One of the classroom management tools that I use with my students is P.A.T., which I learned about from Fred Jones' "Tools for Teaching". You can visit his website here to learn more.
Every week, my students earn time towards P.A.T., which we use to play an educational game in French. Each class starts the week with 10 minutes towards P.A.T. and whenever they save time by doing transitions quickly and quietly, they have an opportunity to earn more time for P.A.T.
One of my favourite games to start off the year is BINGO. Not only do we review numbers and work our listening skills, but it's a great opportunity to introduce and practice new game vocabulary, turning this into a speaking game as well. The students play completely in French, with one of twelve interactive versions of BINGO that I have made for the Smartboard.
BINGO - Numbers 1 - 50 & 51 - 100
I have two versions of the interactive BINGO for numbers: one with numbers from 1 to 50 and 1 with numbers from 51 to 100. I made cards to go with each game that are double-sided and have the numbers on one side and the word for the number in French on the other side. When we play the version with the words, students are now working their reading skills, as well as their listening skills. There are 30 cards for each version so I never have to worry about students having the same cards, which is nice.
Making BINGO a speaking activity
When we play BINGO, I use an anchor chart for common sayings in French while playing BINGO. Students are encouraged to talk to one another after I have called the letter and number. Students use the BINGO Poster if they need it to talk about how the game is going in French. They enjoy sharing how they are doing and I find that this poster helps to generate a lot of authentic talk. I also reward the class for speaking French during this time so they are highly motivated to talk. BINGO - Les sons
Another game of BINGO that I play with my students is BINGO - Les sons. I made 10 different BINGO games, each one focusing on a different sound in French. There are 24 words that I call that contain the sound of the game. Each card has exactly 25 spaces, with one free space. However, no two cards are the same and there are 30 different cards. Every card has all the words so students are very engaged as they listen to the word that I called and try to find it on their card. Students practice listening to targeted French sounds, practice reading those sounds, and also practice saying those sounds in a fun environment. These particular games build vocabulary and help to improve pronunciation in French. I use the same reference poster to facilitate conversations while we play BINGO - Les sons.
These are just some of the games that we play during P.A.T. each week but I find that BINGO is a lot more fun now that it is a speaking game as well as a listening game. My students seem to be more engaged during the whole process. To learn about other games that I do in my classroom, please check out the following blog post:
