Activities I’ve used with movies…which (and I’m not sure exactly how…I am going on instinct and observation here….) hopefully aid acquisition….

1.        A summary of the movie (or sections of the movie) in the target language.  Students must choose one of several answers to correctly complete the sentences.  I try to build in humor, interest, etc…the idea is to get them to want to read.  :o)

       For example:

Avatar is a movie about (another world, another generation, another school district).

The characters in the movie are blue in (mood, room décor, skin color)

You can find examples in Spanish here:

http://www.mwcsd.org/webpages/lclarcq/documents.cfm?subpage=959211

http://www.mwcsd.org/webpages/lclarcq/documents.cfm?subpage=959225

2.        Read a summary and illustrate a segment of the movie from the description:

For example:

Bob Cratchit opened the door of his little home and gazed in at the scene in front of him and smiled.  There sat his wife, tired but still working hard to prepare the dinner.  Near her, seated on his stool, was his son.

More examples in Spanish:

http://www.mwcsd.org/webpages/lclarcq/documents.cfm?subpage=959227

3.        I list MEMORABLE lines from the movie…lines that are clearly spoken by one specific character.

Students draw the character (or I provide a “coloring book-like” image and they create speech bubbles and put the lines in the correct bubbles….

Example from Babe in Spanish:

http://www.mwcsd.org/webpages/lclarcq/documents.cfm?subpage=959243

4.        Here is a new project that we have been working on.  So far…we love it.  If you click on this page:  http://www.mwcsd.org/webpages/lclarcq/resources.cfm?subpage=959247

You will see a diagram that we use to “create” stories….or put stories into a written form. 

I designed it SPECIFICALLY for book/movie/video characters.   The first time we used it, we did it together as a class using the student from Sr. Wooly’s ¿Puedo Ir Al Baño?  as our central character.    We used lines from the song in the bubbles and created our own information for the other sections. 

Ok…it is a little before 4 and I promised that this would be available by then…so here goes…

With love,

Laurie