Taking my lesson in French on sentence structure and making it interactive for my kiddos with Lumi! 😊

This has been quite the informative week in EC&I 834! It has been so much fun creating all my material and setting up my module to use with my students in the fall! It is always so refreshing to take the information we cover in class and apply it to our teaching which is what I focussed on doing this week when I got to explore Lumi to later on incorporate into my module with the hope that it would help engage my students with their online grammar lesson in French.

My first module focuses on sentence structure. Seeing as my kiddos will be in Grade 2 and Grade 3, we are focussing on proper sentence composition. We are also concentrating on identifying the subject (le sujet), the verb (le verbe), and the object (le complément) in sentences. Like with most lessons in a French Immersion classroom, exposure to different vocabulary is key to widening our students’ database in French, and we are always translating and providing new vocabulary throughout our lessons when we can.

As I mentioned in my course profile to ensure consistency throughout the school year each of my modules will have the following:

• PowerPoint Presentation of the new concept
• Pre-recorded lesson of PowerPoint Presentation in French (with English translation included to help all students understand/follow along)
• Both interactive and paper worksheets/workbooks (to be completed at home or in school if needing extra help/time)
• Boom Cards
• Quizlet or Quizizz activities
• Flip video
• Formal evaluation – Quiz (summative assessment) to be completed in class as a whole group.

The first thing I proceeded to do when setting up my module, was take the PowerPoint presentation for my lesson and I recorded a video of the slides. This video provided lots of translation throughout its entirety to make sure my students would be able to follow along when accessing it from home. I used Screencastify to record this video and it was very user-friendly while also making it easy to “export” my video. I did feel like the video was a bit long and worried if it would be able to keep my students engaged (especially when they will most likely be working from home without me around to “help them focus” haha).

I then went on to take my pre-recorded lesson and made it interactive with Lumi. In my opinion, Lumi was the perfect tool to help me insert pauses throughout my video and have my students review different concepts at precise times throughout the lesson. I explored a few of the different interactive activities and selected a true and false question, a multiple-choice question, and a summary task to include in my presentation. I also went on to create two different Quizizzes for this lesson and added two different links to the interactive video that takes students straight to our mini quiz. It was pretty easy to use but I do wish we had more options to add audio to prompts/interactive activities (if anyone knows how or has figured this out, please let me know 😊). I did have to play around with inserting my interactive activities correctly and at precise moments throughout the lesson; I would hope that as I get more comfortable using this tool, I will not need as much time adding the interactive activities correctly.

From that point on, I went on to prepare worksheets on Google Slides that students could submit back to me for review and went to select BOOM cards that I would also include in my module. I also prepared a video that walks students through both the Google Slide worksheets and BOOM cards activity where I translate a good chunk of the content for students to help them complete these assignments. Additionally, I provided one extra Quizizz for students who were wanting some extra practice.

I also created a Flip prompt/activity to go along with this module where I ask students to come up with a few of their own sentences, write them out at home, and then record themselves sharing their sentences with me. I emphasized that when they share each sentence with me, they need to also identify the subject, the verb, and the object in the sentence. This not only helps the kids review what they learned but also provides them with the opportunity to practice speaking in French. I do plan on using the kiddos’ Flip responses as a formative assessment to track their progress.

Lastly, once I had all my material prepped and ready to go, I went into my Google Classroom and set up the module for my students. I wrote up a prompt that provided instructions – this was done in English for parents to understand what to do in case they are helping their child. Adding the activities to Google Classroom was quick and efficient; we are able to add different media, videos, and links to our assignments in Google Classroom which makes it easy for the kids to locate all the activities and have access to them in one place.

Moreover, I think it is important to consider that younger students will need help gaining access to their Google accounts and log-in information. More precisely, teachers will need to walk their students through step by step all the different activities and components of their blended course before allowing them to have access. In previous years, I have set up times for whole-group instruction to take place when I am introducing a new tool, application, or website. I like to project my computer screen on the whiteboard and have students follow along on either an iPad on Chromebook depending on what is available for them to use. For example, when we started using Kahoots, we practiced how to type in the correct address in the URL bar, insert class code correctly, choose names properly, and submit answers correctly. With any new tool – especially relating to technology – it is essential to walk children through all the steps to access and use it correctly. I anticipate setting a couple of weeks aside where I walk my students through Google Classroom, BOOM cards, Quizlet, Quizizz, and Flip so we can do a couple of practice activities together before starting our lessons/module for our blended course. Additionally, at the beginning of each module, I will be explaining all the activities so the kids know how to access all their resources on Google Classroom and feel confident completing the assignments for me from home.

Here is the link to my interactive lesson “La structure de la phrase” (sentence structure). I am excited to see what everyone else has set up!