Instructional Session 31
Objective: By the end of class, you will be able to… Beginner: say sentences in French to give information about regions of France, using topic-specific vocabulary Intermediate: say a series of connected sentences in French to give information in French about the Grand Est region of France, using content-specific vocabulary, and using transition words to say more Advanced: say well-organized paragraphs in French to give information in French about the Grand Est region of France, using content-specific vocabulary, and using transition words to say more
Preparation: The Guided Oral Input strategy you will be using today is a Process Grid. You have come full circle because you are at the end of the topic study. You started with a Process Grid, which was basically your planning document, and now you are going to end by filling in a Process Grid with the class to synthesize their learning and scaffold the Expert Groups to share facts about their subtopic with the other students who were in other groups and thus have not learned about that topic. The grid will be blank when you begin the Guided Oral Input today, and you will make it with the class. This is a way for students to really do a lot of synthesis and review. You studied the first subtopic together as a class (the Grand Est region, in the example lessons), and then in their Expert Group, students explored one of the other regions in-depth as well. As you work together to fill in the Process Grid, they will review the Grand Est, offer facts about the region, they studied with their group, and learn about the other two regions, which they have not yet studied. To “warm up” and model the process, I like to start with the first row - the Shape and Concept Categories about the first subtopic (the Grand Est, in the example lessons) before moving on to the other rows, about the other subtopics that students read about in small groups. Unlike the Expert Group Reading Day(s), the Process Grid discussion can be conducted almost entirely in the course language. Students can respond in the language, and it is very satisfying, for both teacher and students, to set up that expectation and see students able to rise to the challenge. It is in this final lesson that the true power of the Process Grid Process is felt. You have provided such a well thought-out, scaffolded, level-appropriate, backwards-designed learning sequence that your students will most likely have lots of words and facts to talk about. Plus, you are advised to have them keep their readings and notes and Mind Maps handy, so they can refer to all that comprehensible text to help them form responses to the questions you will ask as you fill in the Process Grid together. The process goes something like this. You are advised to begin by reviewing the Shape and Concept Categories for the first subtopic, which you studied extensively together as a whole class. You might say something like, “The first region that we studied was the Grand Est. Can anybody tell us about the geography
Page 487
