LILT Annual Conference 2024

Looking for ways to keep Level 5 students engaged in their final year of Spanish? Look no further! During this workshop you will be exposed to several culture-based projects that aim in engaging 12th grade students and maintaining their communication skills all while earning their Seal of Biliteracy. Note: The activities presented are geared towards non-AP students but can be easily leveled-up to suit the needs of an AP course.

As language educators, we all strive to help our students reach higher levels of fluency and proficiency. However, many upper level Italian courses can become bogged down with grammar drills and rote memorization, leading to a lack of communicative competence. Comprehensible input strategies offer a practical solution to this problem by providing meaningful and engaging language input that promotes language acquisition and fluency. We explore the benefits of implementing comprehensible input strategies in upper level Italian courses, as well as practical ways to do so. We discuss techniques such as story-telling, picture-based instruction, and targeted vocabulary acquisition, and their impact on language acquisition and fluency. Participants will be provided with templates that they can adapt to apply these strategies to different contexts, themes, grammatical structures, and so on, helping participants will have a better understanding of how to create a communicative and engaging learning environment in upper level Italian courses, and how to help their students develop the fluency and confidence needed to use the language in real-world settings.

This workshop aims to help educators create meaningful activities centered around authentic resources. To begin, we will provide a brief overview of the modes of communication, the NYS standards and what defines an authentic resource. Next, we will demonstrate how to design activities that incorporate the interpretive, interpersonal and presentational modes of communication. These communication forward activities will allow teachers to meet the new NYS standards while actively engaging students in the target language. We will spend some time addressing the use of AI to generate ideas and activities. Participants should bring their own device and previously found an authentic resource they would like to implement in a lesson. We will dedicate time during the workshop for lesson planning and activity creation.

In this workshop, I will be sharing my method and though process of how to create Integrated Performance Assessments (IPA). The workshop will show step by step process, sharing of authentic resources and time to collaborate and create your own IPA.

Active Cognition; The Power of Images

The workshop will highlight the events surrounding the Olympic games in Paris this summer. The history of the modern Olympic competition is directly relevant to the history of Modern France. The annual competitions have connotations beyond the simple winner/ loser appearance of the games. They embody the pride of each state/country. Many are politically motivated to participate and win the games to bring a sense of unity, peace, and healing for their war-torn countries, as was the case for the first modern Olympic games.

The objective of this workshop is to serve as a year 2 follow up to part 1 of the series where we discussed the introduction of a new program within our department dedicated to meeting the needs of the ever growing native Spanish speaking population while at the same time addressing the needs of our heritage students. More specifically, the workshop is designed to highlight the distinguishing characteristics of a Heritage class that enable us to meet the specific needs of the heritage student in preparing them for upper level courses within the World Language department while also building on the skills required to improve performance across all content levels.

Unlock the potential of your language learners with "Think, Talk, Learn," a dynamic workshop designed to empower educators with innovative thinking routines. Join us for an engaging session where you'll discover practical strategies to make thinking visible in your classroom, fostering deeper understanding and language development. Learn how to implement routines like See-Think-Wonder, Sentence-Phrase-Word, and Chalk Talk, tailored to support and challenge language learners at all levels. Through interactive activities and collaborative discussions, you'll leave equipped with the tools to create a vibrant, thinking-centered classroom that enhances both language skills and cognitive growth. Don't miss this opportunity to transform your teaching and inspire your students to think, talk, and learn with confidence!