Fun for Children who are Seriously Sick – A Guest Video Post

The tired puppet – courtesy of puppeteer Ruth Levi
(Naomi’s Photos)

Veteran teacher Marlene Saban has kindly sent me a video lesson to share on the blog. She teaches both junior-high & high- school. A reading passage about a special camp (run by special people!)  devoted to bringing some joy to the lives of children grappling with illness, inspired Marlene to add a video as a lead-in exercise (in the case, a short advertisement) and another one directly related to the topic of the reading passage. Since no hearing is needed to understand the advertisement and the other video is meant to be shown without sound, (the students must read the captions in English!), Marlene’s video lesson certainly can be used with deaf and hard of hearing students too!

Marlene used this lesson with a strong class of students in the seventh grade ( 13 year olds).

Here is the lead-in advertisement:

Here is the main video:


Here is a downloadable document with Marlene’s lesson plan and worksheet.

Enjoy!

Fun for Sick Kids- by Marlene

Giving “Pride” a Concrete Expression

It started out small.
(The names of the students have been blurred).

There we were again. Once again my 10th grade student, whom we’ll call Dan, was throwing a tantrum in class over his test grade.

He got an 87.

Which is a very nice grade for a fairly high level exam. But it wasn’t a  grade of 100 or at least one that is over 90 , which is marked with a different color in our computer grading system.

The tantrum was somewhat milder than the previous incident when he threw the test into the trashcan, stormed out of the classroom and shouted some more, so as to attract the attention of more teachers.

Dan has a particularly loud voice even when he is not shouting. Not only does he come from one of those families in which the volume of  daily communication is turned up high, he is one of those hard of hearing people who hear themselves well when they speak very loudly. In addition, his tone is often very aggressive. This attitude has served him well in life and compensates a bit for his learning disability – it seems that people are willing to do a lot just to get him to quiet down. It is quite difficult to have meaningful conversations with Dan as he is always ready to go into “confrontation mode”.

I tried to tell him  before he got the test back that I was really proud of him. I knew he had actually studied for the test and had done all the practice work. I was there when the class took the test and I saw that he really had made every effort.

I told Dan that I was proud of him and that I wanted to post about his achievement on our “I’m proud of YOU!” board.

But the number of the notes on the board is growing…

Dan refused. He was gearing up for his tantrum. It’s purpose was to get me to add 3 points to his grade.

I didn’t. He tried to get my lovely co-teacher to do it but she wouldn’t do it either.

Two days later I had the opportunity to talk to him outside of class. I told him how disappointed I felt that he wouldn’t let me celebrate his achievement by posting on the board (I don’t post about students without their permission.). Dan replied that only when he gets a perfect grade of 100 he will grant me permission.

That’s when I had a moment of inspiration and said:

… and growing!

“I wouldn’t want to post about you if you had gotten a grade of 100.  No way. That would have meant the test was really easy for you. I want to post about how much effort you put into studying for this test (which was not easy) and then did really well. I don’t post about kids for getting perfect scores”.

He actually listened to me. Not something to sneeze at.

Then Dan smiled, started walking away and shouted back:

“Then you should post about me on the board!”

Saturday’s Book: “Waiting for Snow in Havana” by Carlos Eire

Unlocking secrets of the past (Naomi’s Photos)

I don’t usually write about books before I have finished them, but this one has blown me away from the very beginning. The only reason I haven’t finished it is that the need to finish a book is not yet a legitimate reason to stay home from work and forget about feeding the family…

It’s another one of these books that I happened on by chance at the library. Thank goodness for libraries – if I only read books I hear people talking about (or read reviews of ) I would be missing out on a lot.

Eire’s style in describing his childhood in Havana during the end of the Batista era (son of a judge) and the beginning of Castro’s takeover is spellbinding and unique. It is so vivid yet not sugar-coated; it’s not as if everything was the paradise Eire’s teachers tried to claim it was until “out of the blue” bad things happened. His method of describing childhood memories in Havana  and then throwing in comments, snippets highlighting the future trauma when his life changed completely, delivers quite a punch.

Eire was airlifted out of Cuba when he was eleven years old with his brother. He was allowed to take absolutely nothing but a change of clothes, not even photos of his family or a familiar object. Then he began a life of an orphaned refugee.

Not only do I think this is a fascinating book to read at any time, I find it particularly relevant nowadays – Cuba’s new relations with the U.S.A and what it feels like to be  a refugee. I’m not so interested in his comments related to wrestling with tenets of the Catholic faith, but the book does tie into my current ROOTS research – my own grandmother lived in Havana for a few years in the fifties.

“Reading Videos” Strategy Sails Across the Waters

Reaching out across the waters!
(Naomi’s Photos)

I’ve been invited to speak at an international conference!

IV-th International Congress on Social Inclusion Implementations-versions and controversies,  April 6-7 2017., at the Siedlce University of Natural Sciences and Humanities, Poland

I know I’m not being very modest about it but there is a great deal to be excited about:

  • It’s a conference about “Inclusion and Special Education”, and there will be a specific section on TEACHING ENGLISH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE TO DEAF STUDENTS! A golden opportunity for me to finally meet teachers from other countries who actually face the same challenges I do every day!
  • I’ve been invited to the conference and will be giving a plenary talk and a regular session. My heartfelt thanks to Mrs. Beata Gulati, a wonderful teacher and an organizer, for her dedication to connecting the teachers who teach EFL to Deaf students and making this happen.

    My personal invitation!
  • The conference is on vacation time – I do NOT have to ask for anyone’s permission to attend the conference and miss school. As you can see, I’ve not gotten over the traumatic experience of doing that in order to speak at IATEFL Liverpool a few years ago…

I will be speaking about the use of videos  to promote reading comprehension skills and am also writing a paper on this topic for the post conference publication. This is where I need your help:

A question mark in the sand?! (Naomi’s Photos)

Judging by the large number of times my video lessons* (which I call “Reading Videos” ) have been downloaded, it seems that teachers who don’t teach Deaf students also find them useful. Strategies that are good for students with special needs and everyone else as well are particularly beneficial in settings of inclusion. It would be extremely helpful if you could take a moment and answer a very short survey regarding your use of these video lessons.

  • Reminder: You can find the video lessons by clicking on the title of the category on the left sidebar of the Home Page. Here’s the direct link to the category:
    https://visualisingideas.edublogs.org/category/video-lessons/

Thank you!