alice’s posterous

A few weeks ago, I had to plan a lesson on food and drinks to a year 8 (12 years old) low ability group to show how I use differentiation. I was going to be observed by some senior managers so I decided to show them my IT skills and what I have learnt so far thanks mostly to the great professionals I follow on twitter.

The aim of the lesson was to introduce different food from different countries to my students and to create a nice menu which would include the words they have learnt during the lesson.
To find pictures of different types of food, I searched on Flickr. I was introduced to Flickr by attending a free online course on exploring images in the 21st Century Classroom organized by EVO http://aliceayel.posterous.com/free-online-course-for-educato

Flickr is a free website where you can upload you photos and videos, but not only that, you can also edit your photos and make them look nicer, add comments and captions, and search for pictures taken by other members of Flickr. So I looked for pictures of different types of restaurants and then of different types of food. I favorited them on my account http://flickr.com/people/aliceayel/ .
Then I went to http://bighugelabs.com/flickr/ to create two mosaics with my two sets of photos http://bighugelabs.com/flickr/mosaic.php
So on one hand, I have eight restaurants
and on the other hand I have 16 different types of food

My students were teamed up into groups of 3 to 4 and had to look at the mosaics and to decide the type of restaurant (French, Chinese, Mexican ....) and then on the nationality of the food and if it was a starter, main course or desert. In teams, they then created their own menu.

The lesson went well because students liked to work in teams and helping each other out and also because they liked guessing from the pictures.
You can view and download the lesson plan, as well as the slideshow for the lesson and the worksheet describing the food.

LESSON PLAN for Observations

Types of Food Explanation

Buddy Evaluation

And you? have you used Flickr or Big Huge labs in your lessons?

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I received this recipe with my weekly fruit and veg box from http://www.abelandcole.co.uk
Clementines are in season so this is a great recipe if you had too many at the bottom of your stocking ;)

For the topping:
20g butter
1 tbsp clementine juice
3 tbsp sugar
8-10 clementines cut into thick slices

For the cake:
10 g butter softened
2 clementines juiced and zest finely grated
150g sugar
2 eggs
150g self-raising flour
150ml yogurt
1 tbsp ginger
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

Preheat the oven to 180 degres.
Butter a round cake tin.
Melt 3 tbsp of sugar with the butter and clementine juice over a high heat in a heavy frying pan, stirring in the edges as they caramelise to make a thick fudge sauce.
Lay in the clementine slices and cook for 1-2 minutes on each side, till brown and release their juices.
Transfer the clementines onto the tin.

Beat the butter and sugar until light and white.
Add the eggs one by one.
Fold in the flour, yogurt, ginger, cinnamon and clementine zest.
Add enough clementine juice for the mixture to drop softly from the spoon.
Spread the mixture over the fruit.

Bake for 40 minutes, covering loosely with foil for the last 15 minutes.
Wait till the cake cools a litlle, then tip onto a plate. It should look fab!

   

Click here to download:

Clementine_upside-down_cake..zip (13 KB)

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Why not tell a simple stories with key words and expressions students have learnt, It is a nice way to reinforce the vocabulary, to introduce new words (that surely students will remember better because they are told in a story) and also for students to see the  point of learning a new language - Now you can understand a story!

Basically, this is how toddlers learn how to speak and this is the best way to learn another language.

I have found a great website with PowerPoints free to download telling simple stories or songs in French using pictures to explain key words. http://toolsforlanguage.com/french-language-powerpoint-exercises.html#comment

I really like "La Chenille qui a tres faim". What a great way to reinforce the food topic.

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