Football World Cup

SOME RESOURCES

FIFA official site:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/grammar/vocabulary/football.shtml


Fuleco, Brazil 2014 mascot:
http://en.mascot.fifa.com/


The World Cup Stadiums 2014:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/world-cup/10383648/World-Cup-stadiums-a-venue-guide-for-Brazil-2014.html

 HISTORY 

A brief history of the World Cup:

http://content.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1989102,00.html?xid=rss-photoessays&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+time/photoessays+TIME:+Top+Photoessays

SOME FOOTBALL VOCABULARY 

Football vocabulary:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/grammar/vocabulary/football.shtml

  FOOTBALL RULES

The rules of football:

http://rulesoffootball.co.uk/

ACTIVITIES AND PRINTABLES

Quizzes and printable worksheets:
http://www.esolcourses.com/topics/the-world-cup.html
http://www.esolcourses.com/topics/football.html

World Cup worksheets:
http://www.eslprintables.com/Vocabulary_worksheets/Sports/World_Cup/

INFORMATION ABOUT BRAZIL

Brazil:

http://kids.nationalgeographic.com/explore/countries/brazil.html

http://www.infoplease.com/country/brazil.html

http://www.mapsofworld.com/brazil/information/fact.html

YOUR TASK

And now it's up to you! Let's make a digital sport magazine about the World Cup events. Last time I used Glossi (in my previous post about food and recipes), now I've tried Joomag.

Here you can find a short example of our sport web magazine. 

You can write articles, add images, links or videos and keep us informed about the World Cup news! 

Click below to open my example

Become a digital journalist! Some advice for you:

• How to write a digital story
• How to wrtite a sports article

Tour Builder by Google - Storytelling with maps

 

Tour Builder is a free fantastic tool! You have the whole world to put your stories on! It allows you to create or explore stories directly in the various countries of the world where they are set.

You will need to install the Google Earth Plugin (it only takes a couple of minutes), if you haven't already.

You can take a 3D trip inside stories!

It could be very useful to study history, geography, literature and even storytelling.

If you want to create your story-trip  you have to 

• choose your destination on the Google map
• add your photos, videos, links
• describe the places, pictures, photos or videos you put in (you can give a general description in the "tell the story" box and you can also describe picture by picture)
• insert some links if you want people to get more information

Tour Builder takes track of all your movements on the map and this is the final result. Watch my brief example about my Cambridge experience! Choose "enter Street View" on the map to watch 3D the places I saw!

Some students' tasks:

1

Describe your last school (or family) trip. 

• Mark all the places you visited on the map
• Add some pictures or videos
• Describe the places you visited

2

Is there an esotic place in the world you would like to visit?

• Choose a destination
• Find some photos about that place on the Net and add them
• Invent a travel route 
• Add some links to give information about the places you would like to visit
• Write the reasons why you would like to go there

Let's go travelling!

Creative writing tools - having fun with words and images

Here are some interesting writing tools to make writing activities 

more attractive.

You can play with words to create your text and 

you can link your words to images.

Then you can share your material.

Watch my simple examples.

PicLit

You choose an image from the Piclit gallery and you add some text. You can "drag and drop" choosing from different suggested nouns, adjectives and verbs or you can write "freestyle".

My example:
http://www.piclits.com/viewpoem.aspx?PoemId=237190

Capzles

With Capzles you work most of all with images. You can choose an image as your background and then you can add your own pics or videos to create a sort of presentation. By clicking on each picture it is possible to add a brief description. I think it could be very useful to describe a trip or a school activity.

My example:
http://www.capzles.com/3d3a9ba0-7533-45ca-bb0b-f6a97e03ac8c


Mapskip

This is a very original tool. The world is a canvas for your own stories and photos. You start from a map, you click on the place you like, you add your mark and write your story about that place. You can tell your adventures adding your pictures.

My example:
http://www.mapskip.com/stories.php?story=6681

Storybird

With Storybird you choose some images and write a story drawing inspiration from those pictures. Very useful to write a story and improve creativity and imagination.

My example:
http://storybird.com/books/the-teacher-and-the-little-girl/?token=gtq94fygeu


Magneticpoetry

You can write your own poems choosing among different suggested words. Very funny!

My example:
http://play.magneticpoetry.com/poem/Original/kit/15415/?h=8444d213e9cd688d306fa98d2aa7ca79

For teachers - some storyboard generators to create comics

Using storyboards can help us to easily transmit any idea, even the most complex, to our students. Storyboards or comics could make it easier to explain events or processes and could help students remember details and put them on a timeline. 

I have to say that I really had fun! StoryboardThat is a really enjoyable tool to create your own comics!

http://www.storyboardthat.com/ 

This is my short example: 

Click on the link below to enlarge the image:

http://sbt.blob.core.windows.net/storyboards/robertamartino/school-rules.png

I've also tried Make Beliefs Comics.  

http://www.makebeliefscomix.com/ 

Click on the following link to open my strip.

http://www.makebeliefscomix.com/Comix/?comix_id=49325928C1233233

Lastly I tried Zimmer Twins to create animated strips. It's fantastic!

http://www.zimmertwins.com/splash

Here you can see my example:

http://www.zimmertwins.com/node/1447552

I think it would be very useful to make our students create their own storyboards, too.

For example, instead of writing only words they could insert drawings to create their reports or summaries.

Moreover, by allowing students to use digital tools we can teach them  technological skills that will be very important for their future.

For teachers - some digital tools for writing and story telling

This post is about educational tools for writing or story telling.

The first tool I tried is Storybird.
http://storybird.com/

It's about artful storytelling. You can choose different images and drawings from various artists and you (or your students) can create a story. That's my simple example for you:
http://storybird.com/books/the-teacher-and-the-little-girl/?token=gtq94fygeu

 

Then I tried Magnetic Poetry.
http://play.magneticpoetry.com/

You have some words to choose to create your own poem!
This is my crazy masterpiece!
http://play.magneticpoetry.com/poem/Original/kit/15415/?h=8444d213e9cd688d306fa98d2aa7ca79

I have also tried Wordle.
http://www.wordle.net/

It generates “word clouds” from text that you provide. The clouds give greater prominence to words that appear more frequently in the text.This is an example:

 Ok, now you and your students can enjoy using words.... Create your own masterpiece!!