Chez Renée

I just returned from a 10-day educational tour to France & Spain with my students, and it was truly one of the best student trips that I've been on yet.  This was only my second time leading a tour as the head teacher, and the first time was quite a few years ago with a different travel company.  I've also traveled on other tours as an assistant teacher.  The travel company I used this time is called NETC , and I could not have been happier with the service they provided!  All of my students came back so excited about what they'd experienced, and most of all, with renewed resolve to work harder at learning French or Spanish.  What music to my ears!  I had a wonderful time as well, and found that even I was inspired in new ways. Here are some of the reasons that I love NETC: Tour directors who live in Europe.   This person meets you when you arrive and directs the entire trip.  Having such a person in this role gives your stu...

I've been meaning to write a new story for The Adventures of Jacques & Suzette, my classroom mannequins (see previous posts on How to Use a Mannequin in Your Classroom for further explanation).  In particular, I've intended to write a story about Valentine's Day, but have had difficulty finding the time to do so.  I was inspired anew on a recent trip to Rome, where I saw padlocks covered with the initials of lovers locked to chains and posts on the bridges crossing the Tiber River.  I learned that the tradition is for lovers to lock these padlocks to the bridge and throw the key into the river as a symbol of their love. This tradition also spread to France, where lovers lock padlocks to the Pont des Arts  (this is the name of a bridge, for those of you who may not speak French) in Paris.  How romantic!  So, I wrote a new adventure about Jacques planning the perfect Valentine's Day date for his girlfriend, Suzette.  They wen...

I've begun the fabulous adopt-an-escargot  project in my third-year French class this week, and there is definitely excitement in the air!  I love how much this project awakens the interest of all of my students...even those in other levels of French.  Today, students in lower levels of French could be found gathered around  Escargotville in the corner of my classroom :).  It warms my heart to see this. Today I used the iPad2 in conjunction with this project.  Students were asked to write a haiku poem for their dear baby escargot.  After reviewing how to write haiku, students used the StoryKit app to create a page which contained a photo of their baby, the text to the haiku they wrote, and a recording of their own voice reading the haiku.  Students were able to send the link to me through email, and I was then able to project the pages onto the big screen so that everyon...

"If you would persuade, you must appeal to interest rather than intellect." ~Benjamin Franklin I saw this quote on a poster on the Persuasive Writing teacher's classroom door this week, and it got me to thinking about how, in my experience, teenagers do need a lot of persuasion to be convinced that studying any particular subject is worth their while.  So how do we persuade them in a World Language class?  Appeal to their interests, such as: Music Food Entertainment Cultural Differences All of the above are easy to weave into French class if you're willing to exert a little extra effort.  Let's take music, for example.  Over the years I've developed a list of French music that I use to  teach listening skills and to reinforce grammatical concepts at appropriate times.  Students also learn cultural information when they listen to authentic French music, so they're really learning on so many levels when a teacher ...

Today I brought in a delicious French Christmas treat that was so easy to make, and it was a big hit with my students.  It's called a Saucisson LU au Chocolat (rough translation: chocolate sausage), and it's made with French butter biscuits (LU brand preferred) and dark chocolate.  I couldn't find the LU brand at my local grocery store, so I used a German brand (below) instead.    First, you crush the butter biscuits.  I just crushed them with my hands, which I actually found to be quite therapeutic :).  Then you mix up a chocolate sauce and pour it over the crushed biscuits. After mixing well, you'll have a mixture that looks like this: Pour it onto foil, and roll it up into a "sausage" shape. Put the sausage in the refrigerator overnight.  When you take it out the next day, it looks like this: Slice with a knife and serve! As is typical of French desserts, the saucisson  is not...

My third year students recently finished studying how to describe objects in detail.  They learned how to describe the shape, texture, surface, weight, size, capacity, temperature and general condition of an object, including how to name what the object is made of.  In order to help them practice what they'd learned, I gave them a homework assignment to bring an interesting object from home for "Show & Tell" in French.  I asked them to be prepared to describe their objects in detail to the class.  They had to speak for a minimum of 30 seconds at a normal speed.  Here are some photos: Students were allowed to look at a written description of their object as they spoke, but in my opinion, this activity was less like a memorized presentation and more like informal conversation.  Informal speaking is one of those areas that is difficult to assess, and I think this activity was ...

I learned about this review game at a conference and tried it out with my students.  It's called  Organized Chaos.   It would work well for any subject!  Here's what you do: Write 8 questions that cover the topic you want to review. Make 8 copies of each question (so you'll have 64 sheets of paper). Give a few sheets of paper to each student. Ask students to crumble up each individual piece of paper into a ball. Tell students to throw the balls onto the floor, in the center of the room. Ask students to get out a sheet of paper and number from 1-8. Tell students to get up and start uncrumbling paper balls.  They write the answer to the question they find on their sheet of paper.  Then they crumble up the paper into a ball again and throw it back into the center. Repeat until they've found all 8 questions and answered them all. Collect their answers or go over the correct answers as you see fit. Put the garbage can in th...