity 4 (Follow-up):

What do students guess the occupations of the people on the pictures are?

After guessing and giving reasons for their guesses, in two groups, they each look up one of the people, then present their findings to the group.

  • Extra final activity:

What do you think the German saying “Kleider machen Leute” could mean?

We talk about it.

What technology, media or props did you use? (Internet resources, playmobiles, handouts, etc.)

Song, pictures of German celebrities

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

The class worked very well, even though we did not get to the extra activity.

First-impressions

DE S20 ADV: Youth Slang (Zoom class)

Language Resident Name: Tilman Viëtor

Day and Date: Thursday, 04/16/2020

Language and Level (intermediate or advanced class): German, Advanced

# of Students: 3

Class theme/topics discussed: German youth slang

Goal of the class: Students learn about German youth slang

How did you structure the class?

  1. Warm-up (Prior knowledge):

I post questions in the Google Doc, that serve as conversation starters. They talk about the questions in Breakout Rooms and if they look up vocabulary, which I encourage them to do, they put them in our shared vocab list. The questions were 1. What is good about winter if you compare it to summer? 2. What are the most essential food items for you? 3. What three things are the most important for you in life right now? 4. Who is your favorite musician?

  • Activity 1 (Input):

In the Main Room: I give the students three lists of youth slang words and short phrases in the Google Doc. I give each one of them a list and they do a short research on Google.de to find out what the words/phrases mean and what language they are from. I demonstrate the process via screenshare quickly, so that they know that they should also enter “meaning youth slang” into the search bar after the word/phrase. We then go through the words together.

  • Activity 2 (Guided Practice):

We read a website together that is about German youth slang, its history and its important elements and characteristics. They can later use the forms on that website for their dialogues.

  • Activity 3 (Task):

I give the students four different little scenarios, to choose from and write a creative dialogue around, using as many youth slang words as possible for them. They write the dialogues in pairs in breakout rooms, and then they present them in the Main Room

What technology, media or props did you use? (Internet resources, playmobiles, handouts, etc.)

Google Doc, Google.de, Website : https://online-lernen.levrai.de/deutsch-uebungen/jugendsprache/0_jugendsprache_regeln.htm

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

The class went well, we had good conversations and the students had a lot of fun with writing and performing the dialogues. I had to skip the website bit, and we did not have a lot of time left for the dialogues, so they were short.

How could this class be improved/ modified?

I should have reduced the amount of warm-up questions and the amount of words every single student had to research.

DE S20 ADV: Storytelling

Language Resident Name: Tilman Viëtor

Credit to Mariia Glukhova

Day and Date: Thursday, 02/06/2020

Language and Level (intermediate or advanced class): German, Advanced

# of Students: 3

Class theme/topics discussed: Storytelling

Goal of the class: To practice improvisational speaking

How did you structure the class?

  1. Warm-up (Prior knowledge):

Exercise on “Deutsch Perfekt” to practice the simple past form.

  • Activity 1 (Input):

Students play two truths and a lie. Each of the students should tell three stories (‘’I don’t like cats” is not a story!) to the others. Then they ask this person questions in order to catch them on lying. After that they take turns.

  • Activity 2 (Guided Practice):

I write a phrase on the whiteboard. It can be something like: “Paul woke up, and immediately realized that something was different today”. Students sit down in a circle. The first student has one minute to tell what happens next. When the time is over, the next student starts talking and continues the story, and so on.

  • Activity 3 (Task):

We get together in pairs. Each team gets Story Cubes and the show begins. They should create a story and then present it to each other.

  • Activity 4 (Follow-up):

We play “Black Stories”.

What technology, media or props did you use? (Internet resources, playmobiles, handouts, etc.)

Story cubes, website (https://www.deutsch-perfekt.com/deutsch-ueben/das-praeteritum), Black Stories (game)

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

The class was great, and the students had a lot of fun. We did not get to the last two tasks, so maybe a time limit for two truths and a lie would be necessary.

DE F19 ADV Global Warming

Language Resident Name: Tilman Viëtor

Day and Date: Thursday, 09/26/2019

Language and Level (intermediate or advanced class): German, Advanced

Class theme/topics discussed: What can we do as individuals to combat climate change?

Goal of the class: Students learn the vocabulary and grammar needed to discuss measures that individuals can take to combat climate change. They will be able to say whether they are feasible or not and whether they would take them or not and give reasons for their decisions.

How did you structure the class?

  1. They write down 3 questions they want to ask another student. Then they pair up.
  2. Focused free writing (2-5 min.) with a few words/phrases having to do with climate change as inspiration.
  3. Discuss what they have written with their partner.
  4. We watch a video with 5 tips for a more environmentally friendly lifestyle. After the video we quickly discuss what they think was important and whether they learned something new.
  5. Students write all their ideas down about what people can do individually to fight climate change.
  6. I give input, explaining what I do to contribute to the struggle (Already modeling the grammar they will use later)
  7. I explain what “containern” and “bändern” is. Controversial topics as food for thought for the discussion.
  8. I introduce all the phrases and words they can use to discuss actions with their peers.
  9. Students write down 5 things they would do or already do, and 2 things that they wouldn’t do.
  10. They discuss their ideas in pairs first, then in the group.

