Monday 29 April 2013

GCSE 'Fantasy Football' Revision

Whilst selecting my Fantasy Football team a couple of weeks ago I had somewhat of a light bulb moment. What if I could use the format and create a lesson around it? This idea came to me at the same time as I was revising key individuals throughout medicine with my Year 11 GCSE history groups. A perfect match (sorry)! . So, here's how my Fantasy Football Medicine lesson played (really sorry) out..........

The Hook

Whilst the pupils entered the room they were given a post-it note and told to write the name of an individual and why they are important in the history of medicine. I also had this video (which I created using Animoto) playing on a loop to provide extra stimulus and act as a bit of a reminder for those pupils struggling to think of an individual. This worked really well and succeeded in getting them on board and engaged in the learning.  




The Main Activities

Team Sheet

The Medicine Through Time development study requires pupils to remember around 20 key individuals and their contribution to medicine. Pupils sometimes struggle to (a) correctly remember individuals and (b) place them in the correct period of medicine. So, any activity which can reinforce their knowledge and understanding of key individuals is very much welcomed. 

The team sheet required pupils to select the 11 individuals who they think had the greatest impact on the history of medicine. Pupils worked in pairs and used colourful flashcards to support them. Now, this is where the lesson took an unexpected turn. I thought pupils would simply write down down the 11 individuals they thought were most important, however, it generated some interesting discussion such as 'let's put Galen in goal as no one could get past him for a 1000 years' and 'you can't have Koch and Pasteur upfront as they'd never pass to each other'. There was also some concerns that Vesalius wouldn't make a great central defender due to his height, however, he was likened to a Messi with a low centre of gravity and all. 

Pupils then had to justify why they had chosen that particular individual by filling in the who, what, where, when and why grid on the reverse of their team sheet. 



Peer Assessment

Once team sheets had been completed pupils were put into groups of four and each pair had to argue why their team was better than the other team. Again, this produced some interesting debate. 

Man of the Match

Once pupils had finished their peer assessment I asked them to write down who their Man of the Match was (most important individual in medicine) and why. 

The Plenary

I used the Room 101 plenary as I really wanted pupils to think about the individuals they had not selected for their team. I did have to explain the concept of Room 101 to a few pupils but  that didn't take too long. I then got them to nominate an individual they would get rid of and why. Again, this produced some great debate as pupils argued their reasons for placing an individual in Room 101.

Overall, I was really happy with how this lesson worked out. The pupils were engaged and having meaningful conversations about the individuals and their contributions to medicine. My only concern is that a few pupils became a little too fixated on where the different individuals should be playing! 

You can download a copy of the lesson and all the resources here. Could you adapt this for your subject? 



Monday 15 April 2013

10 A Day Challenge


I don't particular enjoy marking. There, I said it. Maybe it's the sheer volume of words or the repetition of answers. Whatever it is I do often dread sitting down, going through pupils' books, reading and correcting and providing truly meaningful feedback. And, if I'm going to be very honest, I often find myself getting distracted by other things, namely, Twitter, Premiership Fantasy Football and Spotify. This means that I am often falling behind with pupils' exercise books. It usually gets to the point where I will need to put aside three days of a holiday to catch up. This is no fun. Surely there must be another way? Welcome to the 10 A Day Challenge.......

The 'challenge' is to mark 10 books a day, everyday, Monday - Saturday (I try not to work on a Sunday - day of rest and all that). A grand total of 60 books per week. Now, using my rather limited mathematical brain, if i teach 200 pupils (which I do) that means their books will be marked, on average, every 3 weeks. This seems quite reasonable when coupled with the ongoing verbal feedback the pupils get during lessons. Also, the feedback will be more meaningful and constructive as I won't become bored and start to drift off (I hope). Anyhow, I now need to go and consume one of my 10 a day.....

Ps - I drafted this post about a week ago. I then read a blog post by @kenradical re: the new curriculum. Whilst reading I noticed he had written a post entitled '10 A Day - making marking manageable and achievable'. You can read it here. It's actually more succinct than my tentative ramblings but 'great' minds and all that..........