A didactic sequence

Some weeks ago, our teacher of this subject -ECO II- proposed us to work in groups so as to plan a didactic unit taking into account the different options that Web 2.0 offers as valuable resources to work with.

After exploring many of them while having fun, together with my mates Solange and Agus, we decided to design a story using Storybird. We were assigned to teach irregular verbs in the past simple.

Storybrid is an online community where you can read stories created by members of the community and create your own, using a wide variety of works and drawings from different artists. We found this tool a valuable resource since we thought that creating a story was a good way to enhance  learners’ creativity while at the same time, it presented an enjoyable way to deal with past simple. Therefore, we planned a lesson around the topic ‘The Ancient World’ and designed a model based on an Egyptian legend.

As a final task, learners would have the possibility to work in groups as well, to design their own stories and share it with their classmates.

Our didactic unit guided students through the whole process, in order to enable them to come up with ideas and different stories' designs, while learning as regards  old civilizations that lived in the past. As a starting point we decided to present a Video related to these civilizations, created with Movie Maker, and then move on to some activities that would allow learners activate their knowledge and infer the difference between regular and irregular verbs in the past.

It's important to bear in mind that if we want to work with online resources we need to count with good internet conection. Nowadays, many students have access to Internet at home but another option is to work during our regular lessons at the Computer Labs present at schools.

This experience was really a great opportunity to work cooperatively and discover that there are endless possibilities to integrate technology into our traditional classrooms’ lessons and our everyday life. 

I really recommend both resources. They provide an excellent visual support , while giving you the chance to enhance creativity, share beautiful stories with others or create videos with your own photos, texts and music.  

Explore them and tell us your opinión!