Deuxième partie de ma série sur Haït (voir le début ici). Je continue d’utiliser le site web de TV5 et voici la feuille qui accompagne la vidéo sur la famille Callixte à Thomonde dans le plateau central de l’île. Magnifique série de reportages de TV5 sur le vie dans la petite bourgade (avant le tremblement de terre).

Je suis en train de parler d’Haïti et du séisme avec mes élèves cette semaine. Après lire une partie d’un article du Matin (journal suisse) (voici la feuille), je vais travailler avec le site web TV5.org et les « Chroniques haïtiennes » sur la petite bourgade de Thomonde et la nouvelle route RN3. Plus d’infos la semaine prochaine là-dessus.

Après les vacances, j’ai décidé de recommencer mes cours avec un petit quiz de culture générale sur le monde francophone.

J’aime le hiphop. Surtout le hiphop français. Peut-être parce que j’en ai écouté pas mal pendant mon adolescence en Afrique. Et maintenant, en tant que prof, je continue d’essayer d’utiliser des formes de musique qui peuvent aussi intéresser mes élèves. C’est ainsi que j’ai décidé d’analyser « Petit Frère » du groupe marseillais IAM avec trois différentes classes. Le tout en 6-8 heures de cours. Vous pouvez télécharger le concept et les feuilles de travail ici. Pas mal de plaisir, certains élèves ont vraiment apprécié ceci. D’autres m’ont dit qu’ils n’écoutaient pas ce genre de musique. Voir mes élèves suisse-allemands essayer et réussir (certains bien, d’autres un peu moins) de rapper en français : un moment de bonheur.

Watching a language change and evolve is a fascinating process. “Unfriend” (the act of removing someone on a social networking site such as Facebook or Myspace) has been declared the Word of the Year 2009 by the New Oxford American Dictionary. Using material found on NPR and Newsy, I decided to do a small listening comprehension based on the NPR article (and the transcript). The entire thing can be found here. I have also added the pictures of Sleeping Beauty, Rip Van Winkle and the map of the state of New York used to introduce the NPR audio segment.

World Radio Switzerland is another great resource for various activities in a classroom and a nice way to add a typical Swiss perspective on news. Their programme called “Expat Life” 0ffers an interesting new perspective on Swiss matters. Living as Expat myself (growing up a Swiss teenager in Africa) for a couple of years, I really appreciate the foreign view of all things Swiss. The model of the peach and the coconut to explain how a society functions is an interesting starting point for a discussion in a classroom. Have a look here at the original segment on WRS (MP3 included) and here on my listening task. The picture above is a screenshot of the WRS website.

NPR.org is a great place to stop by if you want to gather fresh and exciting ideas for listening comprehensions. As a follow-up to my restaurant and menu activity, I wanted my students to get into the “ramen noodle” feeling and talk about it. The following article (mp3 and transcript provided) on NPR.org and my questions (divshare link here) were used to do so. The picture above was taken from the article on NPR.org

The “Gymnasium” edition is a double-period spent analyzing 4 protest songs with a 12th grade class in a public high school in Aarau. Strange Fruit (Abel Meeropol/Billie Holiday), Testify (Rage Against The Machine), War (Bob Marley) and This Land Is Your Land (Pete Seeger/Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings) were used in this unit. Good class, motivated students and a rather nice atmosphere throughout the two lessons.

The “vocational school” edition was also tested during a double-period with a mixed class of  “Mediamatiker” in Biel, Switzerland. This Land Is Your Land (Pete Seeger/Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings), Bring’ Em Home (Pete Seeger/Bruce Springsteen) and Strange Fruit (Abel Meerepol/Billie Holiday) were used. The songs were somewhat too complicated for my students. Bring’ Em Home worked out fine, though. For the Holiday song, I finally decided to work with the German translation of the text.

If you want to have the songs (as high quality Mp3 files) just tell me via email or drop a line in the comments.

Inspired by a rather old and boring text in the Lifelines Pre-Intermediate English book, I tried to come up with something more relevant for my students: the self checkout system one can find nowadays in grocery stores (just starting in Switzerland).  The entire sequence lasted around 45 minutes, spread out on 2 lessons (around 30 minutes in the first lesson and 15 minutes one week later).  Students were interested by the topic and had a rather positive about the idea of a self checkout. Download the handout (text/questions/homework assignment) here.