Moving from the Communicative to the Action-oriented Approach –Oral Interaction

Note to participants who attended April 01, 2016 OMLTA’s “Parle-moi” conference: Included below are the instructions on how to carry out game, dialogue and text tasks as described in Before/During/After stages and new ‘Teacher Feedback’ forms to better reflect the 4 kinds of tasks/ a revised “Auto-evaluation” form.

Contents of this document:

I. Knowledge of the resources I used, seemed very limited. So I have made a list of all of them below

II. Positive Learning environment- importance

III. Definitions of ‘Range’ ‘Accuracy’ ‘Fluency’ PLUS 4 revised Teacher Feedback forms

IV. Explanation of the BEFORE/DURING/AFTER of Games ; an example of a level A1 game: theme L’hiver /example of a level A2 game: theme L’été.

V. Explanation of the BEFORE/DURING/AFTER of Dialogues example of a level A1 dialogue: theme L’hiver/example of a level A2 dialogue: theme Lété

VI. Explanation of the BEFORE/DURING/AFTER using a text (story) theme: winter for metacognitive learning (to practice the learning strategies) at A1/A2 level .

VII. Explanation of the BEFORE/DURING/AFTER using a text (website) theme: summer) for cognitive learning ( to assess accuracy and fluency) at A1/A2 level.

I. Resources I used for the presentation:

A. Ontario Ministry of Education;

1. A Guide to Effective Literacy Instruction Grades 4-6 Volume One (2006) pg 77, Appendix (download from the site . NB Appendix not on the site for reasons of copyright. You will have to make copies from an actual paper copy!)

2.Growing Success Assessment Evaluation and Reporting (2010)

3. A Framework for French as a Second Language in Ontario Schools K-12 (Jan) 2013 (pgs 8-9,21)

4. (Revised) Ontario Curriculum French as a Second Language Core Extended Immersion Grades 1-8 (Sept) 2013 (pg s 28-29 Achievement Chart)

B. Ministry funded documents:

Curriculum Services Canada; Guide to Reflective Practice for Core French Teachers * free download from the CSC website a ‘must read’ for all FSL elementary and secondary teachers if you are just getting started implementing the Action-oriented Approach

Ottawa-Carleton District School Board; Effective Assessment Practices in FSL: Connecting Growing Success and the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) (June 2013

C. Commercial Resources

Nelson Education; Strategies for Success: Tools for the Second Language Classroom M Faulds 2010

Pearson Education Canada Professional Learning; Effective literacy practices in FSL: making connections” S. Howell 2008

Rubicon; Talking to Learn 50 Strategies for Developing Oral Language Glass, Green Gould-Lundy (2011)

Scholastic; Brain-Based Strategies to Reach Every Learner J.D. Connell (2005)

II. Before the BEFORE- Positive Learning Environment *I can’t emphasize this enough!! Have them on hand / permanently displayed/ on your cart at all times

If the goal is to have students feel confident when speaking in French, then it is imperative that they understand and accept that French is the ‘working language’ of the classroom!

In order to encourage the use of French at all times , students need to feel at ease when taking risks to do so. They must have the tools in French to contribute to a positive learning environment for everyone!

Make Anchor charts of them all:

L’acrostiche RESPECT *try to elicit the suggestions

Pour un travail coopératif

Pour m’aider à apprendre le français / Pour communiquer mon message (Above 3 are from CSC: GtRP Core)

98 ways to say Très bien/Très bon – have students practice a few of them so they can encourage each other in French

III. Definitions: Range, Accuracy, Fluency: Using the principle of backward (bottom-up) design, look at the Teacher Feedback forms for assessing. You will see that 3 of the criteria of oral interaction are ‘range’ ‘accuracy’ ‘fluency’.

Range means how many/few vocabulary items a student is able to use when interacting orally about a topic.

Accuracy means if a student can use the correct expression or structure as the situation demands eg: use of Qu’est-ce que c’est vs Qui est-ce; answering a question asked in the plural (structure) with the plural not the singular eg: Est-ce que vous avez...? Oui, nous avons... NOT Oui, j’ai...

Fluency means how much/little the speaker’s responses need to be reformulated by you (tu veux dire que...) in order to keep the conversation going and how much/little starting and stopping the student does.

