Submitted by Elizabeth Chaigne
Objectives:
Content:
Students will...
- recognize that the ability to speak freely and spontaneously (as in an improvisation) as a character depends on the amount of preparation that they completed
- recognize what consititutes effective interview questions.
- recognize what constitutes good interview responses.
Cultural:
Students will...
- recognize and demonstrate understanding of the formal 'vous' as a singular pronoun . (Because the 'vous' pronoun is used both for the 2nd person plural and formal 2nd person singular, students have difficulty distinguishing between these two usage forms.)
Language: Content Obligatory
Students will...
- use the following question words to formulate interview questions in the present and past tense with the 2nd person singular (formal vous form): qui, quoi/que/quel(les), quand, où, comment and pourquoi (i.e. Where did you grow up? Où est-ce que vous avez grandi?; What is your favorite food? Quelle est votre nourriture préférée?)
- formulate responses to interview questions using the 1st person singular with the present and past tense of action verbs such as: live (vivre); eat (manger); grow up (grandir); walk (marcher); run (courir); etc to talk about themselves as a character.
- use agreeing/disagreeing and explaining expressions such as: exactly (exactement/ en effet); not really (pas vraiment); actually (au fait/par contre); that's to say...(c'est à dire...) with both the present and past tenses to engage in partner interviews.
Language: Content Compatible
Students will...
- utilize question/answer vocabulary such as: ask a question (poser une question); ask for information (demander un renseignement/information); give an answer/response (répondre/donner une réponse) in the conditional tense to contribute to classroom discussions (i.e. Il dirait...; Il répondrait...).
- use the conditional form of the verb devoir (this verb denotes obligation) with the pronoun 'on' (3rd person singular) to suggest a need for change (i.e. On devrait changer cette question/ce mot....).
Learning Strategies / Social and Skills Development:
Students will...
- reflect and draw from a self-written character history/autobiography to act out an interview.
- practice generating effective interview questions and answers.
Time Frame:
Two 50-60 minute lessons
Materials Needed:
Description of Assessment (Performance Project):
** Day 1 **
Pre-task:
In today's lesson students will be preparing for and conducting improvised interviews as their character. Students will take turns acting both as the interviewer and the interviewee. The character development work done in all 4 preceeding lessons should feed into this lesson by providing students with all the background knowedge they need to speak freely as their character. Remind students that the overarching goal of this unit is that character development must be a planned out activity so that performances are believable.
In the first part of this lesson you will want to review question words (who, what, where, when, why, how; qui, que/quoi/quel(les), quand, pourquoi, comment); interrogative structures (inverting the subject/verb structure, using est-ce que, or raising the voice at the end of a declarative sentence; and formulating effective responses to interview questions. This may seem like basic information, however students have a tendency to utilize a minimum of language in question/answer situations. One of the goals in immersion teaching is to provide students with a maximum amount of extended discourse. See the CC and CO language objectives for specific langauge to target). Going over this kind of language can be done through direct instruction or weaved into previous lessons' content.
To weave this content into previous work for example, you could use the categories from the bubble map from the last lesson (also attached here as Web Map Example). In a whole class setting have students think about the character of Shrek from lesson 1. Based on these categories (family background, physical attributes, fears and passions, major life shaping events) what additional information would they like to know about him? Let students formulate questions without editing them. Make a list of these questions as they are proposed.
Then inform students that good interview questions naturally lead the interviewee towards complete sentence structure. Interviewers should avoid questions that result in a yes/no answer. Review the list of questions collected on the board and ask how students might modify them to reflect open ended questions if necessary. (i.e. 'Do you like carrots?' could be modified to 'What vegetables do you like the most and why?' (You might want to use the think-pair-share strategy explained in lesson 2 for this also attached under the name 'Explanation of Think-Pair-Share'. See the CC language objectives to help guide the kind of language you may want students to focus on during their Think-Pair-Share.)
This same type of analysis for forming questions should be used to go over how to formulate good responses.
A good response incorporates the who, what, where, when, why and how into the answer. Again, instead of just providing this information to the students you could follow the Think-Pair-Share strategy asking students how Shrek might respond to one of the earlier generated questions. It has been my experience that students at this age have a tendency to repeat the same vocabulary used in the question in their responses. While this can be effective in providing complete sentence structure for answers, students have a tendency to depend too heavily on it. The result does not always sound very natural (i.e. The question 'What are you most afraid of?' results in an answer, 'I am most afraid of...' instead of drawing from richer non-repetitive vocabulary such as 'Well, one time I saw a really big spider, but I think what scares me the most are centipedes.') This is a great opportunity to stretch students to think about the autobiography they wrote and pull some information from it into their responses.
Finally, remind students to think about work from previous lessons and how they can incorporate it into this interview. We should see and hear appropriate gestures and language (lessons 2 & 3) as well as verbal content that reflects the character's life (lesson 4).
During-task:
Students will pair up with each other and exchange the web maps they created during the previous lesson. Based on the categories used on their classmate’s web map and acting as the interviewer they will formulate 8 -10 questions to be used for the improvised interview. Allow students to write out the questions. However, they should not share these questions with their partner. This will keep the interview process spontaneous and keep the spirit of an improvisation at hand. Whatever they do not complete, can be finished up as homework.
** Day 2 During Task (Con't) **
Pairs of students hand back their web maps to their owner. Given class sizes which may be upwards of 25 students, there may not be sufficient time for each pair of students to perform their interview in front of the class. If this is the case and space allows, break the class into two groups and have the two groups perform their interviews in front of each other. The pairs should not rehearse the interview before performing in front of the class.
Beyond Task:
Have the students complete the self evaluation as a homework assignment once they have completed the interview. As a follow up the teacher could summarize the answers for the class to show the overall results for the activity.
Assessment:
Students will self evaluate their performance as their character using a checklist/comment sheet. This evaluation is not to be graded, but to serve as a growth tool for the student. (See the attachment for the checklist/comment sheet.)
Attachments:
NOTE: some attachments are in PDF form (get Acrobat Reader)Think-Pair-Share Explanation