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Lesson Plan including LucidChart
By Marianela Galfón
Course: Adults - Upper Intermediate
Function: expressing your opinion.
Grammar: revision of connectors of contrast and reason.
Vocabulary: revision of expressions such as: I agree with, I strongly believe that, from my perspective, the way I see it is, my position regarding this topic is.
Duration: 2 hours.
NOTE: Students have already been working on a unit about arguing and expressing an opposing point of view. They have dealt with a text about how men and women argue differently and they have listened to a radio interview where a psychologist explains the best way to argue and win.
Warmer
The teacher will ask the students the following question for oral discussion: do argentinians tend to argue? What about people from English speaking countries?
The teacher will guide students to reflect on the differences between these cultures when it comes to arguing. The teacher will help students arrive at the conclusion that in the English culture, people tend to argue less and be more polite when they disagree with someone.
Web
Students will read the article 9 Tips for Talking to People you Disagree with and, in two groups, they will choose 3 tips that they feel are most useful. They will back up their choices by thinking of at least 2 advantages and 1 disadvantage of using each tip.
TASK 1
Students will create a collaborative lucid chart to pool their chosen tips with their corresponding advantages and disadvantages. Each team will have their own chart.
TASK 2
Students will have to prepare an oral presentation to justify their choices. The groups will create another lucid chart, this time with a mind map template, where they will organize their ideas. In the presentation, they have to state their opinions using the vocabulary and grammar previously worked on in the unit. The presentation must be animated and include transitions (the end result will be similar to a prezi presentation).
What’s next
Students will show their presentations and account for their choices orally.
THEORY TO BACK UP THE CHOICE OF TECHNOLOGY
Bloom’s Taxonomy: Bloom's taxonomy is a hierarchical model used to classify educational learning objectives into levels of complexity and specificity. The model is a pyramid which consists of different levels of cognitive learning. In task 1, students are at the understanding stage where they have to think about what makes the tips good and are the cons of it. In task 2, students reach the last two levels of the spectrum: evaluating and creating. They have to evaluate their choices in order to justify them and they have to create the speech they will make to do so. The use of Lucid Charts here scaffolds the students as they move towards the creating stage, allowing them to break down the process into smaller, more guided steps.
SAMR Model: The SAMR (substitution, augmentation, modification and redefinition) Model was created to help teachers evaluate the use of technology in their classrooms. The first two stages are part of the enhancement phase and the other two belong to the redefinition stage. Task 1 is an example of modification, as it allows for the task to be redesigned and done collaboratively. Task 2 reaches the redefinition stage as an animated visual presentation would not have been possible without the use of technology.
TIC TAP TEP: This framework fosters the inclusion of technological tools in the classroom and highlights the importance of making sure students are creators of content (TEP). This lesson includes the use of TIC as the web selected was a news site. Lucid Chart is the TAC since it allows students to reflect on the content they are working on and to work collaboratively to learn. In task 2, students are creators of content and they are expressing their opinions using technology (TEP).
Triple E Framework: This framework guides teachers to successfully and meaningfully integrate technology into their classrooms. Triple E stands for: engagement, enhancement and extension. This lesson engages students by encouraging them to become active participants. As for enhancement, the technological tool allows students to demonstrate their understanding of the topics as well as their command of the language. Lastly, this activity also helps extend the classroom work into their everyday lives as this course is aimed at adults who often have to prepare presentations for work. So the technological tool may be useful for them even outside the classroom.
Global vs. Local: This lesson chooses a global approach by selecting a web that was not written for learners of English as a foreign language. This provides students with authentic material as well as the opportunity to explore the topic, in this case arguing, from the perspective of those belonging to the target culture.
TOOL TUTORIAL: LUCID CHART
Using LucidChart is a piece of cake! First, enter the website and sign up with your google account. Mind you, this is only a free trial (it includes most of the features but you get less templates than in the premium version).
This is your dashboard. Here you will find all the charts you are working on. Choose templates to select a template and start a new chart.
Customizing your chart is just as easy as dragging and dropping! On the left, you have the panel with the shapes, lines and post-its that you can add to your chart. You can choose the color and the size of them. On the top bar, you can add text and color. The layout is very similar to Google Slides so it is user-friendly and intuitive.
Once you’re done, click the slides button. This will allow you to select the objects on the screen in the order that you want them to be presented. Simply click on each object and a new slide will be created.
And voilà! It autosaves so you never have to worry about losing all your work. Click present and show your classmates all your work.
TEACHERS’ OPINIONS
Several teachers have included LucidChart in their classroom as it allows for a variety of different options and activities, engages students as content creators, it’s collaboratively and, most important, easy to use.
A 7th grade teacher in Pennsylvania, US, used LucidChart so that her students could recreate the places of the town mentioned in a novel they were reading. The children created floor plans using the shapes and colors from the options. They also added text to designate each area.
A Spanish teacher in a North Carolina school used flowcharts to practice grammatical exponent of the language. This is somewhat similar to what this lesson here proposes.
A highschool teacher in Saipan uses LucidCharts to break down content into more comprehensible, manageable bits for his tutoring students. He says that they find reading pictures easier than reading text on a blank page, so LucidChart allows him to easily organize the same content into more visually friendly charts.
SOURCES
DiGiulio, S. (2019). 9 Tips for Talking to People you Disagree with. Retrieved from: https://www.nbcnews.com/better/lifestyle/9-tips-talking-people-you-disagree-ncna1059326
García, ML. (2018) chapter 8, Differentiated learning: teacher’s pathways to meaningful technology Integration. In Adapting to meet diverse needs in ELT. Selected Papers from the 43nd FAAPI Conference
H. L. (2017). SAMR Model: A Practical Guide for EdTech Integration. Retrieved from: https://www.schoology.com/blog/samr-model-practical-guide-edtech-integration
Ledesma, P. (2010). WWW.Teach: Employing Web 2.0 Techniques for Fostering
Students’ Creative use of the Language in ESL and EFL classrooms. Retrieved from: https://www.academia.edu/4079644/www_teach_Employing_Web_2_0_Techniques_for
Lopez Barrios &Villanueva (2014) Global vs. Local: Does It Matter?
Sneed. (2016). Integrating Technology with Bloom’s Taxonomy. Retrieved from: https://teachonline.asu.edu/2016/05/integrating-technology-blooms-taxonomy/
Williams, S. (n/d). Twitter Roundup: Teachers Using Lucidchart in the Classroom. Retrieved from: https://www.lucidchart.com/blog/teachers-using-lucidchart-in-the-classroom
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