I've found a great site for keeping track of my tournaments: Challonge.
I created an account and it lets me create my brackets in advance, randomize entries, save brackets, and choose winners for each match-up with ease. During the first tournament I had to stay by the computer to advance words through the bracket, where with challonge, I tap the match-up on the smart board and a box appears where I tap on the winner, after tallying the votes. I liked using it a lot.
I plan on mixing up the formula in the new term. Student interest in finding words has waned, but I think this could be an effective way of introducing new vocabulary for a unit. They'll vote on the words without knowing their defintions. Then, once a winner is crowned, when I ask them to learn the definitions of the new words, I'm hoping they'll have some investment in them.
Sunday, 19 January 2014
Thursday, 24 October 2013
Writing Hooks
I've started a short story unit with my grade 9 English classes and am starting with the first line of a story: the hook.
As a class we've gone to the library and browsed through many books finding first lines we like and dislike. We've discussed our lines with each other and come up personal definitions of what makes a good hook. We've looked at different types of hooks and have now tried our hand at writing our own.
Our hooks are based on this idea for a story: You've inherited a mysterious object from a relative you didn't even know you had. Each of us wrote 5 hooks and chose 1 that we thought was our best. I've compiled each class' best hooks into the following forms.
We would appreciate if you could take a few minutes and give us feedback on our writing.
Class 1
Class 2
Class 3
As a class we've gone to the library and browsed through many books finding first lines we like and dislike. We've discussed our lines with each other and come up personal definitions of what makes a good hook. We've looked at different types of hooks and have now tried our hand at writing our own.
Our hooks are based on this idea for a story: You've inherited a mysterious object from a relative you didn't even know you had. Each of us wrote 5 hooks and chose 1 that we thought was our best. I've compiled each class' best hooks into the following forms.
We would appreciate if you could take a few minutes and give us feedback on our writing.
Class 1
Class 2
Class 3
Friday, 27 September 2013
Tournament of Words: September
Today I held my first Tournament of Words in my three grade nine English classes. I wasn't sure exactly how it would go, since it is the first of my "out there" ideas that I'm using in my class.
In reading we always come across new words. The project is to take at least one of those words, whether encountered in English class, other classes or outside school, with its context and definition, and submit it for the tournament. Students get to vote on which words they like best and each month a winner is crowned. This way when one person learns a word the whole class gets an opportunity to learn it.
I introduced this at the start of the month as a year-long activity. Since it wasn't of immediate concern a fair bunch of students promptly forgot about it. I had two words submitted by the end of last week. This Monday, I reminded them of the upcoming tournament (AND the expectations) and have had many more submissions as the week progressed. I made a few concessions this month, since students are still learning about how this project works: scouring the dictionary was accepted and I gave some time at the start of class today.
I used random.org/lists to fill the brackets and better bracket maker to conduct each tournament.
Winner: Stadstimmertuinen - found in Anne Frank's Diary.
I'm pretty sure they voted for it just because they wanted to keep hearing me struggle to pronounce it.
I was happy to see pulchritudinous get so far.
For the final vote I had everyone close their eyes and vote for the winner and then did a mystery reveal.
Fourth Period
Winner: lapping - found in Killing Mr. Griffin.
This class is pretty small, so students find two words each during the month. I added the word of the day from both Merriam Webster and Dictionary.com to round out the tournament to 24 teams. It feels like a nicer number somehow.
One vote ended in a tie, so the contributors of Alzheimer's and xenophobia played rock-paper-scissors to determine which word advanced.
Fifth Period
Winner: wryly - found in Killing Mr. Griffin.
I thought it interested that both vehement and ardent were submitted, as the definition for each word contained the other!
There were definite favourite words in this class. All the quarter-final votes were landslides or shut outs.
Main Difficulty: None of my classes are powers of 2. For the first class I limited entries to the first 16 words submitted. In the following classes the list randomizer determined which words got byes.
I'm thinking of giving prizes to the people who contributed the winning words in hopes of getting students to submit extra entries. The more words they discover the more chances to win. After all the required entries are in, the remaining spots are first come first served until 32 words have been submitted.
In reading we always come across new words. The project is to take at least one of those words, whether encountered in English class, other classes or outside school, with its context and definition, and submit it for the tournament. Students get to vote on which words they like best and each month a winner is crowned. This way when one person learns a word the whole class gets an opportunity to learn it.
I introduced this at the start of the month as a year-long activity. Since it wasn't of immediate concern a fair bunch of students promptly forgot about it. I had two words submitted by the end of last week. This Monday, I reminded them of the upcoming tournament (AND the expectations) and have had many more submissions as the week progressed. I made a few concessions this month, since students are still learning about how this project works: scouring the dictionary was accepted and I gave some time at the start of class today.
I used random.org/lists to fill the brackets and better bracket maker to conduct each tournament.
First Period
I'm pretty sure they voted for it just because they wanted to keep hearing me struggle to pronounce it.
I was happy to see pulchritudinous get so far.
For the final vote I had everyone close their eyes and vote for the winner and then did a mystery reveal.
Fourth Period
This class is pretty small, so students find two words each during the month. I added the word of the day from both Merriam Webster and Dictionary.com to round out the tournament to 24 teams. It feels like a nicer number somehow.
One vote ended in a tie, so the contributors of Alzheimer's and xenophobia played rock-paper-scissors to determine which word advanced.
Fifth Period
I thought it interested that both vehement and ardent were submitted, as the definition for each word contained the other!
There were definite favourite words in this class. All the quarter-final votes were landslides or shut outs.
Main Difficulty: None of my classes are powers of 2. For the first class I limited entries to the first 16 words submitted. In the following classes the list randomizer determined which words got byes.
I'm thinking of giving prizes to the people who contributed the winning words in hopes of getting students to submit extra entries. The more words they discover the more chances to win. After all the required entries are in, the remaining spots are first come first served until 32 words have been submitted.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)