Anticipatory Sets
Anticipatory sets are short portions of a unit given at the beginning of the class period. They help to get students’ attention, draw students into the lesson, activate prior knowledge and prepare students for the day’s activities. Today’s post is about how to hook your students into the daily lesson. I have been reading a lot of fabulous activities other language teachers use in their classrooms. I thought these ideas would be great anticipatory sets for ASL students.
How to Start Class
I have been thinking about how I start my class and how very routine I am with the flow. Doing the same thing every day seemed like a good idea to keep students’ stress levels down. After all, if they knew what was going to happen, they would come in, sit down and get to it. That is how I learned and it worked. That was my teaching approach and it is working. Then the words of my good friend George Couros came to mind.
“If we are going to help our students thrive, we have to move past ‘the way we have always done it’, and create better learning experiences for our students than we had ourselves.”
I start my classes every day with an interpersonal prompt. I am sure you have heard me talk about how I give students a prompt that they can talk about in an unrehearsed setting. Don’t get me wrong, I stand by my prompts. I think it is great practice for students. The conversations are always different and focused on topics that are of interest to my students. But is it really stimulating to do this every day?
Ideas for Anticipatory Sets
A while back during #langchat @nathanlutz shared an amazing resource with me. It gave me some great ideas for anticipatory sets. In the shared post, Selma Damani talks about her 16 ideas for an awesome anticipatory set. I researched some ideas on anticipatory sets and focused them on ASL so they can become the perfect hook for the sign language classroom.
- Quotes: Put them on your bulletin boards. Choose ones that go along with the unit but also focus on the theme or aspect of culture or communication students are studying. Have students choose one that speaks to them. Then have them write or share in the target language with a friend about how it connects to what they are learning.
- Role-play/Skit: Nothing piques students’ interests quite like not knowing what is going to happen and seeing their peers in the middle of it all. Write out some ideas or words on index cards to start the lesson. Pick a few students to participate. I always confer with students involved to explain the expectations before the lesson starts. Students love to participate. The more you get them in the middle of it all, the more the class will buy into what you have prepared.
- Four Corners: Place possible “answers” to questions on a poster in the corners of the room (2 – 4 corners can be used). Create a list of questions to use with the answers you have posted. Pose the questions and have students move to that corner. Take it a step further by having students talk about their answer to the questions or ask a few follow up questions to individual students in each corner. Once you have created the “answer” posters, your prep for this activity is actually done. It is easy to use over and over again. Ideas and expansion on this activity. Here are some FREE four corner signage for you to downlaod and try with your class.
- Task Cards: This is a great idea to open up past vocabulary and concepts as well as engage students. The Owl Teacher has some great ideas to use task cards. Check it out here. Or get them already made for ASL class here.
- Guess Who: Play a game of who or what am I based on the vocabulary you are working on. This is a good way to get students involved and keep the interest of students in the classroom.
In Conclusion
Now you have a few new ideas on how you can start class. Maybe these ideas are something you have used before but
have moved away from (like me). Now is a great time to try them, reincorporate them into your daily plans, or rotate in a few to mix it up. Buzzzzzzz! Can you feel the anticipation?
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