Dictée is a tried and true bail out move. Getting the kids writing for about ten to minutes is a fail safe alternative if something we are doing isn’t working. Searching the term dictée here is a good idea although some of the older posts (30 of them) on dictée over the years make it more complicated than an updated and newer version Tina does that I learned from her last summer. Russ offers this version that Jennifer just found:
“I was thinking about dictée and thinking of a twist on it. So what we do is we say the sentence/passage/text slowly one time. Students simply listen and copy down what they hear. Then the second time we say it they draw what they hear. Then we give them maybe 5 min after to finish their drawings. Then we say it a third time to edit their drawings / chopped text. Finally they translate it to L1. My thought is that if we delay translation, it will help them create the movie in their head. Also we would encourage them to read what they copied down and look at their drawings to help them translate the entire text. I am going to try this in my classes this year. If someone has already done this then please let me know how it turned out.”
(This was posted last August and I am wondering if anyone has tested it or Russ if you have any updates on it…).