Throughout the past two years, many of us have been teaching language courses remotely, either synchronously or asynchronously. Even as many institutions move back to hybrid and in-person courses, there are many useful tools we can incorporate from online learning! One quarantine class activity that I particularly enjoy is creating […]
Digital Resources
10 posts
Which activities should I do on the first day of class? After several years of teaching, I still ask myself this question. As the first day sets the structure and tone for the whole semester, I am always on the lookout for new ideas. This year I created a YouTube video […]
The French writer Marcel Proust (1871-1922), best known for his novel In Searh of Lost Time, discovered an English game called “Confessions” as a teenager. His answers written as “Marcel Proust by himself” where discovered after his death. The set of questions and answers Proust wrote gave birth to what […]
Specialized Vocabulary: The Job Interview I wanted to have an activity for intermediate- lower advanced students related to “La vie au bureau”- worklife. Learning about work life is challenging yet essential for students without work experience at a professional level, since most of them are considering an internship at an […]
To keep the spirits up and maintain engagement during this week, I created this non-graded activity just to work at home on pronunciation. I designed it for beginner students, but it could easily be adapted to more advanced levels. This activity allowed me to combine two of my favorite tools: […]
The images advertising women’s beauty and care tell a cleverly designed story intertwining social norms of desire, intimacy, and gender. Examined diachronically, these images record the emergence of a modern understanding of self-fashioning entangled in growing consumerist expectations. I’ve become interested in these archival materials while researching the construction of […]
There exist many free and user-friendly word cloud generators online (a list is offered here). They can be very helpful with getting a group discussion started. The example, below, comes from an activity revolving around the (very catchy) song “Où va le monde?” by French band La Femme (This Youtube […]
This activity is ready to implement in any language and best for novice mid to novice high. In this activity, students view photographer Peter Menzel’s photo series “Hungry Planet,” which documents what families around the world eat in a week. Students then describe what they see in the photos, namely […]
In this activity students break into groups to diagram a famous, fictional family tree. Students then present the family to the class. This activity is ready to implement in any language and best for novice mid or whenever the family unit is covered. Implementation: Students choose which group they’d like […]
This post outlines the teaching resources offered by three NYC museums as a way to start filling your “toolbox” with visual-based activities. Many museums have developed valuable resources for educators interested in implementing activities based on artworks. With a bit of adjustment to your own teaching and learning environment, these may be fruitfully […]
