CALL Task 3 - Presentational

Lisa Peskar

Context: Spanish 1, 7th Grade

Class Size: 16-23 students
Class Length: 45-50 minutes daily
Unit: Introductions and Likes/Dislikes

Task Name: Introduction to Spain E-Pal

Previous Vocabulary: This is students first year of Spanish, and this is the first unit of
the year. During this unit, students learn greetings, how to discuss basic information about
themselves such as age, birthday, where they are from, and also discuss likes/dislikes
using the structure I like (to relax), and using the verbs to play (tocar, jugar) in the
first person and second person singular: Yo juego/ toco , and t juegas / tocas

Objectives:
Students will be able to state highly practiced information about themselves to
introduce themselves to another person
Students will be able to ask simple questions to another person about likes/dislikes
Students will successfully engage in presentational communication via video
recording and editing

Task Description & Instructions:

Students will be engaging in video recording to create an introduction video of themselves
to their E-Pal in Spain. The video call can occur through recording on a cell phone, or
recording on their Chromebooks using a program such as Screencastify. Our students have
all been partnered up with an E-pal for the year where they write to each other as we go
through each topic (school, family, sports, basic information), so the purpose of this video
is to introduce themselves to their partner as the first assignment of the year. Our students
all have school-issued Chromebooks to use for technology daily, so access to technology is
not an issue.

Pre-Activity:
The pre-activity will consist of 2 parts
1. Informacin sobre otros
This is a review of several pieces of basic information that we have been practicing
throughout the unit. The teacher will have four different pictures of people in which
students will invent information. This will be done through class discussion -- for person
#1, for example, the teacher will show the image and ask in the target language ste es
un hombre, o sta es una mujer? The class will respond ste es un hombre, and
students will write this on line one of their paper. For the rest of the information, teacher
will ask more questions such as En tu opinin, cmo se llama el hombre? Teacher will
get several student opinions, and then ask the class their opinion. Clase, cmo se llama
el hombre? and the majority name heard will be the deciding factor that the class will
write down. This will continue for the persons age, where they are from, and what they
play (juega, toca) or what they like to do (le gusta). Also, during this discussion,
teacher will ask students similar questions. For example, if the class decides the
man/woman plays basketball on line five, I will ask students questions in the interpersonal
form in the target language. For example, Mara, t tambin juegas al baloncesto?, and
the student will respond in the first person form. This way, the activity will practice first,
second, and third person singular forms of the language with students, and the activity is
entirely in the target language besides explaining the instructions. This activity can take
anywhere from fifteen minutes to thirty minutes depending on how many and the type of
questions teacher is asking the class, so it is up to the teacher on how much time s/he
wants to spend.

Worksheet given to students:

Me llamo: _____________________________
Info sobre otras personas (ppt)
For each person, write a sentence using:
1. ste/a es (this is) 2. se llama (his/her name is)
3. es de (is from) 4. tiene ___ aos (has years) *age
5. juega /toca / le gusta (plays / likes)

#1 - Persona 1 #3 - Persona 3

1. 1.

2. 2.

3. 3.

4. 4.

5. 5.

#2 - Persona 2 #4 - Persona 4

1. 1.

2. 2.

3. 3.
 4. 4.

5. 5.

Images projected to go along with discussion and worksheet:

1 3

2 4

2. Questions practice
Students often have trouble when first creating simple questions, especially yes/no questions,
because the do that we put at the beginning of a question (example: Do you play basketball?)
does not exist in Spanish. In my experience I have found that this needs to be formally pointed out
to students. At the novice level, as they are creating questions for their E-Pals, they are often
translating in their brain from English to Spanish-- if they want to ask Do you play sports? , they
struggle since they are trying to think of it word for word, and can't think of what the word for do
is! To point this out and practice, I do a simple translation activity of questions. This will prepare
students to be successful when creating questions for their E-Pal in the presentational activity.

The first part is Spanish to English for receptive practice and input. The teacher will project
questions one by one, and students will tell their partner what that means, and teacher will verify
that students have gotten the correct meaning before moving onto the next question. After, teacher
will project questions one by one in English that students must write in Spanish. This is where
students will begin asking How do you say do?, and the teacher must point out that this does not
exist in Spanish. The teacher should scroll back to the questions they just looked at in Spanish, and
point out that we just said This question is asking Do you play sports? -- how is it formed? We
dont have the word do that we have in English, so it starts off with the next word, you play, and
that is how the question is written in Spanish.

The main verbs that we have practiced during the first 7-8 weeks are tienes, tengo ,
juegas/tocas, juego/toco , te gusta/ me gusta, eres, soy so questions are using these verbs.

