Anne Robertson (Waikato Diocesan) has created this versatile topic based activity to explore vocabulary for Food and Drink in a practical way. Anne explains how basing the activity on blog writing and actually cooking the afternoon tea led to general enthusiasm.
Read Anne's description of her activity: " I used the idea first of all with a Year 11 group to revise the food & drink topic and revisit language from Year 10. They worked in small groups in the classroom and just did the invitations, conversations and shopping lists, they then did a written task explaining how the party went. The idea blossomed when they said how the activity would have been better if they had beeen able to actually have the party and cook the food. So I devised the extended activity to use with my Year 10 class and tweaked it a bit to include language they needed to learn. It can be done as a web based activity or not depending on the resources you have. As the students worked through the activities and needed clarification on the grammar points I interrupted and taught them as necessary. I introduced the topic by looking at some recipes in class and we explored the language used in them. I also provided powerpoint presentations on creating invitations, future tense with aller and going to a restaurant both in class and on our VLE Ultranet. The outcome of afternoon tea really motivated them to complete the tasks and the results were delicious! Doing the blog ensures that they think a little bit everyday about what they are doing and "chunks" the activity so they don't leave it all to the last minute. It also meant that I could feed back regularly and see where they were having difficulties so that I could respond in lessons to clarify language and grammar. It is a very flexible activity and how much you need to input really depends on the group of students. Feedback was generally positive - some students would have preferred a tighter framework whereas others revelled in the freedom of being able to explore the language. When I do it again I will probably give more support and guidance in the early stages so that the weaker students feel comfortable and in control".
Margaret Ubels (St Peters' College) has created a domino activity for year 10 concerning food products that one can buy.
You can print them off on different coloured cards to make different sets then laminate and cut them.
►