The Bubblr Tool

My first time using Bubblr left me with many ideas for using this digital storytelling website in my future language classroom.  I decided to create a short, seven slide story containing just a little bit about the cultural background and a couple traditions carried out within my family.  I decided to title the story All About Me, and would use it in a classroom as an example of what I would like students to create in order to share a little bit about their cultural backgrounds with their peers and myself. 

Creating a story such as this example story does not require a lot of complex language or narration.  It is an activity that can be adapted for each individual learner's level of English.  This can be done by asking higher level English speakers to use certain vocabulary and/or tenses within their story, for example.  An objective for this type of activity could be as follows:

Students will be able to: state where they are from using the present tense; identify and share three facts about their family; write one questions directed towards a peer.

Not Your Normal Storytelling

Storytelling is one of the oldest forms of entertainment, used to pass information from generation to generation or for simply passing the time before television, the internet, and other technological advances came about.  An interesting spin on storytelling can be described as "Digital Storytelling".  This type of storytelling "combines a narrative with digital content, including images, sound and video, to create a short movie, typically with a strong emotional component", as stated in the article titled 7 Things You Should Know About Digital Storytelling on the website Educause.edu. This type of storytelling encompasses any type of storytelling, such as persuasive, historical, instructional, and can even be created as an interactional story that requires readers to choose the next path the story takes or choice a character makes.  The options available for digital storytelling are limitless.

 Photo by Rael1

That being said, thinking about how digital storytelling can be applied within language instruction is almost overwhelming due to all of the possibilities it has to offer for students.  Digital storytellers can use free websites like Flickr, for example, to share their cultural identity with a classroom to promote a community of learners who are open to learning about other cultures, beliefs, or values.  Using pictures paired with his or her narrative, for example, promotes ownership of their creation.  This project would be very meaningful for them as students assemble a meaningful story for a specific purpose.  It would be very eye opening and a great learning experience for both the language teacher and peers to listen to a person's story and/or cultural background as it is brought to life by digital storytelling.

The Garbage Game

Overall, I've had a pretty productive day today.  I woke up, ate a good breakfast, and created a garbage plan for New York City that was submitted for approval and pleased many people.  I was able to do this by playing a "serious" type of game called The Garbage Game. While I navigated through this game on three different, I thought of some ways it could be used by students outside of the classroom, perhaps as homework or for practice.  This game asks the player to make a series of decisions regarding what to do with waste found in NYC, with lengthy descriptions of the problems NYC faces daily and yearly regarding the volume of garbage and waste it produces.

This is a great way for students to achieve the objective of defining the following vocabulary words: recycle, reuse, sanitary; as well as identify the processes of waste reduction that can be followed in NYC as well as other places in the United States.  This activity would be extremely beneficial as it teaches academic language through content, in this case Science.  Learning objectives could be assessed by the teacher by asking students to submit a printout of the results of their decision making as a "city commissioner", which could then be assessed in class.  A high reading level would be necessary for students to complete this task on their own outside of the classroom due to the lengthy descriptions of each stage of the game.

Trapped! The lesson plan

I've had my first experience playing an "escape room" game, and I have to say I was pleasantly surprised.  I couldn't really understand the point of it or what it exactly entailed from reading the description, but I tried out the escape room called "Trapped" and really kind of enjoyed it.  I played it once, thinking about how I could "gamify" a language lesson, or in other words apply game-design thinking to a non-game applications to make it more fun and engaging.  After tinkering around with the game and taking a look at what sort of objects were found in the rooms and where they were found, I thought this game would be useful in providing students practice with listening and reading comprehension as well as prepositions.  

Within an upper-intermediate to advanced class, I would pair students up and give one student half of the clues given in the walk-through in written form.  This could also be done in larger among larger groups.  As the teacher facilitates, providing assistance where needed, students would only be allowed to read the clues to one another, while the other student listens and comprehends to complete the first half of the steps.  The next student would then read the next few steps aloud and the second student would listen and complete the steps as they focus on prepositions.  Objectives would include, or students will be able to listen for clues to identify where hidden objects are located and identify prepositions in "walkthrough" to locate each object.  An instructor could assess students formatively through informal observations as they listen to students identify the prepositions in each step, as well as summatively by observing whether students were able to communicate effectively enough to escape the room.  The lesson could be differentiated according to language level, with lower lever language learners being provided with images as well as text to provide scaffolding.  I would be very interested in seeing how students react to this type of practice through gaming.  

As a side note, I don't think I would use this particular "escape room" game in a classroom anytime soon since the last scene requires shooting snipers in the woods.  With the sensitivity among people, schools, and gun control, I think it would be wise to avoid using this particular setting for a classroom game.  However, as soon as I get more time, I plan on exploring the other settings to get an idea of how the other settings end.