F251: Service Learning Class
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Useful WebsitesDescription: Here you will find an excellent collection of training exercises in English, German, French and Spanish. There's an extensive collection of exercises dealing with verbs, including present tense, past tense, imperfect tense, present perfect, etc. as well as thematic vocabulary based around topics such as animals, professions, weather, soccer, computers, the sea, the human body, and many more. This is an excellent collection of activities. Use: This site would be excellent to reinforce or review a vocabulary module. Students select a theme and then chose their native language and then L2. Students then are given the word in English and have to type the correct word in the target language. The incorrect words are recycled until the words have been correctly written. Teachers also have the possibility to write their own exercises for student use. Grammar exercises are translation so no room for creativity but exposes students to new verbs with which they might not be familiar. Description: This is the homepage of the Parisian public transportation office. Students are able to access information and schedules for various forms of public transportation in Paris: metro, RER, and buses. News articles pertaining to transport issues are also available as well as the information covering all the types of métro passes available. Use: There are numerous exercises that students can get involved with using this web site such as planning excursions from one train station to the next, calculating costs and the time that it will take to travel. This would be a good exercise for intermediate French language students. The interactive métro map allows the instructor to teach how to use the métro in an interactive manner by having students find out how to reach specific Parisian tourist sites. 3. http://www.casadejoanna.com/ Description: This page has been designed for both teachers and students who are using the Internet as part of their language curriculum. You can find here lists of French and Spanish language web sites, search engines and the mandatory organised information. There are also activities and resources on technology implementation. The author classifies each link with a simple icon system which is easy and quite helpful (ex. mouse = activity, apple = teacher link) Use: This website could be an AMAZING addition to a foreign language textbook series. The French section is divided up into thematic units. Each unit is then broken down into several different activities. In the food unit, students have access to the French Canadian food rainbow, a French bakery’s webcam allowing students to see the baguette making process, and much more. Many of the activities have accompanying external documents. The activities can be geared towards listening, reading, writing, and speaking and another benefit is access to the French-speaking world. Activities are not only based on France. 4. http://www.ltscotland.org.uk/5to14/C4modernlanguages/ Description: This website uses games to help students to have fun while working on their French. Students will join the residents of Chez Mimi. These characters assist students of all levels to perfect their knowledge of French. Upon completing a gme, students receive token which will help them to make it onto the Top Ten list. Bonne Chance! This site is also available in German under Hennings Haus. Use: The games are divided into three different levels. Students work on a variety of skills. One of my favourites games would be the Guess who version and would be a great activity for when personal descriptions are taught. There is also the possibility to make your own cartoon. This activity would be a great tool when talking about either the Tinton or Astérix comic books. Students are able to create their own token books, so are able to return time and time again and save their tokens in the same file. A teacher could give a week long challenge to see who could gain the most tokens on would win a prize. This could lead to out side of class motivation to use French. 5. http://www.bbc.co.uk/education/languages/french/experience/index.shtml Use: This site is nice because it has real life videos on a variety of topics. Some scenes might be a bit outdated, but still gives a true to life presentation on a variety of themes. Teachers could use this site with intermediate students and have then select from the large variety of clips. Students could then write questions and discuss the videos with their partners. I really liked the way the clips are organized. Students have the choice to view the complete video with the sound, just listen, and then read the transcript. This gives opportunities for all types of language learners. If a student is struggling on a specific word, he/she could read the transcript. The teacher should promote watching and listening before reading the transcript. 6. http://fog.ccsf.cc.ca.us/~creitan/grammar.htm Description: This is an excellent collection of online quizzes designed to allow students to test themselves at their own pace. The 12 chapters each contain between 8 and 10 quizzes. This website is an ideal place from which to set homework, or to use as a tool to support or extend students. Quizzes have been made to accompany the Allons-y textbook series. Use: Although this site is geared toward one text book series, it has many quizzes from grammatical concepts covered in all text books. Students have access to a variety of quiz formats from selecting the correct conjugated verb to fill in the blanks. One advantage to this site is the listening quizzes which are available from distinguishing tricky numbers such as 6 (six) or 16 (seize) to distinguishing between different words poison vs. poisson. This site would be appropriate for 1st and 2nd year French. 7. http://www.nll.co.uk/test/french.shtml Description: This site has fifty multiple choice questions which vary from beginning level to more advanced idiomatic expressions. Students read the questions and select one of the four choices. After completing the test students are automatically able to see their score with correct and incorrect answers. Teachers are able to receive their students’ results. Use: Teachers may wish to use this test as a pre-test to see what knowledge their students have of the French language before building on possibly, weak foundations. Multichoice and answered online, the test takes about 30 minutes to complete. It could also be used to give 4th year students an idea to what sort of placement tests they might encounter for to earn college credit. 8. http://www.tourisme.fr/visite-virtuelle/index.htm Description: This is a wonderful collection of material dealing with all aspects of touring France through virtual visits. Students are able to view one-three different views of the specific location. The site presents the well known as well as the more obscure aspects of French culture and life. The site is in both French and English and would present students with some excellent translation material. Use: Teachers could use this site with all levels. Students would be able to view a variety of different tourist sites through viewing the virtual visits. Afterwards students could work in small groups and develop a short presentation about their site. With more advanced students, this could include having the students do more research on the French region in which the monument is located. Teachers could create an extended document describing in French many of the places one could visit on the map. Students would have to understand the description and try to find the corresponding place from the virtual visit. 9. http://www.funtrivia.com/dir/357.html Description: There are quizzes here involving everything from “Harry Potter”, to "French Verbs for Beginners". There are also quizzes dealing with Idiotic French Idioms, French Numbers, French Proverbs, Combien Font, Vive le R’s, French Slang and many more. The quiz subjects are so diverse that I would believe every student could be entertained. Students automatically receive feedback upon completing the quiz. Use: This site would be appropriate for all levels. I see this site as being a reward for students or the day after a test for some sort of fun day in the computer lab. Students would be able to pick several quizzes on their own and learn different aspect of the French language that is not directly covered in class. For example, the French equivalent of Hufflepuff (Harry Potter house) is Poufsouffle. 10. http://www.bbc.co.uk/languages/french/lj/ Description: French Steps is an online beginners' course and starts with basic phrases that allow you to order a taxi, ask for directions, get tickets on the underground, buy presents and get some travel tips. You will also be taught how to say your name and where you're from, greet people, discuss your family, buy clothes, talk about the weather as well as take a train and book a room. This site is a good online practical course in French. Use: Teachers could use this site as a supplement to units in the text books. Each module has pronunciation explanation with oral samples. After completing an in class vocabulary module on one of the taught topics, students could reinforce the new vocabulary through the exercises proposed on the site. The vocabulary list is quite helpful and is organized in alphabetical order. Students could work through these modules at his/her own pace. Teachers could develop exercises from this site and have a substitute carry out the guidelines with ease. It is hard to find substitutes who are able to speak French. This site would be perfect for a day when the teacher knew he/she would be absent. |
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Department of French and Italian |
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