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- Didactic guidelines -

General information about the project

This project is part of a set of projects entitled 'What a Digital World!' which is based on the curriculum for the 2nd year of compulsory secondary education.

 

Resumen del proyecto

Objectives

The following objectives have been considered in the design of this project.

  • to learn while working on a project.
  • to encourage collaborative work, since most assignments require information sharing and interaction with other students.
  • to foster students' self-learning process by using IT resources.
  • to reinforce students' communicative skills through activities of listening and reading comprehension, but above all, through tasks in which they must produce their own oral and written messages.

The project includes several stages that students will need to go through to eventually do the final challenge based on the production of a short film. Within this learning resource, relevant language contents can be practised and a wide range of tasks is presented so that students get encouraged to practise and improve the linguistic skills required for their final output.

Resource structure and contents

Canvas

About the project is the first section of the project containing information about the channels that students will use to publish and share all their work as we think that they will be happy to showcase their familiy and classmates all the outcomes that they will be doing throughout the project. From the wide range of websites and social networks available, we suggest that students have their own site at Weebly.com, just like a portfolio, where they can post all their work and complete a Learning diary that will help them reflect on their own learning process.

Encourage students to design their site following a clear structure. Their site must contain at least these pages:

  • Homepage, the first and main page which must include a title, index, images and a description of the project.
  • 'My writing guide' . This page will include all the stude

    nt's writing tasks and tips for good writing.
  • 'Key vocabulary'. Students will include here links to the word maps and charts that they create using key vocabulary.
  • 'My digital resources'. On this page, students will publish the links to the digital material that they will have created in their missions.

On the other hand, students can use Pinterest to share their outcome with the people they like. Google drive apps can be also used for writing texts and preparing presentations collaborativelly. Besides, students can collect and add notes about vocabulary and grammar using online tools such as Cacoo and Canva.

The rest of sections in the project include several stages that students will need to go through to eventually do the final challenge, which is described in the section entitled 'A film festival' and it is based on the edition and promotion of an original short film.

This resource includes several activities to work on the different skills: listening, writing, reading, speaking and interaction to satisfactorily achieve every goal from a linguistic point of view.

Finally, learners are going to work on all the contents of the syllabus within their level with a project-based learning orientation and using active learning methodologies.

Learning Pathway and timing

Steps

Main aim

Timing

About the project

Learn about the structure, main missions and assessment criteria of this project.

Get familiar with the channels to publish and share the student's work.

1 session

Going to the movies

Identify film genres and present a film billboard.

Write a film review.

2 sessions

Shot on location

Create and present a Google map based on film locations.

2 sessions

A matter of time

Create and present a timeline based on historical facts.

2 sessions

Playing with roles

Create original dialogues and shoot the scenes for a short film.

2 sessions

A film festival

Edit and promote students' short films at a school film festival and on the net.

2 sessions

Some of these tasks lend themselves to be done outside the class timetable. Anyhow, it is recommended that all practical activities and, above all, those that imply team decision taking should be done within class time. 

Interdisciplinary nature

  • This project has a strong relationship with the area of History, as students will learn about historical facts portrayed in classic drama films.
  • It also has a link to the area of  Geography, because this resource brings them the opportunity to learn and talk about locations where films have been set.
  • Language could connect to this project. Writing, speaking are basic skills involved in the creation and promotion of a film. Making a subtitled version (with Spanish, French or Portuguese subtitles...) could be a great idea.

Assessment and curricular references

For assessing the final challenge of this project, both you as a teacher and your students, are expected to use the rubric to evaluate the project: 'Rubric to assess the project Becoming a cinema director' .

Every mission will include a final task to consolidate all the learning contents and will be assessed considering a rubric evaluation model. The rubrics for assessing each mission are listed below ("Assesment pattern section")

Contents

At the end of the project, students will have been able to work on the following contents:

  • Listening, speaking and interaction:
  • Comprehension and identification of general and specific information in oral texts.
  • Production of short and coherent oral texts.
  • Participation in conversations and role plays.
  • Use of correct answers in communicative situations in the classroom.
  • Reading and Writing:
  • Students understand general information and identify specific information in written texts.
  • Preparing and writing dialogues
  • Writing  a plot summary
  • Knowledge of the language
  • Sentences in Present and Past tenses.
  • Past- time expressions.
  • Place and time prepositions
  • Question words.
  • Vocabulary: types of films, 
  • Vocabulary: adjectives
  • Vocabulary: greetings
  • Intonation in questions.
  • Use of IT resources for self-learning
  • Participation in self-assessment and peer-assessment activities.
  • Organization of personal work.
  • Participation in group work.
  • Socio-cultural aspects:
  • Recognition of a foreign language as a tool for international communication.
  • Consideration of films as a useful tool to gain knowledge on language and history.
  • Reflection on historical facts and development of critical sense

Notice that all the contents are related to the four blocks stated in the new curriculum for the first foreign language area in the first cycle of compulsory secondary education. These four blocks are comprehension of oral messages, production of oral messages: expression and interaction, comprehension of written texts and production of written texts: expression and interaction.

Learning standards

At the end of the project, students will have been able to practise and acquire the following learning standards stated in the BOE (3rd January 2015) regarding the curriculum for the first cycle of CSE.

