By Carmen Samanes and Elena Zapico, Atlanta International School
Attending the Project Zero conference in November was definitely an inspiring experience that sparked multiple conversations between us on how to apply Thinking and Artful Routines to the Spanish classroom. In one of those conversations, we came up with the idea of changing the usual activities of movie watching. Under the impression that “before the movie” and “after the movie” activities based on analysis of characters and events become easily tedious to the students, our main concern was being able to generate their active participation from the beginning of the film. The creation of deep exploration beyond the plot is also a must that unfortunately rarely happens. Would any of the routines that we learned in PZ work the magic?
Poster with the movie characters and an explanation of the "Circle of viewpoints" routine.
We decided to work with a mixed group of 11th and 12th grade Spanish B students using the Spanish-Mexican production “El Orfanato”, a terror film from the director Guillermo del Toro. We integrated the movie in the units of “The art of cinema” (11th grade) and “The mechanisms of fear” (12th grade). The entire activity lasted three class periods.
After discussing as a group the topic of fear and its triggers, we proceeded to watch the movie without interruptions for one class period. The next day, we started with the Visible Thinking Routine: “Circle of Points of View”. In preparation for the activity, we created a poster with pictures of the different characters that had appeared in the movie so far. The students were given a sticky note where they had to write the following prompts:
I am thinking about the events happening in “El Orfanato” from the point of view of (name of the character chosen).
- I think that…
- A question I have from this viewpoint is…
Students posting their sticky notes with their 3steps of the routine written on it.
When watching a movie, students are usually focused on viewing without interruptions and are commonly resistant to discussing their thoughts before having finished it. In this occassion, we were surprised at how engaged the students were in the activity and the lack of rush to continue watching the movie. It was extremely interesting to reflect as a group about the number of students that chose the same point of view and why other perspectives were less chosen. This activity was definitely a great warm up for our second day of movie watching. The transition between routine and continuation of the film felt smooth and natural.
After finishing the movie and debating as a group about its different topics and techniques, we concluded with the routine “Ten times two” (10×2). On this occasion, we hung several copies of the movie poster around the classroom and gave the students a sheet of paper with the title 10×2 and two blank columns with 10 points each. First, the students had to stand up and observe the poster for 30 seconds. We insisted that they did not write anything during the observation time. Also, standing up was important at this stage to clearly differentiate between observing and writing.
Writing the List
It was difficult for the students to stay quiet during the observation because their first impulse was sharing with their mates what they were seeing in the poster. Although we emphasized that they had to observe in silence, we considered their engagement in conversation a sign of enthusiasm. Secondly, the students sat down and made a list of ten words or phrases about any aspect of the picture. We told them to write freely and spontaneously without the pressure of filling all the points. Then, we repeated the process: observing for 30 seconds and listing 10 new thoughts. Finally, we went around the class for everyone to share one idea for each time of observation. While the students were participating, we posted several questions for reflection: What did you miss the first time but observed on the second? Did you have difficulty filling in all the points? Was it less difficult to come up with ten ideas the second time? Which is your most surprising thought about this poster? Did you observe more the second time?
This routine led to a very rich conversation about the students´own thinking process, giving them the opportunity to go beyond obvious description of their outcomes. We were very pleased to notice how the students were not self-conscious about the correction of their language use but focused on communicating their ideas and experiences. We observed an increased participation and a more relaxed atmosphere than in regular classroom activities.
It is impressive how much this experience has impacted both students and us. We have been tremendously motivated to continue incorporating visible thinking routines in our lessons, not only as formal activities, but also as a philosophy that creates new approaches to our curricula. The students have appeared more comfortable and perceptive in our lessons which has impacted their performance in the formal assessment tasks that followed the movie. A continuous implementation of PZ routines in the Spanish classroom definitely seems to be the perfect companion for our program. The spirit is on!
Excellent teaching and learning example, really enjoyed your presentation.
Very interesting approach on how to use films in the FL classroom. Thanks for posting and sharing.
Congratulations, Carmen and Elena! I read the article with great interest and have shared it with our language teachers at WIS. What about a collaboration on using thinking routines in the language classroom between our two schools?
Jim Reese
WIS
I never thought I would find such an evreyday topic so enthralling!
Unique and interesting way to engage students in a movie!
That’s a lot of qtuoeisns!1. Personal taste can certainly be incorporated in the classroom. There are plenty of assignments that can incorporate that. Simple connection: which artist that you like is most like Mozart (young-genius-kooky-prolific)? Make video-essay-song to compare.Also, you often find personal tastes change after years in concert band.2. Every curriculum is different. I focus on creating musicians (play piano, transpose, compose, be able to listen, play in all keys). I play less concert music, but we play it better.3. I don’t think this generation is more used to instant gratification. But I cant think of any discipline that creates more instant feedback thus gratification. People who practice a lot do so because they sound good and they like sounding good. Its your job to get them to sound good.I suggest following the musiced chat on twitter on Monday nights.
It’s good to see smoeone thinking it through.