Lesson #3
Key Word Notes Using National Geographic Video on Sea TurtlesGulf Turtle Eggs Relocated
Purpose or Language Learning Objective
Students will practice the skills of listening and viewing
for information, distinguishing more important words from less important words
in an informational video, writing information in their own words, and recalling
information from a video by speaking with a partner. The larger purpose is for
students to increase comprehension and retention while listening to and viewing
informational videos.
Lesson time: 30 minutes
Student group: 5th and 6th grade
advanced
Lesson details
- Students work with a partner, each receiving a key words note template sheet.
- I will describe to the students the concepts of key words - that they are words, not full sentences. Key words are the words you feel are most important to describe or summarize the content of the video. There are not right and wrong answers, just educated opinions.
- We will watch the video together as a class. I will have divided the video into four, 1-minute to 1 ½ minute chunks. We will watch each “chunk” then pause the video.
- Each student selects 3-4 words from each video “chunk” either during the video or when the chunk is finished and writes those words in the corresponding box on their template sheet.
- Partners share the words they selected and why they selected them.
- Students repeat the process with the next three chunks.
- When the entire video is finished, partners share an oral summary of the video using their key words.
- Individually, students write one or two sentences in the bottom box of the template sheet to summarize the video.
Review/Analysis
How will you use this resource to meet the needs of your
instructional purposes?
The particular video I chose from National Geographic will help
meet the instructional purposes of my lesson because it is a good length (appx
5 minutes), it is about a topic that will be engaging for 5th and 6th
graders, and because it provides English in multiple formats including
narration and on-camera interviews.
What handouts or directions will you provide students to
focus learning and adapt this resource for your instructional goals?
As stated earlier, I will spend time discussing the concept
of “key words” with my students prior to doing this activity. I will also
inform them that the video contains some fairly advanced vocabulary, and that
they may not understand everything from the video. I will tell them to focus on
the images and information they do understand, and to try their best with the few
challenging vocabulary words and concepts. And again, in terms of handouts, I
will give each student a key word notes template on which to enter their
information.
Are the format, organization, design and language level
of this resource appropriate for your instructional goals?
For the most part, this National Geographic video meets the
needs of fulfilling my instructional goals. It’s an engaging, short video that
makes it perfect for a key word notes activity. However, the language level
will be a little high for my students. Some words and concepts are presented
that they may have difficulty with. But I feel overall the concepts and the
language are appropriate for these students.
What are the potential problems, either language based or
technical, that you may need to troubleshoot or prepare for?
Again, as I mentioned before, there will potentially be
words or concepts the students might not understand. This, however, could lead
to follow-up activities where the students spend more time learning those words
and concepts. I am also a little concerned that because this is the first time
the students will be doing a key word notes activity that they might not fully
grasp the idea of “key words.” Because of this I will do some explaining at the
beginning of the activity, and I will also do a follow-up activity the
following day in which students share their key words with me and the rest of
the class. This way I can check for how well the students understood the
activity and can modify it or explain it further for future key word note
activities.
Chris
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for sharing this! I have never encountered the idea of having students listen for key words like this in a listening activity. It resonates with me as a second language Spanish speaker so much, this activity is so true to the experience of being a second language learner attempting to piece together meaning from the words you can understand OR by catching words you don't understand being repeated enough times that you know its important enough to ask or look up its definition.
You said this will be the first time you have done an activity like this with you class, did you consider giving them a word bank for this first time attempt run of a new listening activity? Or maybe watching a different video as an example which you do together as a class? Hmm... or maybe the first minute section you could model... giving a couple of word ideas as key words that obviously weren't even in that clip or only came up once and one that came up a lot and have them as a class vote on which of those they think was a key word of that listening segment??? And then ask them as a class to brainstorm a couple more from that clip before loosing them to do the next sections in pairs? doing something like that might help serve both as a concept check for the idea of "keywords" as well as modeling how to fill out the form. Whatever you do to get them into the activity though I'm sure it will end up working out great. I can't wait to use this kind of activity in the future in my teaching!
Hi Chris,
ReplyDeleteWise choice; I imagine the clip you have chosen has appeal for your targeted age group. You have written an organized lesson directing and helping your students develope the skills needed for listening and picking out important content words that carry and support the theme of a text (deliver the information).
You have laid the ground work by explaining the concept of keywords and providing them with a template to write on as they watch and listen. This is also a good practice for developing note taking skills. Your decision to show the video in 4 individual segments would help the students process the information in parts and not be overwhelmed. Partner work helps them utilize the terms /concepts/words they have picked out and practice using them in their discussions and later in writing
summaries.
Suggestions: 1. How about using an example video to do with the whole class, so they can see& experience what they are expected to do in this type of activity? 2). How about at the end when everyone is finished, reviewing the main points everybody picked from the clip as a whole class?
Hi Chris,
ReplyDeleteListening activities based on videos, especially National Geographic videos, have been exceptionally difficult for my high beginning/low intermediate college level students. The problem is three fold: 1) The videos move quickly 2) Even by native English speaker standards, narrators speak quickly and 3) the topics are somewhat advanced and so is the level of information presented. Even with subtitles and transcripts, my students report to me that they understand about 50-60% of the video (ours are about 2 minutes). All this to say that National Geographic videos are tough!
With that said, I like how you broke your 5-minute video up into chunks. That will go a long way to help make the video more accessible. Having the students talk to each other about the keywords they chose, between segments, would also be helpful. However, I wonder if doing this would this would interfere with overall comprehension. I would suggest a complete viewing of the video, all the way through, after the "chunking" viewing.
I would think that a word bank, while helpful, would be self defeating. If students are guided to words you think they should choose, then the critical analysis/thinking component of the exercise will be compromised. Though this is a challenging exercise, I think you should keep it that way. There's nothing wrong with challenging your students. It's a lot easier to shoot high with a lesson plan, scaling back if necessary, than creating a lesson plan that is too low and having to "scale up."