**NB 1. The Teacher Feedback forms may not be a good tool to use to assess when your students are NOT accustomed to being assessed for oral ability/ you have little experience in formal assessment of oral ability. At the end of each performance task, I have provided a description of how to scaffold the actual assessing-full support /partial support. This can be considered an ‘interim’ way to assess until such time as you and your students are comfortable with using the Teacher Feedback form. The eventual (year-long or longer) goal is to assess using theTeacher Feedback form. Students with learning challenges may always need support. This can be reflected in the evaluation in the report card. USE YOUR JUDGEMENT

NB 2. Before you assess using the Teacher Feedback form, show it to the whole class and have a few students practice using it with you for all students to learn the expectations

IV. Using Games to assess range accuracy and fluency in Oral Interaction

Games:

List of 20 games with instructions found in the Handout

Sources for the games:

1. Nelson: Strategies for Success, Chap. 7

2. Pearson: Making Connections, the Appendix

3. Ont. Ministry of Education: A Guide to Effective Literacy Instruction Grades 4-6, the Appendix

4. Rubicon: Talking to Learn 50 Strategies for Developing Oral Language, Chap’s 1-

5. CASLT: AAT Assessment in Action Levels A&B

NB: Research on brain-based learning shows that retention improves with movement/the brain LOVES anything new or different

Try to incorporate as many different games as you can into your practice

Purpose: to acquire a wider range of vocabulary, expressions/structures based on the topic.

‘ How to’- BEFORE/DURING/AFTER

BEFORE:

-you decide the topic /theme

-have the appropriate questions for the topic/ theme on an anchor chart/screen as well as vocabulary items: Have them displayed-picture + word. YES Poster Pals theme vocab posters are still very useful!

-make a paper copy of the vocab items with picture and word

DURING:

-With the whole class, you practice pronunciation then do a Q/A with several students for everyone to listen to.

Choose 2- 3 of the games to practice the Q/A.

Many of the games start by dividing the class into teams/awarding points/You may want to keep the same teams for the term award points or privileges to the best team

AFTER:

Assessment of the Performance task(product) -4 ways keeping in mind range, accuracy fluency (interim/ more simple way of assessing until students are comfortable with ‘Teacher Assessment forms.)

i) you assess specific students while the game is being played

ii) you offer the option of students choosing their partners to do the Q/A. You listen/assess

iii) partners record their Q/A session that you later listen to and assess

iv) you assess by having a 1-1 conversation with specific students asking the questions, the student answers/ student gets to ask you a couple questions.

Scaffolded assessment:

–full support: student has a copy of the vocab items right in front of her/him with the words

-partial support: student can glance at the anchor chart / up on the screen

-independently: you use the Teacher feedback form student may need to look at the anchor chart when needed.

**Long term goal is for students to be comfortable enough that you can use the Teacher Feedback form directly.

Student Self-assessment (Auto-evaluation) - 2 different formats. If students have never done this before, they may benefit from a discussion in English about the kinds of information being asked for.

Game examples in the Handout

“Jai.../Qui a...? (winter vocabulary see egs of game cards in Handout; suitable for A1 (Breakthrough) stage

La châine des questions (summer vocabulary see egs of game cards in Handout; suitable for A2 (Waystage)

After the AFTER: Keep paper copies of the vocabulary, as well as the ‘Teacher Feedback’ form if you use it, in the student portfolio so students can use them to explain the importance of doing games/ how well s/he did.

V. Dialogues Classmate conversations/ role plays/ topics of personal interest

Purpose : to be able to converse with classmates on topics of personal interest

‘How to’ –BEFORE/ DURING/ AFTER

BEFORE:

In the Handout there is a 2 pg list of Action-Oriented tasks which can be made into dialogues for student to student conversations or for specific roles i.e. customer/sales assistant, 2 cousins talking etc. *A couple on the list are for skills other than Oral Interaction but I have left them in anyway.

Also In the Handout, a suggested list of topics of personal interest you can use to get started

you choose the topic/scenario

with the whole class, develop a dialogue based on a topic. Give students the opportunity to contribute ideas for the content. This, in the resources, is called co-construction. You guide how simple/complex the questions and answers should/shouldn’t be. This may have to take place in English.

Co-construction of vocabulary items / structures / expressions become ‘Additional possible criteria’ in the Teacher Feedback sheet

here is where you decide if any JIT grammar needs to be (re)taught i.e. which structures /expressions embedded in the dialogue you will (re)teach for better understanding of the language itself.

JIT (Just in Time) Grammar- (from Pearson’s Making Connections) important quote:

“To avoid presenting grammar and language structures out of context, FSL teachers remain vigilant of just-in-time grammar opportunities. For example if students are expressing what they like to do in a learning sequence, you orally introduce the verb aimer and teach some forms of it (sing/pluriel) (prés/passé-composé) (aimer + infinitif)”

DURING:

Have a copy of the dialogue up on a screen/ on chart paper and on a sheet for each student.

Model with a few students while the whole class listens.

