Show and Tell

In the last week have started Show and Tell sessions in class.

The pupils bring in some photos from home and can prepare some comments about them. The main objective is to just speak clearly about something familiar and simple.

The pupils work in groups of about 5. While one of them speaks the others have an assessment sheet. They have to evaluate their classmates on several key areas -  interesting photos, speaking clearly, interesting information, "correct" English and a final mark.

(las hojas de evaluación solo sirven para enfocar el interés de los alumnos mientras escuchan a sus compañeros)

5B show and Tell 1 from Atalía 5 Gijon on Vimeo.
5B Show and Tell 2 from Atalía 5 Gijon on Vimeo.

And thank you Martín for your humorous "Ninja Cat" presentation ...

5B Show and Tell (Martín) from Atalía 5 Gijon on Vimeo.

Easter Holiday Homework: Follow-up.

The pupils produced some excellent and interesting "Holiday Diaries".
(Pincha en las fotos para verlas más grandes)

After returning from the Easter break we did a questions and answer session using the whiteboards to take notes. (photos and video 5ªB). After selecting various dates from the holiday period pupils have to find others in the class who did something on that date. They use their own diary for consultation.

La calidad del sonido en el video no es muy buena pero se puede ver que todos los alumnos se involucran en la actividad 

Easter Holiday News from Atalía 5 Gijon on Vimeo.

Holiday Drawing Activities

Ideas for the holidays: Why not try drawing your favourite animal or cartoon character?

This is a link to "Art for Kids Hub" playlist on youtube. The same one we used to draw the Kookaburra.

Running Dictations

5ºB Running Dictation from Atalía 5 Gijon on Vimeo.

We went outside on a cold friday midday to do a "Running Dictation". Working in teams the students have to pass a written message from one end of the playground to the other via a chain of communication. Sentence by sentence, bit by bit. The final writing is never the same as the original but it is interesting and fun to see the end result then discuss which parts are "easy" and which parts cause difficulties.

Photos from 5ºA:

Who Am I? (actualizado)

Pupils have to guess their "new identity" as a famous person in this speaking activity. In this video there are very good examples of :

• Self-correction, 
• Question formation
• Listening and speaking in context

... and excellent interaction between pupils. Well done!

5ºB:

Who Am I? from Atalía 5 Gijon on Vimeo.
5ºA:
5A Who am I? from Atalía 5 Gijon on Vimeo.

Types of Questions the students asked:

• Am I a man? Am I a woman? Am I an actor? Am I Spanish? Am I a singer?
• Can I speak English? Can I run fast? Can I play the piano?
• Have I got long hair? Have I got a famous wife?
• Do I live in Hollywood? Do I play for Real madrid? etc etc

Story Time: The Iron Man

On fridays we usually have our "Story Time" when we read poems, section of novels or short stories in a group. In the first term we read the first chapter of this famous story for children, "The Iron man" by Ted Hughes.

Open the video below to see an excellent and atmospheric, animated version of the first chapter. It is from the BBC children´s channel.
(1. Esto es un recurso que se utilizará en el aula)

Below that there is a video of the students in 5ºA doing a follow-up activity.
(2. Alumnos de 5ºA hablan del libro en el segundo video:)


The Iron Man from Atalía 5 Gijon on Vimeo.

5A The Iron Man Review from Atalía 5 Gijon on Vimeo.


Listening Practice: This is an abridged version of the story, we will be doing some comprehension questions based on this listening. Practice reading the text to yourself as it is read by the narrator.

Esto es otro recurso que se utilizará en el aula:

Kookaburra Videos (Art)

Photos and video from our recent art class: ...

Pupils follow the instructions from the video on the interactive whiteboard:

5B Kookaburra Drawing 1 from Atalía 5 Gijon on Vimeo.

... and then give feedback on their first attempts ... some are more happy with their work than others!:


5B Kookaburra Drawing and Comments from Atalía 5 Gijon on Vimeo.

Even though these photos and videos are from the pupils in 5ºB the drawings from 5ºA  were equally excellent! More photos of the finished drawings to come soon.

What did you do ...?

