Hello! Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Ms. Ryan and I am the student teacher from UB currently working with Ms. Muhlbauer in the Iroquois Middle School Library. I will only be here for a short time, but I have already had so many wonderful experiences in this library! It has been a joy to come into a learning community where students are eager to engage with books and teachers are utilizing the space and resources in innovative ways.
One of the first projects I was lucky enough to be a part of was a foreign language lesson in the library. Ms. Marcinkowski and Ms. Gaske brought their 7th grade Spanish and French classes in to work on a project that would allow them to become foreign language authors using a website called Book Creator. The purpose of this lesson was to give students the opportunity to apply their new French and Spanish vocabulary in a creative and meaningful way by writing a children’s picture book in a foreign language.
This was my first time working with Book Creator and I was excited to share with students the tools that were available to them and explore the possibilities of this website together!
During students' first visit to the library they were able to choose the topic for their book from a list generated by their Spanish or French teachers. Possible topics included “numbers”, “colors”, “weather”, “emotions”, and “personal I.D.”.
Before students began working on their digital book, they created a rough draft using a storyboard. This let them visualize what each page of their book would look like including text and pictures. Just looking at their storyboards we could already tell these books were going to be great!
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| "Emotions" storyboard |
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| Plans for a book about "Colors" |
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| The students are such talented artists! |
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| Another great storyboard |
On Day Two in the library, students were able to log on to Book Creator and begin designing their digital books. Each page of their book was required to have one sentence or phrase in French or Spanish and a picture to match the text. Students were shown how to import images from a Google image search and import hand-drawn illustrations using their laptop cameras. There was lots of excited chatter in the library as students worked on this part of the project.
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| Learning all about Book Creator. |
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| Students were so focused on this project! |
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| Ms. Marcinkowski instructing the Spanish students. |
On our final day together, students had an opportunity to display their speaking skills by recording themselves reading their books in Spanish and French. A few students even volunteered to share their finished books with the rest of their class.
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| Making sure the Spanish is just right! |
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| Sharing the finished books. |
The completed books will be shared with the 6th grade students later this spring when they visit French and Spanish classes before choosing a language to study in 7th grade. We were so impressed with the books the students were able to make for this project. This was a fun way for students to showcase their foreign language skills. Thank you Ms. Marcinkowski and Ms. Gaske for bringing this project to the library! It was a pleasure to work with you and your students!
