1. Topic-
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Success at a new school in Spain |
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2. Content-
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In the Spanish language: school subjects, school materials, activities
related to doing well/poorly at school, making polite suggestions |
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3. Goals: Aims/Outcomes-
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1.The students will act as the guidance counselor and respond to
student posts looking for advice on how to do well in various school
situations.
2.Students will consider what a new student attending a new school
may be feeling and provide suggestion for that student to make friends.
3.Students will need to decide which activities from the vocabulary
list would allow a student to succeed in school and which would not
be recommended in order to do well. |
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4. Objectives-
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1.Students will make polite suggestions on how to do well in academic
subjects, using "debe + the infinitive."
2.Students will make polite suggestions on how to make friends at
a new school.
3.Students will also indicate (using "no debe + the infinitive") what
types of behaviors would not be suggested. |
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5. Materials and Aids-
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6. Procedures/Methods-
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A. Introduction-
1.Student should discuss in small groups a time in their life when
they did particularly well in a class or assignment (or some other
academic endeavor).
2.They should come up with a group list (in English or Spanish) of
things they did in order to achieve their success. They need to consider
all of the things along the way that lead up to their moment of success.
3.Finally, they should hypothesize how things may have turned out
differently had the things they included on their list never occurred. |
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B. Development-
1.As a class, read a note that was posted on the guidance counselor's
door from a student who recently transferred to a new school in Spain
and is having difficulty doing well in her math class.
2.As a class, write a response to the student, giving her suggestions
on what she needs to do in order to do better in her math class. |
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C. Practice-
1.Working in small groups again, the students will respond to three
more posts left on the guidance counselor's door: one student looking
for advice on how to do well in his art class, one student looking
to make friends because this is a new school for her, and one student
who can't understand why he isn't doing well in his Science class
and lists some of the things that he currently does (all typical teenage
pitfalls - talking to friends during class, doing his homework with
the TV on, and not wanting to ask the teacher for help).
2.Students will have access to their notes and books but are encouraged
to try to work together to come up with their responses without needing
to look too much up. (At this point in the unit, they should be pretty
familiar with the vocabulary and the goal with this activity is to
put the vocabulary to practical use in complete sentences to make
polite suggestions.)
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D. Independent Practice-
1.The students will work individually to respond to two out of three
possible posts. The three posts that the students will choose from
are similar to the ones that they worked on in their small groups.
This will then be discussed so that they can learn what things they
did well and any areas where they could improve. |
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E. Accommodations (Differentiated Instruction)-
1. For higher achieving students, I will ask that they try to include
some of their personal experiences when they relate their suggestions
to their student's posts. They should make suggestions, then try to
elaborate on them using personal experiences (real or imaginary) to
illustrate the effectiveness of their suggestions.
2.For students who are having some difficulty with sentence structure,
but seem to have a good grasp of the vocabulary, I will allow them
to use examples that they could refer to of other suggestions made
to students posts. During their assessment, they could use the replies
that they wrote together with their group as a model to help them
form their new sentences in their writing assessment.
3.For students who struggle with the vocabulary, they may be allowed
to use their notes during their writing assessment or may need to
work in small groups to help each other during the assessment, while
each still responsible for writing his/her own work (but they could
help each other do it). |
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F. Checking for understanding-
1.For a final assessment, the students will work individually to
respond to two out of three possible posts. The three posts that the
students will choose from are similar to the ones that they worked
on in their small groups. This will be a formal writing assignment
that is graded using a 15 point rubric. |
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G. Closure-
1.To wrap up the assignment, the students will discuss as a class
some of the things they discussed in their small groups from the introduction
to the lesson. We will also discuss what determines whether they use
those same techniques that provided them success before on future
assignments.
2.Then the students will come up with a list of some of the things
a foreign exchange student may be feeling or dealing with while making
the transition to a new school and a new country.
Some of this discussion will need to be in English, but as much as
possible should be in Spanish. |
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7. Evaluation-
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1.Students are able to write a response to two out of three posts
that will be scored on content, mechanics, and comprehensibility.
2.Student should reflect good decision making in the types of suggestions
that they are giving in their role of guidance counselor. They should
also show compassion for the foreign exchange students who are having
a difficult time adjusting to the new school setting in the lesson. |
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8. Teacher Reflection-
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The students did well in making good suggestions on how to do well
in school. They know what are the recommended study techniques and
have reported that most often they know what they should be doing
to succeed but also have learned that in some situations they are
able to get away with doing less. In any situation where they can
get away with doing less, they generally choose to. |
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