The students often tell the class their news at the start of the class. Part of the process is the use of verb tenses in context.  However occasionally we revise and focus directly on some grammar points.

Here the students from 5ºB are doing question and answer chains. They prepared their questions but do not know who they will be speaking to until their turn comes around again. (activity from October 2015)

Some students prefer to watch and listen ... which is fine!

5B Past Tense Chains from Atalía 5 Gijon on Vimeo.

Draw a Kookaburra (Art)

We have been working on birds in Literacy. Our next project in Art class is going to be building 3D models of birds from Oceania. Before that we practiced drawing this super bird that is found in Australia: The Kookaburra

Here is the video with step by step instructions that we watched in class. (Message to pupils: If you don´t like your first version do another one!)

The Magpie Poem.

We are working on "scientific" and non-fiction texts at the moment. To coincide with the research on different types of birds we had a bit of fun with this traditional poem about the magpie (the urraca or "pega"). Throughout history the magpie has been the subject of superstition and folk stories.

In the first video the pupils of 5ºA have been given the words of the poem as a puzzle. They are deciding the logical order for the words by working out the "value" of each element and which of them rhyme.

5A Magpie Poem Class from Atalía 5 Gijon on Vimeo.

Here the pupils of 5ºB recite the poem in groups:

5B Magpie Poem 1 from Atalía 5 Gijon on Vimeo.
5B Magpie Poem 2 from Atalía 5 Gijon on Vimeo.
5B Magpie Poem 3 from Atalía 5 Gijon on Vimeo.

There are lots of variations on this traditional poem but this is the most commonly known one:

One for sorrow
Two for joy
Three for a girl
Four for a boy
Five for silver
Six for gold
Seven for a secret never to be told!

The Strange Life Cycle of the Cuckoo.

This is a video that we watched in class. It was the introduction to focus our interest on the life and behaviour of a very strange bird: the Cuckoo.

Día de la Paz (Art)

Every year we celebrate "Peace Day" in school. This year we made a copy of Picasso´s Dove of Peace". We made a collective artwork with all the Atalía pupils making hand prints around the dove silhouette. In class each pupil also made their own versions of the Picasso drawing.

In this video the pupils from 5ºB are painting around dove templates which they had made by copying from the original drawing. Then they used their fingers to create a similar effect to the whole school picture which can be seen on the floor.

5Bpeacedayart from Atalía 5 Gijon on Vimeo.

Teatro de Halloween (octubre 2015)

Para coincidir con la celebración de halloween en el colegio, los alumnos hicieron una adaptación de un cuento que habíamos leído en "story time" (la sesión de cada semana que dedicamos a cuentos, lectura en grupo, dramatizaciones ... ). El cuento original se llama ""Little Rabbit Foo Foo" y la versión en canción se puede ver en este video:

   

El proceso de adaptación del cuento/canción se centró en cambiar los nombres de los personajes, añadir nuevos adjetivos y mantener el numero de sílabas que hay en la canción original. 

Los alumnos decidieron en sus grupos el guión final y por eso la versión de 5ºA  se llama "Evil Demon Boo Boo" y la de 5ºB "Creepy Zombie Zoo Zoo". 

Aquí hay un video del último ensayo en cada clase:

5A Theatre Rehearsal: "Evil Demon Boo Boo" from Atalía 5 Gijon on Vimeo.


5B Rehearsal Theatre: "Creepy Zombie Zoo Zoo" from Atalía 5 Gijon on Vimeo.

y aquí algunos fotos de los actores ...

Using Whiteboards in Class

For general motivation and class dynamics the whiteboards are great. Pupils just like the switch from writing in their notebook. Here they are reviewing their news from the previous weekend and doing a simple questionnaire,  getting up out of their seats, walking around the class and writing down answers.

We have been working on giving instructions and orders. In the activity in the following video the pupils need to write down commands on their whiteboards using common verbs and then dictate them to the group who then have to do an action in response.

The aim of this activity is for everybody to participate, to think and act quickly, and to feel confident using English.


5A Whiteboards from Atalía 5 Gijon on Vimeo.