For the first few years of teaching, I organized my end-year review by chapter (or by theme, before I had a textbook with chapters to follow). As I learned more about how children learn, especially the ideas of Bruner and how children make ongoing connections in their learning by spiraling the curriculum, I moved toward a more skill-based review. I teach almost all of the grammar topics through one of two big ideas (verb conjugation and agreement), so I devote a solid day to review each big idea rather than all parts separate. My final exam is also spread out over two weeks, three sections, so I can spend a little time reviewing specific strategies for each part of the exam.
This year, our planned review started as we were finishing up the last chapter of the year:
- My colleague and I developed a list of 30 questions that include all topics from the year. We made sure to include some yes/no questions and many information questions. Then we sorted the questions to present two each day. Sometimes the daily questions included grammatical nuances the kids often mix up (cuándo vs. cuantos, cómo estás vs. eres) and sometimes they were meant to review vocabulary not used recently (nunca, biblioteca). Each day, students copied these questions from the board and wrote their own answers, then we reviewed as a class so everyone had a "right" answer. This took about six minutes a day for 15 days.
- Students work in pairs to construct conversations using the 30 questions. The conversation topics mimic those on our actual speaking exam. This way students have targeted practice, they have an idea of what's expected on the test (it's similar to our chapter speaking tests, but we provide the exact questions for those and no longer provide the exact questions for the final speaking), and they develop a sense of how to use the 30 questions from class as a study tool.
- I developed a packet (I'll post it when it's prettied up, I find it hard to make things completely student-ready while working on the iPad) to review all of the verbs we learned this year. While I believe in a communicative classroom, I find that my global learners never understood verb conjugation until I started breaking it down for them. The packet reviews the "rules" to conjugate, sample verb charts, and fill-in activities for all the types of verbs we worked with: regular, irregular no pattern, irregular yo form, stem-changing, and "special" verbs like gustat. Pretty dry but a comprehensive review that will take most of one period and a short homework (homework is regular verbs, since it's the easiest).
- I'm developing a packet to review all things agreement: hints to determine the gender of a noun, definite and indefinite articles, adjectives of quantity, descriptive adjectives, colors. The benefit to this packet is that it also reviews some vocabulary they will need for the writing test.
- While I'm administering the speaking test (during class, so students are left to work rather independently), they will be working on specific activities from the textbook. I've developed four writing tasks that mimic those on the final writing test AND that combine elements from several chapters. (The writing tasks during the year are more chapter-specific.) the activities im choosing from the book are ones that will help students brainstorm for the day's practice writing. I will collect but not grade the practice writing every day, just to get an idea of what students accomplished. I'm also going to note common errors in the practice tasks, and those common errors will comprise the activity on the last review day, "how to proofread." the proof reading activity will focus on looking for verb conjugation and adjective agreement mistakes, expanding use of a limited vocabulary, and organizing a writing task.
- After the writing test, we'll do a practice listening activity. Another concept I've worked with a lot this year is answering questions, and I've developed a power point to review interrogatives and how to answer them. I'm hoping this also spurs the review of some reading strategies like pre reading, referring the text, and using context clues.
- The last day of class has been my favorite for many years. I make a huge power point (that is uploaded to my school web page later that day, as an interactive presentation and as a PDF if students want to print it) that includes every vocabulary slide from the year. Students love it, they laugh at the old pictures again and see if they can remember the order of lists that I created randomly. They race each other to see who can remember the words faster. They are always amazed at the number of slides (about 200, many have more than one word) so it also shows them just how much they really learned.
What's your favorite way to review a year's worth of work? How to you keep students engaged and interested when all they really want to do is sit in air conditioning? And when all I want to do is sip on an iced caramel macchiato?