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

Video 1 : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HTAGliXvZXg

Powerpoint, Pen, Whiteboard

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

The class went, well and we had a lively discussion. Students told me they liked it.

Germ.-adv-4.2

 

DE F19 ADV children’s books, Thanksgiving

Language Resident Name: Tilman Viëtor

Day and Date: Tuesday, 12/03/19

Language and Level (intermediate or advanced class): German, Advanced

Class theme/topics discussed: Thanksgiving, children’s stories

Goal of the class: Students improve their narration skills, asking questions, reading skills

How did you structure the class?

  1. Warm-up (Prior knowledge):

Two truths and one lie: I tell students three short stories about my Thanksgiving holidays, one of which was a lie. I wrote 1 word associated with each story on the board. Then students had to decide which story was a lie. They could each ask me two questions before making a decision. Then the students had to come up with three words and stories about them, and then they presented, and we played in the same way as detailed above.

  • Activity 1 (Input):

I talked about children’s books that I read as a child and showed and described to them the covers of these books. I then told them about my favorite children’s book, and in the process answered the 5 questions I would give them afterwards.

  • Activity 2 (Guided Practice):

I gave the students the following questions to answer about their favorite children’s book:

  • What is the title of the book?
  • When was it first published?
  • Did you read it yourself or was it read to you?
  • What is the plot of the book?
  • Why should everyone in this room read this book?

The students presented their books to the class.

  • Activity 3 (Task):

I introduced the “Struwwelpeter” to the class and read the first story in the book to them, while showing the text and pictures on the screen. Then I gave both students a story and they figured out what it was about, asked for words that they did not know and then read and presented their story to the class.

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

Whiteboard, pens, PPT, Handout with the Struwwelpeter stories (You can find the whole book as a free pdf on Google)

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

The class worked pretty well, the students were engaged and seemed to have fun.

How could this class be improved/ modified?

More work with the text. Maybe a gap text, or matching pictures and verses of the stories.

Thanksgiving-Kids-stories

DE F19 INT Introduction

Language Resident Name: Tilman Viëtor

Day and Date: Wednesday, 09/04/19

Language and Level (intermediate or advanced class): German Intermediate

Class theme/topics discussed: Introduction (personal & organizational)

Goal of the class: The students and I get to know each other; they understand what the class will be like. Also, they get to talk about themselves, practice asking questions and describing the past.

How did you structure the class?

  1. Introducing myself (in German), with a stick figure representing myself and answers to questions about myself around it. The students guess the questions to the answers.
  2. Organizational introduction (class agreement, attendance sheet, syllabus (task for second lesson: look over the syllabus, think about what topics may interest you)
  3. Students do the self-introduction like I did in step 1
  4. What did you do this summer?

In pairs: One person explains, the other person draws a picture of the holidays. Afterwards, the person who drew shows the picture to the other pair and explains their partner’s holidays using the picture.

  • Speeddating: Students pair up, and they get 5 Minutes to find 4 things they have in common. Then they switch partners and repeat.

Difficult decisions: I ask “either or” questions and the students position themselves on one or the other side of the room, according to their opinion. Then they explain their decisions.

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

White Board, pens

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

Everything went well

DE F19 INT Housing

Language Resident Name: Tilman Viëtor

Day and Date: Wednesday, 09/11/2019

Language and Level (intermediate or advanced class): German, Intermediate

Class theme/topics discussed: Housing: How do you live? How to shop for furniture and decoration at IKEA.

Goal of the class: Learning vocabulary about furniture and housing, negotiating, talking about your living situation

How did you structure the class?

  1. Warm-up: What do you like in your dorm room? Why? (Talking with their neighbor)
  2. Brainstorming for words for furniture and decoration. First make individual lists of all words that come to mind, then say a word one after the other until you don’t know another word (no words twice). Everyone has three lives. You lose one life if you don’t know a word when it is your turn. When you lose three times, you are out. The last person standing wins a prize.
  3. Input: IKEA ad, talking about the ad to assure understanding.
  4. Shopping at IKEA: Budget constraint of 700 EUR, time constraint of 20 minutes, work with a partner to furnish your new one-bedroom apartment together.
  5. Explain to the other pairs what you bought, and why.

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

Powerpoint, Whiteboard, Pens, Banana with a small German flag as the prize

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

The Brainstorming did not go very well. After about two rounds no one came up with any more new words. The shopping at IKEA bit was great. They had a lot of fun doing that and learned new words and phrases.

How could this class be improved/ modified?

It will probably work way better with a big group, because more people usually mean more ideas for words. Also, it would be more interesting to see more than just two different ways to furnish apartments, so the students get exposed to more words. Maybe it would also be good to lower the budget to about 600 EUR, so they feel the constraint more.

Int.-presentation-wohnen

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