Photos to Elicit Discussion in the MFL

http://www.buzzfeed.com/daves4/people-you-wish-you-knew-in-real-life

Following the success of "March is Children's Story Month" in my upper level Spanish class (see post HERE), I am declaring "April is Photo Month".  This means I will start each class with a photo and a short discussion.  

I'm banking on the saying "a picture is worth a thousand words" to capture the students attention and elicit their thoughts and opinions in the TL. Starting class with photos and a 7-10 minute discussion will keep the students guessing as to what I have in store for them each day, but won't steal away too much time from the scheduled lesson plans.

I suggest that you vary the goal of the target such as one day students say what will happen next, or what happened previous to the photo being taken, or creating a personal profile for the person, etc.

Below is a list of a mixture of serious photos from news sites, beautiful photos from National Geographic, and funny photos. As always, you will need to preview the photos for school appropriateness! 

1. BBC News in Pictures

2. Toxel.com "World's Best Father" photos

3. National Geographic Photo of the Day

4. Lens, New York Times Photos

5. Awkward Family Photos

6. BuzzFeed, People you wish you knew in real life

7. NYTimes, What's going on in this picture?
   (Click HERE for a previous post in Feburary regarding this website.) 

Here is an idea to get students involved in finding the photos for discussion:  Choose 3 students at the end of each class and give them the assignment to find and email a photo to you that evening, along with an explanation (in the TL of course) why they think it is a good photo to use in class.  The next day in class, show the 3 photos but DO NOT tell the students who sent the photos to you.  The class will then vote on which photo they want to discuss and the student that sent the photo to you can win a small prize. (Even something as small as a "fireworks" clap. Anything to give them recognition for having their photo chosen by the class!)

Please feel free to share other websites with collections of interesting photos.