Divide the class into groups. All students practice with at least 2 different partners using the paper copy for support. **I don’t advise using knee or elbow partners for this activity. This is ‘the work’ part of oral interaction!

AFTER:

Assessment SAME AS FOR GAMES

Self-evaluation-same as for Games; 2 different examples (half page)

NB From simulated conversations to organic interaction

**Once you have practiced dialogues on 3-4 topics (in fall), using the anchor charts of those topics for support, with the whole class, have a student ask a friend 1 or 2 questions using topic 1, then that friend asks another friend 1-2 questions using topic 2 etc.. This is simulated conversation among classmates . As more topics of personal interest are added, the goal is for students to be able to organically choose a topic/ questions they want to ask each other. Once students are accustomed to this kind of talk , I would suggest that you schedule it at least 2-3x/week and/or use as a Warm-up.

To get started this ‘organic conversation sharing session’, ensure that everyone takes a turn (let students know ahead of time when their turn is) and assess while they are speaking. You should not need to assess formally but may want to as you approach the end of a term.

For this, have students choose their own partners and perform a conversation (Q/A) on a minimum of 2 topics of personal interest.

Dialogue examples in the Handout

Winter: buying ski equipment at a ski shop in Quebec A1 (possibly) /A2 level

Summer: calling a distant Francophone cousin in Cochrane to ask about recreation facilities in preparation for a family summer vacation there A1 (possibly)/ A2 level

After the AFTER: Keep copies of the dialogues any assessment forms you use, in the portfolio so students can use them to explain to parents/guardians the purpose of dialogues as practice for class sharing sessions on personal topics.

VI. Using a text (story) Le bonhomme d’Helene Allan Morgan

Purpose: -Metacognitive learning –giving students the opportunity to practice the learning strategies for (better) comprehension

-Cognitive learning- the traditional purpose of learning (new) knowledge

Before the BEFORE

Return to maintaining a positive learning climate:

-“Pour un travail coopératif”

- l’acrostiche RESPECT

-Pour m’aider à apprendre le français/ Pour communiquer mon message

-Review/practice ‘97 ways to say Très bien/Très bon’ to encourage ‘persistence’. Once again build in time for students to practice a few of their choices as ways to encourage each other in French!

Overview: NOTES

-8 Comprehension Strategies found in Pearson’s Making Connections pgs 74-111

- reflect Bloom’s for L2 learning.

-There are tracking sheets for all 8 comprehension strategies /some of them are for 2 different levels of ability

-Have strategies 1-3 up on a screen/on anchor charts/ make paper copies of same for students and whichever of strategies 4-8 you are will be using. SEE below for an explanation.

-NB: The main purpose of the example task I shown here is to make the learning strategies ‘visible’ to the learner i.e. the assessments are Q/A about the strategies not the content of the text itself. I would suggest that for Core classes, you use this kind of task often with different kinds of ‘texts’ during the year until you feel your students are starting to become familiar with the process and the strategies.

-For Immersion/Extended programs these are of course the steps you use in teaching the content subjects as well, so your students automatically get more practice at it.

-A lot of the Before, some of the During, After sessions will be done as a full group/ whole class activity. This is where you will model and explicitly teach the learning strategies using the GRR. Students will follow along/participate/fill in on their copy of the Tracking sheet for each. Students then go into work groups, they practice the Q/A of the strategy with a partner using the Tracking sheet for support, then change partners and repeat. Strategies 1-6 are done in this way.

-** If you think students need more practice of the Q/A in the group situation , build it in.

-NB Starting at Strategy 3, some tracking sheets are for different ability levels; simpler/ more detailed

-Use whatever you think your students can achieve-Krashen’s ZPD.

-Assessment: for most of the strategies, can take place in the same 4 ways as for the Games/Dialogues above OR

use ‘Teacher Feedback-3 “I can ask and answer simple questions about learning strategies”.

The goal, once again, is to use the Teacher Feedback form once they are confident being assessed in this way.

Important quote about the use of the comprehension strategies from Pearson’s Making Connections

“Exploring aural, visual, and written text in FSL is about understanding the text. It is also about reusing strategies students already know and acquiring new ones, to help maximize understanding. Bringing these strategies to a conscious level so students develop an awareness of how they learn best, is called metacognition. Specific strategies are used Before, During, or After exploring a text. They are best introduced in short lessons that require simple but meaningful input from students followed by practice. They should also be introduced in a progressive manner so that one strategy helps prepare the way/contributes information needed for success with the next strategy. Anchor charts /tracking sheets help cue and reinforce the language used to talk about each strategy”.