Questions to project (one by one):

Espaol a ingls:
1. Te gusta descansar?
2. Te gusta escuchar la msica de Selena Gomez?
3. Te gusta jugar videojuegos? Te gusta jugar con amigos? Juegas en tu
telfono?
4. Juegas un deporte? Qu juegas? Qu nmero eres?
5. Tocas un instrumento? Tocas el instrumento para la escuela, o practicas en
tu casa?

Ingls a espaol:
Do you play soccer?
Do you play volleyball with friends?
Do you play games on your phone?
Do you like to listen to music?
What do you like to listen to?

Presentational Activity:
Using the bullet-pointed requirements for their video, students will create a script for their
video recording. Students will also make a list of items/propts needed to make their video
recordings more captivating! Students will have twenty minutes for writing their script, and
students will have one class period (fifty minutes) to work with a partner to film their own
video, their partners video, and for compiling the segments together in Screencastify (or
other chosen program) for one final product. If students do not finish during this period, it
will be due two days after filming, submitted on Google Classroom and shared with their
E-Pal.

Student Instructions:

E-Pal Video 1
I hope you are excited to meet your E-Pal! To meet them, you will both be recording a
video to send to start getting to know each other. In this video you will need the following
requirements for your speaking information, and also you should bring in a few props to
make your video interesting for the viewer.

Any new words may ONLY be looked up using WordReference.com . If you have
questions about the sentence that you are writing, please raise your hand to ask your
teacher!

1. Introduction
- Hello, nice to meet you _____
- My name is
- I am _____ years old
- I am from _______

2. Describe what you play (instruments, sports, games, videogames, etc).

Be descriptive! For example, instead of just saying I play football, you can say I play football for
the school. My number is 23. I play on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays.

3. Things that you like (TV shows, music, songs, celebrities, activities).
You must mention at least 2 things. Make sure that these are all school-appropriate TV shows,
music, etc.

4. Questions for your E-Pal

You must ask at least 2.
For example: Do you like Justin Bieber? Do you play videogames? Make sure these are questions
within your Spanish level, think of questions that we have been discussing in class!

Items I need to bring in for filming:

What props can you bring to make your video interesting? For example, if you mention that you like
Justin Bieber, you can print off a picture of him to hold up in your video.
-
-
-
Recording: You may use a cell phone or your Chromebook to record. If you choose to use
your Chromebook, Screencastify is a program that your teacher can help you with.
*Once you are finished recording, you may use Screencastify (or another video program) to
put together the various recordings into one video. These must be uploaded into Google
Classroom, and shared with your E-Pals e-mail for viewing access.

Post-activity:
As a post-activity, students will watch their E-Pals video once it is sent back. In this video,
their E-Pal will ask them questions as well since they are completing the same assignment.
The student follow-up activity is to write back to their e-pals e-mail answering the
questions that they were asked.

Purpose & Rationale

The activity is teacher determined, as the teacher is determining the exact structures of
language that students will be using in their production of language throughout the
presentational task. Although this does not allow for much flexibility, as novice learners in
their first few weeks of Spanish, this is appropriate for the students level, as outlined in
Brandl (2002).

For language functions, this activity ties in with our vocabulary for our current unit of
study, which will give students more practice with current vocabulary. We stated in our
CALL task principles the importance of tying in CALL activities with learning targets.

The pre-activity with forming questions, and the presentational activity itself, both allow
students to monitor their output and allow students more processing time as they pause to
create, look up words needed, and ask for teacher feedback before producing the final
product. This was mentioned as important for L2 learners in Youngs, Ducate, and Arnold
(2011). We also said that opportunity for feedback and correction was important in our
CALL task principle relating to output, which states: CALL tasks should provide meaningful
opportunities for output in real-life contexts, with opportunity to self-correct and focus on
form.

Pairing our students up with native speakers from Spain gives them an important
opportunity to interact with the target culture. Interacting with a native speaker gives them
the motivation of using their language for a real-life purpose. We stated in our CALL task
principles that it was also important to expose students to authentic resources and
situations. In addition, this activity provides an opportunity for cultural insights. While our
students are sharing information about their own lives and likes/activities, their E-Pal will
do the same, which will provide a lense into a student's life and activities from a different
culture. We stated in our CALL task principles that incorporating culture was also important.
This cultural aspect of this task falls under using technology to Communicate and
Collaborate, as mentioned per Guth and Helm (2011). In their article, they cite studies that
show that benefits of telecollaboration in L2 learning have included: increased motivation,
increased cultural knowledge of products, practices and perspectives, and increasing
interest in the target culture.

Finally, this CALL task also is designed to develop digital literacy in students, which we
stated is important in our CALL Task Principles. It is important for students to use
technology and develop their digital skills. This is important as technology is becoming
more and more pertinent in everyday life, including work and recreation.