Almost every kid I've ever met can play Go Fish (I say almost because it turns out I have one student who's never played, so there goes the assumption that every child knows this game), and they enjoy, if for no other reason than (I'm quoting a student here), "it's fun, it's not really competitive, and there's no pressure or timing and you don't really feel like you're losing." It's also really great for repeating the same vocabulary words and descriptions over and over again, as well as reviewing plot points in a story.
I've been doing MovieTalk with my twos, with a video every kid who's ever seen it hates because it hits them in, as they say, the feels. They never forget it, though. It's a 5:33 short called Changing Batteries. It's really beautifully done and lends itself to all kinds of vocabulary and structures - I highly suggest you watch it.
We took two days to watch, discuss, work through, imagine and tell Changing Batteries, and then a third to review it. Today, I took an idea I got from Martina Bex and took screen shots of points in the film that I thought (a) exercised important vocab, (b) were distinct enough in appearance that they couldn't be mixed up with others, and (c) were important points of the story structurally. Then I pasted them into Word and made flash card sized cards. I made sure to have thirteen scenes I'd chosen and I made four copies, so each group was getting a full, 52-card set of pictures. notate bene: the kids astutely recommended that if I do this again, I should print the scenes on card stock and laminate them, because they will last longer that way. They'll also be harder to see through.
The students and I looked at each of these pictures, discussed and circled each of the things going on in them, and talked about the characters' motivations for doing what they did. When we'd discussed it essentially to death, I handed out decks of cards to each of my groups of students. (My kids sit in groups of four at tables, changed up every week, so they have ready-made groups and partners. If yours don't, I recommend groups of 4-5 for this)
We then followed the basic rules for Go Fish, more or less - I did tell the kids to draw two cards out of the go fish deck if they ran out of cards, and that way no one could duck out of the game. The students asked each other (we practiced this several times before they began, and I wrote it on the board as well), "Do you have the scene in which [thingy happens]? (estne tibi scaena in qua ____________?)" Throughout the class period, they tallied the number of pairs they got even across games, and the winner at each table got a Hershey's kiss at the end. Why the candy? Well, I like chocolate, and I don't give it out much. Also, I wanted to add a reward for kids who wanted to go above and beyond, like this:
as we were discussing the characters' motivations, I wrote each of their sentences on the board. We would say things like in this scene, the old woman opens the door to look for the box. I wrote to look for the box on the board. The old woman opens the door is sufficient to describe the scene - the extra description (a) practices a structure I'm targeting and (b) allows students who wanted to push on their ceiling a little more to do so without confusing anyone else, because we'd already discussed the target structures. It also meant that in their attempt to use the new structure, they weren't doing so incorrectly, thereby giving anyone incorrect input, because the structures were on the board. If I heard anyone using the extra structures, I gave them a sticker that was worth two points and could be added to their tally of pairs at the end.
They were very good about helping each other through vocabulary, describing scenes, etc., where needed. Even my kids who struggle had fun with this because they were working repeatedly with the same thirteen pictures, and pictures we'd already scaffolded significantly from a video we've watched ad nauseam. They told me it was a really good vocab review, and that it would have been a really good story review if the story weren't so straightforward anyway. :)
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