Wednesday, September 17, 2008

French Teaching Activities: Telephone and Numbers Games

I would like to announce the arrival of my first foreign language teaching e-book.   Since 1990, I've shared classroom games, activities, and projects at teacher conferences across the U.S.  Now I'll be sharing ideas digitally on-demand!

I have partnered with a former Spanish teaching colleague to create Foreign Language House language learning materials.  My talented friend, Catherine, and I are working on lots and lots of e-publications for teaching French, Spanish, and English in the classroom or at home.  Let me tell you about our first baby.

French Telephone Games is a resource for teaching numbers and conversational skills to students in upper elementary through high school.  If you teach foreign languages, perhaps you've played the "Telephone Game."  Every student receives a paper telephone with a phone number on it.  When the teacher draws a phone number out of a hat and "dials," the owner of the phone must pick up and perform the dialogue.  This activity is intended for use in a classroom, but it can easily be adapted for groups of four or more.

My students love the Telephone Game for the simple reason that they love to talk on the phone.  Yes, even my high schoolers get that little paper phone in their hands and start happily gabbing away!  I like the Telephone Game because I can review numbers quickly and naturally at any point in the year; my students develop the useful skill of using phones in French; each and every student is accountable to practice dialogues and listen for their phone number; the activity is adaptable to almost any context and ability level; and best of all---it's just plain fun!

Check out the snazzy cell phone Table of Contents to see what you get in this e-book: over 15 pages of directions, culture, language, student handouts, and a dozen fun numbers games.  The best part is the template for the paper phones.  Just print and go!  Plus, I've included a variety of authentic French telephone numbers to use on your phones as your students practice numbers 0-99.

French Telephone Games is available to be downloaded now for only $5 US.  Click this link, or visit the Foreign Language House store on Lulu.com  (The link is on the side bar.)  The Spanish version of Telephone Games will be out any day now, and we've got several other works in progress.

Comment if you have any requests for teaching or learning materials in English, French, or Spanish.  Merci :-)

2 comments:

Lyne Des Roberts said...

WOW Diane!

You're certainly a busy woman!!! Do you get some sleep sometimes?

A real superwoman: a mom, a high school teacher, a blogger (and a great one I must say!), a summer teacher for pre-schoolers et j'en passe sûrement! And now, some e-publications!

Congrats my friend! Your phone game seems quite interesting... will have to check it. Not that I could use it w my crooners though! LOL

You're soooooooo resourceful and creative! À plus tard!

Diane said...

Sleep??? I vaguely recall the concept. Ask my kids about our "Mommy needs coffee" song!

Actually, I've been creating and presenting teaching materials for so long, it's just a matter of getting everything "techie" and polished. Creating activities, games, songs, and stories is my greatest strength as a teacher. I'm always running from textbooks in order to personalize instruction. If I can keep my own short attention span engaged, my students are usually entertained as well.

It's been an enormous amount of work, but a labor of love. We've been dreaming about this project for months now. It feels so good to finally have a little, bitty something to show for it. Can't wait to unveil our logo when it's done! Thanks for your kind words :-)