Guest Blogger

Bonjour! I'm Señora Hitz's French teacher colleague. She asked me to write about how I employed the students to do certain jobs as I was storyasking today.

I had several positions open for students today. I had one student responsible for counting the repetitions of the focus words. I had another student responsible for writing the 10 point true/false quiz for the end of the period. I had a third student (who promised to be ruthless) be the contribution checker. This person's job was to note those students who offered suggestions to the story as I asked for them.  The other part of that job was to routinely scan the classroom looking for students who had their heads down, eyes glazed, or were just not with us.  I also had a student who was responsible for completing the story outline with the class suggestions as I asked the story.  Finally, in addition to the actors, I had the cue card holder. The cue card holder had three cards to hold up while I was telling the story. The holder had to listen very carefully to see whether the "ahhhh", "ohhhh", or "awwwww" card was most appropriate. I plan to add more cards in the future, perhaps with "C'est fascinant" or "C'est vraiment dommage".  In three classes, I used a final student to write the names of the places that the actors went to and tape the place name on the desk to keep everybody straight as to where exactly Wolfie went to try to find his cheeseburger, for example.

I was skeptical that the jobs would work, but the kids clamored to volunteer.  Without having to mark suggestions, note kids who weren't with us, fill in suggestions, or write a quiz, I was free to circle, check for comprehension, and coach the actors.  The students did a fantastic job and the entire class was seamless.  I would love suggestions for other jobs!
~Krista