Wednesday 19 March 2014

Alors, on danse? Motivating with music.

Each week I attempt to teach French to a class of year 9 students who have targets ranging from level 2a to 3a.

They have one lesson a week and their attendance is not fantastic.

Each lesson has to be planned as if it were a stand-alone lesson and, most of the time, they don't remember what they've done from one week to the next.

Until now.

The topic we're studying at the moment is Music.

Last week, I introduced them to some francophone artists and we "learned" how to give opinions and compare 2 songs in French.

The songs we compared were Game Over by Vitaa ft Maitre Gims and Adieu by Coeur de Pirate (which has some amazing exploding heads in the video!! To be honest, that's the only reason I chose it!!)

To my amazement they actually liked the lesson and this morning, one of the boys came to me and said, "Do you know this song?"

He'd written the title on his hand:

Surprisingly, I did know the song, (thanks to Helen Myers who has used it with her classes and has made resources too) and said I'd play it for them if they got on with the work I had planned.

They did so I did.

This is it: Alors on Danse by Stromae.




The others then decided they liked it and could I play it again.

 I ended up playing the whole album.

This has really surprised me as when I took over the group in January getting them to stay in their seats and keep their hands off each other was a real challenge.

No comments: