Unit: Involucrado para mejorar la comunidad

This unit is soooo great....it feels so authentic!

I've always loved it. (here's our old version that is solid)..but my colleague and I have made some tweaks that are really powerful to create flow as we guide our students to the final evaluation.


First change:  Rename it (again)!  Involucrados para mejorar la comunidad
I wanted to showcase our goal (create a proposal to our partner college to help communities in need of assistance), so the name makes more sense.  I do one daily translation a day and that's with our daily learning target and sometimes I build the title into that procedure.  I just use my magic pointer finger (which requires English which is normally a no-no) and point to what they translate...and I focus on morphemes a lot.  So for example when we translate para as "in order" I immediately put my pointer on the "ar" in mejorar and pause while they say "to" before moving to the root verb and they say "better".

Second change:  Use an authentic photo for my cover page.
No more cute clip art if I can help it.  I want true representation of the target culture and that's great fodder for communication.  We spoke about it various teams throughout the unit because there's a lot going on.  They also asked questions (!!!) about it.  I will promote and encourage authentic questions ALL THE TIME because they are an absolute essential skill for intermediates.

Third change:  re-evaluate our mini themes to ensure that we are giving examples of ways that communities are being helped so the students have a foundation of ideas (and tons of tons of input based on #authres).

Overall plan: Powerpoint for the unit
Days & Theme authentic resource
1-2:  Una comunidad (Senor Wooly's Amnesia) to focus on structures for the unit: ladron, se mete en, se fija en
3-4:  Trafico loco y los Mimos video, article
5-7 (may add a day): Vendedores Ambulantes (day 7 is a reading IPA) art sketches, songs (Caribefunk Playaman, Ruben Blades En El Semaforo), parody (Vendo pan), article
8-10: Personas sin techo / Indigentes Cali y El Dandee La Estrategia, Juanes La Historia de Juan, Duolingo Podcast La Voz de La Calle
11-12: Pobreza Google maps, videos and article for Sebastian Yatra Si Quieres, Puedes
13-14: "Arte" Photos of murals & graffiti, video and article about Macromural de Palmitas
15: review all ideas and plan proposal (planning for presentational speaking)
16: presentational video and transribe/reflect


NEW Materials:  (otherwise see original post)

Day 1: story based on screen shots and modified embedded reading (their evaluation at end was to simply highlight everything they understood in the story)
Day 2: use nuggets to work to and evaluation at end is a "grammar" evaluation (note:  NOT in gradebook though it looks that way so students put more effort in!!)

Day 3: vocab listening (a grade will always raise their efforts!)
Day 4: article and Angela Gardner's activity that I learned about at ACTFL 2019 called "Grilled session".  It's awesome!  It creates reading FOR A PURPOSE!
Process:  Look at picture and discuss along with title and quote.
Paragraph 1: I give them 2 minutes in silence, 1 minute to collaborate and then turn papers over for the competition.  I pull a name at random to answer my question.  If the student answers correctly, class gets a point and if not, teacher gets a point.
Repeat for paragraph 2 (it's longer so maybe break it into 2 sections)
THEN...change course....same process for the following paragraphs... but students (random names) ASK THE QUESTIONS and teacher is on the spot to answer.
It's an engaging activity.

Day 6:use picture and have students ask each other questions (post English question words: Who, What, Where, When, etc),  salad bowl game (from Carrie Toth) to introduce vocabulary and video to visually work on not only the products and practices but also the perspective of vendedores ambulantes

Day 8: story based on screen shots and story which is used for grammar evaluation, tic tac toe (print this 9 screens to one paper for a tic tac toe board! and give out different color post it notes to partners) speaking to determine present vs past (I put a word bank on the board)
Day 9: PQA via a cootie catcher!

Day 10: podcast packet and presentational writing

Day 12: music video1, article, music video 2 (I did the same thing for the article as day 4:  Grill Session), grammar evaluation
Day 13:  distribute a pic to partners and have different rounds as they pass around (see below); group competition (tried for groups of 3):  my colleague got this activity called "know more" from a blog, but doesn't know where...it's awesome to get them interacting together; evaluation Venn diagram

round 1: identify if mural or graffiti, play I spy with my little eye (model this so they remember how to play) and then pass new pic,
round 2: identify if mural or graffiti, put the timer on 60 seconds and partners work together to identify 20 objects; pass for new pic
round 3: identify if mural or graffiti, partners work together to identify their American perspective vs an Hispanic perspective; pass for new pic
round 4: identify if mural or graffiti, partners take turns to 1 positive and 2 negatives

Day 15:  review my ideas (and others that are not new) with memory and then time to brainstorm about their presentations that they'll present orally on Flipgrid the next class