 

Bloque 1. Comprensión de textos orales

  • Identifica el sentido general y los puntos principales de una conversación formal o informal entre dos o más interlocutores que tiene lugar en su presencia, cuando el tema le resulta conocido y el discurso está articulado con claridad, a velocidad media y en una variedad estándar de la lengua.
  • Comprende, en una conversación informal en la que participa, descripciones, narraciones, puntos de vista y opiniones sobre asuntos prácticos de la vida diaria y sobre temas de su interés, cuando se le habla con claridad, despacio y directamente y si el interlocutor está dispuesto a repetir o reformular lo dicho.
  • Distingue, con el apoyo de la imagen, las ideas principales e información relevante en presentaciones sobre temas educativos, ocupacionales o de su interés (p. e., sobre un tema curricular, o una charla para organizar el trabajo en equipo).

 

Bloque 2. Producción de textos orales: expresión e interacción

  • Hace presentaciones breves y ensayadas, bien estructuradas y con apoyo visual (p. e. transparencias o PowerPoint), sobre aspectos concretos de temas de su interés o relacionados con sus estudios u ocupación, y responde a preguntas breves y sencillas de los oyentes sobre el contenido de las mismas.
  • Se desenvuelve correctamente en gestiones y transacciones cotidianas, como son los viajes, el alojamiento, el transporte, las compras y el ocio, siguiendo normas de cortesía básicas (saludo y tratamiento).
  • Participa en conversaciones informales cara a cara o por teléfono u otros medios técnicos, en las que establece contacto social, intercambia información y expresa opiniones y puntos de vista, hace invitaciones y ofrecimientos, pide y ofrece cosas, pide y da indicaciones o instrucciones, o discute los pasos que hay que seguir para realizar una actividad conjunta.

 

Bloque 3: Comprensión de textos escritos

  • Entiende los puntos principales de anuncios y material publicitario de revistas o Internet formulados de manera simple y clara, y relacionados con asuntos de su interés, en los ámbitos personal, académico y ocupacional.
  • Entiende información específica esencial en páginas Web y otros materiales de referencia o consulta claramente estructurados sobre temas relativos a materias académicas, asuntos ocupacionales, o de su interés (p. e. sobre un tema curricular, un programa informático, una ciudad, un deporte o el medio ambiente), siempre que pueda releer las secciones difíciles.
  • Entiende información específica esencial en páginas Web y otros materiales de referencia o consulta claramente estructurados sobre temas relativos a materias académicas, asuntos ocupacionales, o de su interés (p. e. sobre un tema curricular, un programa informático, una ciudad, un deporte o el medio ambiente), siempre que pueda releer las secciones difíciles.
  • Comprende lo esencial (p. e. en lecturas para jóvenes) de historias de ficción breves y bien estructuradas y se hace una idea del carácter de los distintos personajes, sus relaciones y del argumento.

 

Bloque 4. Producción de textos escritos: expresión e interacción

  • Escribe notas y mensajes (SMS, WhatsApp, chats), en los que se hacen breves comentarios o se dan instrucciones e indicaciones relacionadas con actividades y situaciones de la vida cotidiana y de su interés.
  • Escribe notas, anuncios y mensajes breves (p. e. en Twitter o Facebook) relacionados con actividades y situaciones de la vida cotidiana, de su interés personal o sobre temas de actualidad, respetando las convenciones y normas de cortesía y de la netiqueta.
  • Escribe informes muy breves en formato convencional con información sencilla y relevante sobre hechos habituales y los motivos de ciertas acciones, en los ámbitos académico y ocupacional, describiendo de manera sencilla situaciones, personas, objetos y lugares y señalando los principales acontecimientos de forma esquemática.
Key competences

By working on this project, students will be able to develop and acquire the following key competences published in the organic law on the improvement of the quality of education (LOMCE).

  • Linguistic competence: students are able to use and interact with othe people using the English language, both in oral and written registers.
  • Digital competence: students are able to use IT resources to obtain, analize, produce and share information.
  • Learning to learn: students are able to manage their tasks and time throughout their learning process and can work in an individual and collaborative way to achieve an objective.
  • Social and civic competences: students are able to interact with other students and participate actively in different missions following codes of good behaviour.
  • Sense of initiative and entrepreneurship: students show themselves as creative and are able to take risks, plan and manage their projects.
Assessment pattern

Evaluation

As a teacher, you can use the rubrics included in each mission and in the challenge to evaluate your students. This will be 40% of the final mark.

Students will also play an important and active role in the evaluation process.

  • peer evaluation: students will assess other classmates by creating their own assessment sheet with the items that they consider as appropriate or by using the assessment rubrics listed below. This will be 20% of the final mark.

Teacher's observation in class based on the students' degree of participation in the project and how well they perform all the missions will be 20%.

The following rubrics could be the refeference for the different missions and tasks.

    Need any help?

    Have a look at the links included in the Language resources title. They are offered to access useful resources for the development of this project.

    Language resources

    Vocabulary: film genres

    Going to the cinema

    Film review

    Trailers & short films

    Vocabulary- Places

    Film locations

    History sites: 

    Grammar- tenses

    Time expressions

    Titanic-worksheet

    Vocabulary - Personality adjectives

    Vocabulary - Physical appearance adjectives

    Conversational English  

    Online apps

    Throughout this project, we suggest a wide range of open source apps and tools with which students will carry out their missions and final challenge. However, feel free to replace them or recommend your students others which you think are more suitable according to their profiles and needs.

    How to

    Some links to tutorials are provided throughout the project to help your students  learn about how several online tools work so that they can perform their work more easily.

    Remember that you can find more tutorials about other online apps and tools on YouTube.