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Teaching Foreign Languages K-12: A Library of Classroom Practices

View & Analyze the Video

As you reflect on these questions, write down your responses or discuss them as a group.

Before You Watch
Respond to the following questions:

  • What are some of the premises of content-based instruction in foreign language classes?
  • How can content from the general curriculum be integrated into a foreign language lesson?
  • What kinds of writing activities are appropriate for the elementary grades?

Watch the Video

As you watch “Sports Stats,” take notes on Ms. Garcia’s instructional strategies, particularly how she interacts with students and how she incorporates other content areas into the language lesson. Write down what you find interesting, surprising, or especially important about the teaching and learning in this lesson.

Reflect on the Video
Review your notes, and then respond to the following questions:

  • What content areas does Ms. Garcia integrate into the language lesson on sports?
  • Describe the work students do with graphs, both their own and the one in the article.
  • What observations can you make about Ms. Garcia’s questioning techniques?
  • How does Ms. Garcia introduce the various activities while staying in the target language?
  • How is German instruction extended beyond the classroom at Brockett Elementary School?

Look Closer

Take a second look at Ms. Garcia’s class to focus on specific teaching strategies. Use the video images below to locate where to begin viewing.


Video Segment: Expressing Sports Preferences

You’ll find this segment approximately 6 minutes after the video starts. Watch for about 5 minutes.

In groups, students take turns expressing their sports likes and dislikes while their classmates record the information.

  • How does Ms. Garcia instruct students to express their likes and dislikes? How does she adapt instruction so that students can truly say what they feel?
  • What kind of communicative error does Candice make? How does Ms. Garcia handle that error?
  • In what ways does Ms. Garcia interact with students during group work?

Video Segment: Reporting Preferences

You’ll find this segment approximately 11 minutes after the video starts. Watch for about 3 minutes and 30 seconds.

Students contribute information about their sports likes and dislikes to create a class graph.

  • What aspects of the math curriculum are incorporated into the survey of student preferences?
  • Describe the sequence involved as Ms. Garcia turns control of the activity over to students.
  • How do students react to their role in this activity?

Video Segment: Reading an Article

You’ll find this segment approximately 14 minutes and 30 seconds after the video starts. Watch for about 5 minutes.

Students read an article from Das Rad about the sports likes and dislikes of young Germans.

  • What is the students’ prereading activity? What is their scanning task?
  • How does Ms. Garcia model the idea that it isn’t necessary to know every word in the article?
  • Why does Ms. Garcia read aloud? Why doesn’t she ask students to read aloud at this stage?
  • How does Ms. Garcia use the reading activity to make connections to German culture?

Series Directory

Teaching Foreign Languages K-12: A Library of Classroom Practices

Credits

Produced by WGBH Educational Foundation with the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages. 2003. 2016.
  • Closed Captioning
  • ISBN: 1-57680-731-2

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