A Truth Universally Acknowledged

“It is a truth universally acknowledged that…” –quoting Jane Austen’s opening line of Pride and Prejudice – adolescents have developed a strong negative attitude to writing. So, I find myself invariably squeezing my brains to figure out how I can make writing more appealing, more authentic, more creative for my FCE students. In Unit 4 of FCE Result, they are asked to produce a review of a film. 

Therefore, I thought it’d be far more motivating and engaging to start with a class discussion of films in general – different kinds, films they’d seen or would like to see, films they would or wouldn’t recommend at all. They worked in groups, exchanged opinions, agreed or disagreed about the messages sent by some films they discussed and, most importantly, they naturally used loads of meaningful, thematically related language. The final step of the activity would be, of course, writing the review. 

I do not know if they had a good time while writing it at home. I choose to think they did. Anyway, if it was half as much as the fun they had while discussing the movies in class I believe the task was successfully accomplished. 

Teacher: Laura Lupo
Class: FCE `G´ and FCE Cultural Norte

Teen Voices

 “Which could be a meaningful topic, one which would motivate my students to engage in a heated discussion and collect data to write a report as a follow-up activity?” I wondered. And then, while watching the news on TV, it dawned on me that my students would very likely be casting ballots in 2013 Congressional elections and I thought about the Teen Suffrage Bill.

When I put forward the idea to my First Certificate classes in Cultural Centro and Cultural Norte, everybody responded enthusiastically and in no time at all they put pen to paper to design a set of questions to prepare a questionnaire. They decided they would visit other classes and find out how their peers thought about “being given a right they haven’t asked for”. Here I´m quoting Sofia Rossin, one of my students, who very solemnly established her position about the TSB.

A total of 47 students were interviewed – FCE “C”, FCE “E” and FCE “H” in Cultural Centro- and in Norte we visited Pre -First. We were warmly welcomed by the “host classes”, who willingly answered all the questions my students had so conscientiously prepared. They took down notes of ALL the opinions, arguments and viewpoints provided.

The next step was talling the information gathered and drawing conclusions. Finally, working in groups, they wrote a report considering the suitability and acceptance of the bill.

Although most of the students interviewed were familiar with the TSB and said they usually discussed politics with their friends, families and teachers, they vehemently opposed the bill. On which grounds ? Basically, it seems they do not feel responsible enough to vote and that being given voting rights at 16 would definitely not motivate them to participate in the democratic process of our country.

To sum up, I believe it was a truly fruitful, interactive activity. All the students, the interviewers and the interviewees felt they were being listened to, that they had a say on their future. In other words, they felt they had A VOICE.

  

Teacher: Laura Lupo
Class: FCE G and Norte

Your Week in a Headline

If your news reported your week, what would be the headline? “Your week in a headline” started as a fun, short and simple way for students to summarize what they had been up to during the past week, at the beginning of our weekly Skype Session. What follows is a selection of some of their most memorable events so far this year. 

Teacher:Rocío Villanueva

Class: FCE Online

My Fave Bookmarks

I asked my group to bring colour cardboard, a pair of scissors and sticking glue for the following class. They probably thought something was wrong with the teacher! To prove them right, I also brought old mags to cut out bits and pieces in case they might feel like a collage. The next class I asked them to join in pairs or groups of three and read a story in class. This time everybody read “The Shepherd´s Daughter”. Then, I asked them to design a bookmark related to the story. They spent 40 minutes in their design and then presented their bookmarks to the rest of the class, explaining the connection between the bookmark and the story they had read. They voted for the best bookmark. A different class altogether where everybody worked in a relaxed atmosphere with inspiring background music.

Teacher: Juana Nicemboin

Class: FCE 'D'

Grabbing Blurbs

Teacher: Mariana De Biassi

Class: CAE 'B' 

Lights, camera, action!

Teacher: Lucy Guerrero 

Class: FCE 'A'

 

Making thinking visible

Many times what we learn mirrors what others are doing around us. We watch, we imitate, we adapt, we construct from there, we develop. Now imagine learning to dance when the dancers around us are not visible. Strange as it may seem, something very close to it happens all the time when learning to think. Thinking is pretty much invisible.

What we did in our group was try a way of making thinking visible through the use of art. The learners browsed through a menu of short stories and they chose the one that attracted them most. Yes, each learner can choose what to read and yet be in the same class as peers who have taken different reading decisions and paths. 

First, the learners decided what to read and I made sure that more than one student would read the same story from the menu.

We followed the several-stories-but-same-task approach. When the time came to discuss the stories we left the classroom and went to the place that speaks volumes about books: the library, which accounted for a big portion of the successful outcomes.  There the students gathered in different corners with the like-minded partners who had read the same short story.

The task I set was very simple, the thinking they engaged in was not: they were asked to say what was meant by the title and to select powerful quotes so as to discuss their implications. Next came art and that was when their thinking became visible.

These are the posters they designed to encourage others to read their short stories in our school:

All this flowed from rendering thinking visible. However, the first step is to overcome the problem of invisibility. Part of the challenge lies in the invisibility of thinking, which is in itself invisible. We are so used to thinking being invisible that we do not notice how easily thinking can stay out of sight. As educators then the first task is to see the absence, to hear the silence, to notice what is not there. A journey of one thousand miles, the Chinese proverb says, begins with but a single step. Seeing the absence is an excellent first step.The second making thinking visible through art.

