When I was planning with my colleagues last summer we decided that we would do an Amazing Race competition for one of our level 3 and 4 units. We had all kinds of great ideas and we planned for hours to make what we thought was a great project, but when we put it into practice it was a major flop. I was ready to give up and throw in the towel second semester because I could not come up with a way to make the assignment interactive, engaging and easy to keep track of. One day my husband came to the rescue when he sent me a link to the blog Ditch That Textbook which is FULL of Google Apps for Education resources that can be used in a variety of ways, one of which is using Google Forms, Slides and Maps to create an interactive, self-run Amazing Race project. Hallelujah! You can see the post here, but this is what I ended up with. Pre-Work for Students
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I asked myself this same question when I started teaching at a rural, low-income school where the most up-to-date resources I had available to me were at least ten years my senior. I'm here to tell you that it's possible, but it can be tough. Here are a few tips I've learned along the way. Tip 1: You don't have to pay for your resourcesLet's face it, as teachers we do not make enough money to pay for our own resources, at least not in my state. Many of my colleagues will go and spend hundreds of dollars to buy pre-made courses that they end up modifying anyway. If you're like me and you are simply not capable of buying your own resources, then don't! There are plenty of places where you can find free online resources to teach your students French. For example, you can visit my grammar pages which have exhaustive resources to teach and practice grammar topics at all levels. You can also find resources at sites like French Spanish Online, Frenglish News, Tex's French Grammar, Themes (done by the same school), French-Resources.org and the like. I like to search through University sites, and I have actually found that sites specifically designed for students in Great Britain to study for the GCSE exams are extremely helpful! A lot of the grammar sites that I come across have sister listening sites or have links to activities. Make sure to bookmark EVERYTHING, because you never know when you could use it. The bottom line is, the resources are out there, and somebody has probably already done the work for you. Check out my resources pages to find activities as well as more links to great sites that can help you out; some pages are currently under construction but are coming soon! Tip 2: Don't be afraid to make your own resources out of what you already have available to you |
Bienvenue!Welcome to my blog where I share tips that I have learned as a young teacher with little to no resources seeking to create a relevant, rigorous French curriculum.
RessourcesL'ÉcrivainMy name is Mme Probst and I am a French teacher who, after years of struggling to find resources without a text, decided to share my resources with the world so that other teachers didn't have to do the same. Archives
October 2019
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