Sport für alle!

This year when Deutsch II was learning sport-related vocabulary, I decided to work with our Physical Education Department at Glenelg to give the students a day to play a sport of their choosing.  I got them the gym for a whole period on a Friday - they chose a game and we took it from there.

First I started with some Piggeldy und Frederick.  We watched the video on Schlittschuh laufen in which Frederick has to explain skating to Piggeldy.


After viewing and discussing this video, I divided the students into groups and assigned each group one of the following sports: Basketball, Fußball, Hockey, Volleyball, Baseball, Tennis, amerikanischer Fußball.  Each group needed to come up with a German explanation of the game for Piggeldy.  They had to find the vocabulary to describe things like how many players were on a team, different positions (ex: goalie) and equipment (tennis racket), and the different rules/actions involved ("don't touch the soccer ball with your hands" and "kick the ball").  Then each group reported out what they had come up with.

At this point, I revealed that they were going to get a chance to play ONE of these sports during class.  They had to pick which sport, though, based on how easy they thought it would be to get the materials necessary and if they could get a big enough team.  After some voting and finagling, they agreed on Fußball.

The next step was I gave them the option of "inviting" (read that as "challenging") Deutsch III and Deutsch IV to the match.  They whole-heartedly wanted to challenge the upper levels.

Of course, it's one thing to have your own class go to the gym and play a game during the period that they have you.  It's another thing to pull students from other classes for a game.  I told the upper level German classes about the match and gave them a permission slip.  It was really more of a way to let the other teachers know what was going on.

A lot of students wanted to participate but most couldn't get out of class that day (we had had several snow days in a row which undoubtedly had something to do with it).  It was definitely fun to get a few new faces.  I hope to be able to do this game again in the future - I want it to be something that builds up and the kids look forward to playing as a team against another class.

As an alternate activity for students who, for whatever reason, didn't want to play, I gave them the chance to take pictures of the game instead.  This is German, not Gym, after all and I didn't want to force the kids to play - it's supposed to be fun!

The game itself went well.  The Phys Ed teachers were super supportive - they gave us pinnies and equipment and (most importantly!) the space to play in.  I think next year, though, I would invite another teacher to help moderate the game.  The kids were well behaved, the issue was more that I'm not personally very familiar with the rules and game play of soccer.  I'm a hockey and football girl, so when we play a game I don't know as well I feel I should ask one of the school coaches if they'd be willing to ref for us.

Now as fun as it was to take a day off and play a game, there's no way we stopped there!  The kids had, after all, spent all that time looking up soccer-related terms and we had all these pictures.  There was a project to be had out of this!

One of our media specialists had talked to me earlier in the year about Animoto, a website that makes you put together videos from your own photos or video footage.  You can get a free account, which does limit you to 30 seconds of footage and you don't have as wide of a selection in animations, music, etc, but the length was actually perfect for what we needed.  Check out one of the student videos!

Sporttag was a lot of fun and I can't wait to do it again next year!

- Frau Leonard

Piggeldys Geburtstag

In Deutsch II, our first new vocabulary unit relates to gifts and holidays.  Students discuss common gifts to give different people, as well as holiday traditions in Germany (with a focus on Christmas and birthdays).  In order to get a better look at birthdays, the class throws a birthday party for Piggeldy.  This is one of my favorite activities for the year because the kids really get into it.  It's a chance for them to have fun but still do something related to German and our current unit.

Maybe I should back track a little.  Who's Piggeldy?  Well, he's a character in a children's book and cartoon show called Piggeldy and Frederick that I frequently use with my students (great for listening practice and circumlocution, but more on that some other time).  Because of how often we use this cartoon show, even in Deutsch I, I do happen to have a stuffed pig in my classroom that we call Piggeldy.  So when we do activities related to the show, or when we have this party, we can bring Piggeldy front and center :)

Every year students start by watching the Piggeldy und Frederick episode titled "Geburtstag."  In this particular episode, Piggeldy wants to know what a birthday is and then wants to find out when his is.  We find out that  he's 5 years old and that today is actually his birthday.

After this introduction, I tell students we need to have a birthday party to celebrate Piggeldy turning 6.  We go through all the steps of planning a party.  After we've discussed the date and location, students write invitations.

This year is actually the first year I've handed out these invitations - I sent the invitations along with this explanation to our school administrators, inviting them to see what we're doing in the classroom.

To further prepare for the party, students had to write a birthday card for Piggeldy and find him a gift.  Students obviously didn't have to buy a gift - I told them to find something they thought Piggeldy would like, print out a picture of it (or draw it themselves), and explain why they thought it was a good gift for him.  They're usually pretty creative (though there's usually at least one student who gives him bacon each year...).  Here are some of the birthday cards and gifts:

Yesterday was our actual celebration.  In class we played three birthday games.  We played Gummitwist, Schlangenschwanz, and then Steck dem Schwein den Schwanz an (see below!).  Since I'm not German and don't have a German family background, I didn't know too many authentic games.  When we first started doing a party for Piggeldy, I had to look into the types of games German kids play at birthday parties.  These were the ones I found (though I did change it from pin the tail on the donkey to pin the tail on the pig, just to go with our birthday theme).  If you know of any other games, let me know and I'd be glad to try and incorporate them!

After playing games, students gave Piggeldy their cards and gifts, we sung Happy Birthday in German, then got to eat :)

The kids had signed up to bring the food ahead of time - I promised to bring the cake, but they had to do the rest!  We usually get a pretty decent spread, though (what can I say, teenagers love to eat).

I'm really glad that this year I invited our administrators.  Three of the four of them came, and they got to see the kids in action!  They experienced a whole class in German, with both me explaining the games completely in German and the students speaking to me and each other in German (without needing to be prompted, which is always a plus!).  They were really impressed with how much they were using the language in a level 2 class and loved the activity.  I loved that the kids got a chance to show off what they can do while having fun!

- Frau Leonard