Art invites thinking, encourages visual literacy, fosters different learning modalities, develops forms of thinking that are vital to grow as individuals. The positive payoffs of the experience? Thoughtfullness, accomplishment, enjoyment, ownership, and above all a dream come true: a bunch of adolescents staying 20 minutes after the class was due, handling books and gathered around the librarian to borrow one!

Teacher: Analía Dobboletta

Class: CAE 'C'

Reading Marathon

Throughout the year, some students approached me asking how they could enhance their knowledge and improve their skills to be better equipped to face the demands of the course. Apart from mentioning attending Self Access and handing in homework, I insisted on the importance of reading - a habit which, frequently because of lack of time, we neglect.

On Sep 30th, Fundación Leer launched the 9^th National Reading Marathon. Students, teachers, relatives and volunteers gathered to enjoy reading at schools, libraries, clubs, etc. I thought it was a good opportunity to remind students of the importance of reading, so we celebrated this event in the library, devoting part of the class to reading for the sheer pleasure of it. After the initial surprise (students did not expect to have a class in the library!), they chose some short stories and sat down comfortably in the armchairs. When they finished reading, they made their recommendations on “literary emoticons”, and shared their comments about the stories with other students. 

As a follow-up activity, the students designed a poster combining images and their quotations on reading. We all participated enthusiastically and benefitted greatly from the activity.

Listen to CAE 'D' students' comments:

Teacher: Laura Gieco                     Artículo en Español
Class: CAE 'D' 

         Escuchar comentarios de alumnos

Tea Party

Our project was the result of many talks we had in class during the first half of the year. Basically, at the beginning, students were interested in cultural and historical issues associated with The British Isles. Consequently, I (as a teacher ) took a map to the classroom since they even wanted to learn about the Commonwealth and topics connected with this.

By July, ARCI 70^th Anniversary was also present in our talks and one of their concerns was associated with very name of the Institution. Why was it officially called ‘Cultura’ when people referred to it as ‘Cultural’? And so I told them about the Library and the concerts, plays, etc. that had taken place there. They agreed it was a real pity that all those events had been discontinued and were happy about the Film Festival held this year, for instance.

When we discussed our reader, ‘The Woman in White’, we devoted two complete 3 period  classes to the topic. I remember it was very cold (July in fact) and they were so involved that they did not even want to go out and take their break. There, they said how good a cup of tea and something sweet would feel. And there sprang the idea of celebrating ARCI’s  70 Anniversary with a Tea Party. Their research started and they collected lots of information on the topic. There were other alternatives in the air, such as competitions, etc. but the Tea Party finally won its place among us.

After our Director of Studies, Prof. Mónica Pérez was informed and she gave us institutional support. Then I introduced the idea of a raffle to make the event more attractive and because I felt both the Institution and our students (not only my group) deserved the chance of getting a present. It was a success and we got many prizes. 

 

We also agreed Escuela Cacique Taigoré would be the place we would help with donations. We collected many things for the school and the girls in charge of receiving donations were proud of the many objects we got.

Together with this simple account of the project I attach the file we forwarded via our Virtual Classroom to the other groups. The photographs of our Tea Party are part of the series of pictures our Coordinator, Prof. Analía Dobboletta shared with us.

READING ABOUT TEA

WRITING TASKS

All in all, it was a pleasure to work on this and all of us ( FCE Adults ‘A’ students and myself ) felt really happy and satisfied with the results.

Teacher: Gabriela Muller                       Artículo en Español

Class: FCE Adults ‘A’, 2011

Forever Young

With our FCE classes we dealt with the topic of “Stages in Life” in our coursebooks. We studied a really interesting article called ”My Generation”, which was about a group of elderly people in the UK who got together and formed a rock band named “The Zimmers”.

As a follow-up activity we watched their video on YouTube and then we talked about how brave, how enthusiastic, how unbelievably young these elderly people looked. In contrast, we also talked about those other people who are dumped in homes, marginalized and forgotten.

And thus the idea of the project was born. We thought we could visit a home near Cultural and spend a nice time with the inmates there. So we got together - FCE “G” and FCE “M”- several times, rehearsed a couple of songs and a puppet show and the students had good fun  during the rehearsals.

On August 24^th we happily made our way to “Excelencia”, a home on Laprida Street, and we spent an absolutely delightful afternoon there. The elderly people were fascinated to see so many young people around, talking, singing, dancing for them…They were moved to tears. They were so grateful to us for the visit!!

Yet, we believe our students -really sensitive kids by the way- were still much more touched. They were amazed at the lively chat, the easy manners, the sweet looks these people gave them in return for their songs and dances.

We conclude our students learnt that elderly people are not always unhappy and that sometimes feeling 'forever young' is possible, that there is always a will to go on…

It was an utterly rewarding learning experience for the elderly people in the home, for our students and for us, which made us all feel better people. Unforgettable…

Teachers: Laura Lupo and Patricia Zorio

Classes: FCE 'G' and FCE 'M'

                  Artículo en Español

Pequeños Gestos, Grandes Logros

Students from FCE 'A' ran a solidarity project to help the 'Pequeños Gestos, Grandes logros' Charitable Fund. 
 

Teacher: Lucía Guerrero                           Artículo en Español
Class: FCE 'A'