Anagrams for Verb Practice

One thing that drives me bonkers is that, no matter how many times we go over the four main verbs in French (to be, to have, to go, to make/do) the kids STILL don't remember how to conjugate them.  Of any verbs in the French language, these are the ones to do.

Because of how often we work on these verbs, it's easy to run out of ideas of how to practice them.  I've done everything under the sun: dice tic-tac-toe, straight up conjugating worksheets, whiteboards, word scrambles, you name it.  I came up with an idea this week that kind of puts a spin on word scrambles: anagrams.

The activity has two parts and the difficulty depends on the level.  French one only did this activity in the present tense, while French 2 and 3 got to do it in present, futur simple, passe compose, imparfait and conditionnel.

I started off with a powerpoint with 20 slides.  Each slide prompted them to write a conjugation (I had them use whiteboards).   Then, they had to show me the answer upon me counting to three.  Then I clicked the mouse, which then revealed the answer.  Each one they got right, they got a point.

At the end of this activity, I had them grab random letters and accents (I just typed a bunch of letters into MS word and cut them with a paper cutter) that was equal to the number they got right during the powerpoint.

Then I handed out a worksheet that required them to fill in the letters at the top.  Using the letters they got, they had to come up with as many conjugations as possible.  For each conjugation, they had to indicate which of the four verbs it was as well as which subject (French 2 and 3 also had to indicate which tense).  For every three conjugations they got, I gave them a point of extra credit (I RARELY give extra credit, so this was a treat for them).

This activity worked really well because it incorporated them coming up with the conjugations upon me giving them a subject and verb, but then the roles switched and they had to come up with not only the conjugations, but the subject and verb as well.

One thing I would do differently next time would be to give them maybe one or two "free" letters.  Once they got started, they could pick a letter or two to add to their list.  Some kids got majorly screwed over and could only make one or two conjugations.

Overall, though, they enjoyed it.  They love anything that has a competitive edge to it.

After doing this activity I realized how many different places I could apply this activity.  It could be applied to ANY verbs, not just the four main ones in French.  It could even be applied to grammar and/or vocabulary. You could even get multiple topics into one with the activity if you were to do a grammar concept in the powerpoint and vocabulary and/or verbs with the anagrams.

Want a copy without having to do any of the work? Check it out in my TPT store.

To be or not to be...that shouldn't be the question

For my French 1 students, obviously their skills are extremely minimal.  They just started.  When teaching a language, you can't just pick and choose what topic to do when.  Many topics require previous knowledge.  For example, you can't teach the past tense without teaching avoir (to have).  There is a general, logical flow to how to teach any student a language, and it's common to start with square one: to be.

It's hard to describe anything in any language without knowing how to conjugate "to be".  She is a student.  I am smart.  We are American.  "Is", "am", and "are" are all forms of "to be".  French is very similar to English.  Like you wouldn't say "I is" in English, you wouldn't say "je est" in French.  It just doesn't make sense.

You also need to teach subject pronouns fairly quickly.  You can't constantly be saying Emily is smart, Emily is pretty, Emily is fun.  You say Emily is smart, she is pretty, she is fun.

So in Chapter 1 of our book series, part of it is to introduce être, which means "to be".  When I taught it this time, I taught them in conjunction of one another.  I taught "to be" at the same time I taught the subject pronouns.  BIG MISTAKE.  They started thinking that "je suis" meant "I" instead of "I am".  I ended up taking a step back and emphasizing that je, tu, il, elle, etc. never change.  It's the VERB that changes with each one.  For a solid ten minutes, I gave real life examples.  I asked the class which pronoun I would use if I was talking about my mother.  Or if I was talking about my mother AND myself.  Or if I was talking about my mom and her friends.  A bunch of different examples.  They seemed to have it.

So color me confused that their average score was a 20/30 on the être quiz I just gave them.  Well at school 1.  School 2 took it today, so we'll see how they do.  I clarified a few things differently for the School 2 kids and made a few more examples on the board before the quiz, so we'll see if that helps.

I'm thinking, next time around, I will probably start with JUST subjects one day and then add être the following day or a few days later.  They will never have a grasp on verbs if they can't get subject pronouns.

There is a really catchy song I like to use with the kids that helps them remember the different forms of être.  It can be found here.