It's a bit late for Year 11, I know. My Year 10s are preparing for end of year orals and have been using a multimedia approach to drum those conversation topics in.The first stage was very conventional: write answers to questions on school, hand in, then type up the corrected version. Next, choose images from the net to reflect each of your answers. Drop these into Photostory 3 and add the questions as subtitles.
Now the more unusual bit: upload your answers to readthewords, choose one of the available French-speaking voices, and listen to your own answers. For students lacking in confidence this breaks the back of any pronunciation problems without the need for an unrealistic amount of time practising with the teacher. After a final rehearsal with me, the students then record their answers in Photostory, making a great resource to share with other students, mail home, or download onto a smartphone etc...
This took two 55 minutes lessons and two homeworks, and I'm looking forward to hearing the impact on their oral performances next week. The students certainly enjoyed making their short videos, and using speech simunlation as pronunciation support was excellent for boosting the independance of a bottom set.
Nice to feel new technologies can help us meet the old expectations of learning a certain amount of language by rote.
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