The Task sequence: BEFORE/ DURING/AFTER

BEFORE:

Select a topic/type of text; decide the purpose

a) the practice of the learning strategies (metacognitive) OR

b) learning new information/knowledge (cognitive)

Always, in any of the 5 skills you assess, clearly explain the purpose right at the beginning i.e. the job students are expected to do at the end – the Performance Task. Why? Because once the brain knows the job it has to do, it then immediately goes into ‘anticipation and planning for’ mode!

See list of 40 text types in the Handout; modify any language that is necessary ; my example is in the passé simple which needs to be changed.

The ‘Hook’ Then create the ‘Hook”-the story you will tell to the students about a personal experience that gets the students interested in the topic/gets them thinking about a related personal experience of their own

you decide what JIT grammar needs to be (re)taught. Make an anchor chart of it using examples from the chosen ‘text’ / prepare a practice sheet for students- if you are going to give one.

DURING: Strategies 1-4 are fairly self-explanatory.

1. Je pose des questions

2. Je fais des prédictions

3. Je vérifie ma compréhension

NB Strategy 3 is the start of where I have given 2 choices for the Tracking sheet to accommodate the levels of ability

a) Simpler graphic, fewer details

b) more details – eg monitor and repair of comprehension.

Once again, use whichever suits the needs of your students as the anchor chart/Tracking sheet!

Strategy 4: Je fais des liens (T-S) (T-T) (T-W)

Make anchor chart of Tracking sheet of your choice

For, Le monde autour de toi? (T-W), you may have to ask very guided questions to elicit 1 or 2 ideas.

Strategy # 5- “Je dessine une image”- only 1 level of ability Tracking sheet

Strategy #6 “J’identifie les idées principales” – 2 levels of Tracking sheet

NB: Learning sequence choices

Once you are at During: Strategy 4, you are already in the upper section of Blooms. You can stop there if your class has reached its max.

Strategies 5-8:

-for those who can take their students further.

-any of these may also be a better fit the kind of ‘text’ you have chosen

*In the Task example I will show you, I skip from Strategy 4 right to Strategy 7 because I feel that works best for the ‘text’ I have chosen.

Strategy # 7 Je fais la synthèse & Strategy # 8 Je réfléchis

How you ‘teach’ these strategies will depend on: type of text, ability of students, how and if you even want to formally assess these strategies.

2 levels of Tracking Sheets for both 7&8 / on half sheets

Assessment: Depending on the confidence level of your students, use either the tracking sheets (full support) , an anchor chart (partial support)to assess OR the Teacher Feedback Dialogues/Personal Interest

Self-Assessment use the same examples ( half page of 2 different kinds) that are used for games and dialogues/ personal interest.

Text: Le bonhomme d’Helene Allan Morgan suitable (possibly) A1 /A2 level

After the AFTER:

a) have students keep their grammar notes/ any practice sheets and Tracking sheets of the Strategies in a duotang / binder entitled “Stratégies et Grammaire” or put them right into their portfolios.

VII. Using a text (website) www. festivaldubleuet .com/ (à Dolbeau-Mistassini)

BEFORE:

-Go to the website and determine the knowledge you want your students to acquire (Backward design)/ prepare (in advance) the questions you are going to ask in order to elicit that information

-Ensure that the answers for Tracking sheets 1-3 are easy to find

-Make a list of new vocabulary students will need to practice / know the meaning of in order to be successful when on the site. Make paper copies of the list for students

- Have the Tracking sheets for Strategies 1-3 and any others you wish to use up on anchor charts/ up on a screen

-Make paper copies of the tracking sheets for student use.

DURING:

Choose 2 games to play and assess students so they will be confident in their pronunciation and comprehension of the specific vocabulary for the task.

JIT Grammar: Teach any grammar you see used on the website in order for students to better understand the information on the website.

Have the site up on a screen; lead a Q/A discussion in order to highlight the basic information you want them to acquire. Ask questions which allow students to predict the kind of information they will find in the menus of Programmation, Tarification/Passeport, Hebergement, Profil, Nouvelles, Artistes Invités, Zone Multimedia, Merci à..., Nous joindre

Next day: The talking session you have done will allow students to fill in the answers on the Tracking sheets. Provide time for partner practice in small groups .

AFTER

Assessment: Use the Teacher Feedback form – Knowledge to assess

Self-Assessment: same as for the above 3 kinds of tasks (half page)

*Website: Festival du Bleuet: Suitable for A2 level possibly A1 if the questioning is purposely kept simple.

After the AFTER

Have students put the vocabulary page , any tracking sheets assessment forms you used in the student portfolio so students can use them to explain to parents/ guardians what they learned about this Festival

*RevisedTeacher Feedback forms/ Auto Evaluation below