Diane continues her description of Listen and Draw:
“Since then, I’ve found it helpful to shorten the description and include two sketches – about 4-6 sentences, and maybe 5-8 minutes needed to complete each. With classes that can play, story-asking for the specific details is great. My current 7th grade class is excellent at that. One scene recently created with them ended up with a student from the class at (recurring character) Apple Juice Man’s house watching SpongeBob on TV on Sunday (targets: watch TV, weekend, with). The kids added who and what and really owned it. There was passion when they saw each other’s versions of Apple Juice Man!
“Reading and writing can also be done in follow-up. I use two scanned drawings and a sentence on the same PowerPoint slide. Students walk up & hit the correct picture, or write down which picture matched (left/right or above/below, more reps on direction words) for a quick quiz.
“Another way with less prep would be to hand out a sheet with the sentences in a different order. Have students cut them out and place each sentence under which picture matches. We re-order after they’ve matched sentences. Even simpler: just write which picture matches next to each sentence. We could then check them afterwards together. This brings more reps.
“Another reading possibility is to put one sketch onto each PowerPoint slide, leaving space for a caption. Create captions in class with student input, or prepare them beforehand if you prefer just a straight reading exercise.
“Writing possibilities: students could be asked afterwards to write a description of each scene, or an alternate scene with the same target structures. Grade the writing using a rubric.”
I say congratulations to Diane. What she describes above is real comprehension based teaching. It’s “monitor and adjust” with style points thrown in. This drawing idea is indeed a gem of a CI strategy and also it is a gem of a bail out move. It slows the kids down and focuses them. PLC member David Talone said, after trying it, that it “eliminated the need for me to be so interesting. And it does what all comprehensible input should do; it focuses the kids on the language.