Estos no son mis brazos

The oversized jersey made this team's arm illusion especially convincing.

While searching the internet for some #authres, I came across the Youtube channel for "LosPolinesios," a trio of Mexican siblings that film themselves doing hilarious retos, or challenges.  Mostly, they dare each other to eat outrageous food items, but they also play practical jokes on each other and make silly videos.  They have a series of videos called Reto: Éstos no son mis brazos (Not My Arms Challenge), where one person talks and the other provides accompanying arm movements.  Lesslie did a video, with Karen as her arms, in which she discussed her rutina diaria, which just so happens to be a unit in our 8th grade Spanish curriculum.  Lesslie covered a lot of our reflexive verb vocabulary in her video:  despertarse, cepillarse los dientes, maquillarse, peinarse, desayunarse.  Perfect #authres!  I showed the video to my students and asked if anyone was brave enough to try to make a similar video.  I wasn't sure how they would respond, but before I could even get the idea out of my mouth, several of them were clamoring with excitement.  Speaking in Spanish...on camera...while having someone throw a bunch of beauty products in your face takes a certain personality type.  I wanted everyone to feel involved and comfortable, so I said students could pick from three main roles:  the speaker, the brazos, and the helper.  The helper would be entirely behind-the-scenes and would help edit the video.

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INTRODUCTION AND SET UP

1.  Showed the video to my students and gauged their interest.
2.  Put 3 roles on the board: speaker, brazos, helper.
3.  Asked each student his/her preference and wrote names under each category.
4.  Had students mingle and create groups.  They figured out their teams without any problem.  Out of three sections, only 2 students needed help figuring out who to pair up with.
4.  Gave basic guidelines for the project.

GUIDELINES

This is a screen grab from a Google Doc I shared with my students.

LOGISTICS

​Day 1:  Students were introduced to the project, formed teams, and began brainstorming.
Day 2:  Teams put their ideas / script into a Google Doc, shared with me, then were approved for practice.
Day 3: Students practiced in class.
Day 4: Filming (4 groups in 40 minutes)
Day 5: ​Filming

Supplies that came in handing on filming day:

• giant plastic tarp - Protected the floor from water, shaving cream, cheerios, etc.
• plastic table cloth - Protected the desk from mess.
• laptop  - We used Mac's Photobooth app.
• Apple headphones - We plugged them into the laptop's headphone jack and taped down the attached microphone to a nearby desk for better audio.
• trash bags - Served as ponchos for teams that went all out and weren't afraid of getting messy or wet.
• make up wipes - Maquillarse was the most popular verb used in the skits.
• scrap paper - I had students give feedback to each group.  They had to write a few positivos, a crítica, and had to rate the group's español and overall comedia on a check plus, check, or check minus scale.

VIDEO

This was the first video that came into me.  The student editor for this video added in sound effects and played with the video speed.  The only requirement I gave was providing subtitles, but she had fun playing around with iMovie.  She has a few typos in the subtitles, but I love the spirit of this video!

STUDENT FEEDBACK

"I liked this project because we were moving around, not sitting and listening, which really doesn't work for me."

"I enjoyed the laughter that came out of this. I loved seeing the other ideas that my classmates had."

"I learned the words while they were put into action, which was helpful."

"I liked to see people using the phrases.  It helped a lot."

COMPETITION

The videos are beginning to come into me as students finish editing.  Each class will vote for the best video from their section.  They will choose the videos based on the quality of the Spanish and overall humor.  I spoke with my principal in advance, and we decided to show the top video from each class at our morning assembly.  The student body will vote on the best video and that class will win a reward.  I'll post the results in my next post.  To be continued...