Day of the Dead: TED-Ed Lesson

In my post from yesterday I gave my initial reaction to the "flipped classroom." In short, I loved the idea, but wasn't sure how feasible it actually was to create effective lessons for students to complete outside of the classroom.  Well, I created a TED-Ed lesson for a homework assignment for grad school, and was pleasantly surprised by how easy it was to do.  With easy to follow steps, I could DEFINITELY see using this in my future classroom as a way to introduce topics to students before we even meet in class.

Check out my Day of the Dead Lesson here.

Lesson Language Learning Objectives:

• Relating Cultural Practices to Perspectives: Learners will use the language to investigate, explain, and reflect on the relationship between the practices and perspectives of the cultures studied
• Relating Cultural Products to Perspectives: Learners will use the language to investigate, explain, an reflect on the relationship between the products and perspectives of the cultures studied
• Acquiring Information and Diverse Perspectives: Learners access and evaluate information and diverse perspectives that are available through the language and its cultures
• Cultural Comparisons: Learners use the language to investigate, explain, and reflect on the concept of culture through comparisons of the cultures studied and their own 

** These can be catered to meet the level of the class which is being taught **

How to Test if Objectives Have Been Met:

• This lesson has several "Think" Multiple Choice Questions and and Discussion Question.  The MC questions check for comprehension, and the discussion question directly calls for cultural comparisons
• This TED-Ed Lesson should be followed up by an in-class discussion in the target language in which the teacher models the discussion question in Spanish and a possible response.  Students will already have thought about the discussion question and their answer as per the TED-Ed assignment, so in class they will need to only focus on target language use.  The teacher can further this discussion by facilitating a conversation about the practices and products associated with Day of the Dead and how it relates to cultural perspectives.  This is the definition of flipped learning: The students learn the basics outside of class, then they can achieve higher level thinking in the classroom as guided by the teacher.