In French class we try to avoid using English wherever possible when showing understanding.  That’s why I often ask students to draw a phrase or sentence they see written or hear spoken to them.  Back in the day we used mini whiteboards to accomplish this, but they always took time to pass out, and students would doodle on them even when they weren’t supposed to be. Since going 1:1, students now mainly complete their drawings right on their devices. Here are some of the ways I have students use drawings to demonstrate understanding:

Last year I used Classkick to monitor student practice in class. The app allows you to view students’ work in real time. I haven’t used it yet this year (it was more helpful for hybrid and virtual instruction than in person), but one of the features I liked that was great for homework was the drawing feature. You can just make up a worksheet and students can use the pen tool to draw their answer. I had a couple of assignments where students had to draw sentences incorporating our vocabulary. Click here to read my more in-depth review of Classkick.
Nearpod was another tool that was indispensable last year to check understanding from students at home. It’s still great for in person instruction too, though. I love how when you do the “draw it” feature, you can show your favorites to the whole class. Sometimes I give a prompt for students to draw or sometimes I ask them to write their own sentence and illustrate it. Another great feature of Nearpod is the self-paced version. This is great for sub plans. Last year there was a lesson or two where I had students draw sentences on one slide and then on the next slide there was an example drawing to check their work. Click here to learn more about how I used Nearpod last year.
Last year I did a version of my ABC Book Project that I intend to repeat again this year. Students picked a theme, then wrote sentences featuring an activity for (almost) every letter of the alphabet, with groups getting assigned several letters. Then, to illustrate the book, instead of illustrating their own sentences, students were actually given a different sentence to look at and illustrate, which further reinforced their reading skills. Click here to read about this project.
Write Draw Pass is a classic, fun, whole class activity similar to Telephone (but on paper) where students write a sentence on a piece of paper, pass it to the person next to them who draws it, then folds the first sentence down and passes it to the next person, who writes a sentence based on the picture, and so on.  It helps a lot to give example sentences. It doesn’t matter if the sentence morphs a lot, students are getting reading and writing practice either way! Make sure to leave a lot of time for this activity, especially if it’s the first time doing it. Unfortunately, for the past couple of years I have not been able to do this activity due to Covid protocols, but I’d like to reinstate it this year. I first got this idea from Martina Bex.  Martina even has a template you can download! I first blogged about this activity in my “Beg, Borrow and Steal” series.
I first blogged about this activity in my Parts of the Body post. In this activity, the teacher announces body parts for students to draw.  Since it’s a monster, you can say things like “dessinez trois têtes” or “dessinez une bouche sur le cou” to make it more interesting.  Although everyone is following the same directions, the monsters all come out unique. 
When learning how to describe the weather and seasons, I draw a scene on the SMART Board and have the students write a description with as many terms they can think of to describe it.  I have students do this on mini whiteboards.  After they’ve done a few of these, I flip flop the roles.  I write a description on the board, and the students draw the scene, incorporating everything I’ve written. I first wrote about this activity in my post about Weather Writing and Speaking Activities.
I’ve gotten away from flashcards over the years, instead encouraging my students to use more interactive and communicative ways to study, such as watching a movie in French or playing Duolingo, but if I do turn to them, I ask students to draw pictures instead of writing the English.
When we learn about adjectives, students work on this assignment, which my colleague introduced to me, where students practice writing sentences about an image they drew and place the adjectives in the correct place and use the correct form. This is a very difficult concept for students to master (when to put an adjective before and when to put it after and how to gender them correctly), and I don’t expect students to fully master it in 7th grade (after all, they are still comprehensible even if the adjective is in the wrong place and misgendered), but this activity gives them an opportunity to let it all sink in.
Colors are hard to teach, especially when students do not have the language skills to use them as adjectives. One of the activities I do to review colors is to have students draw a picture and when they color it in, they have to write the color in French over and over instead of actually shading it. I found this idea on Pinterest. I first blogged about this activity on my post about colors.
Although I don’t give a lot of quizzes on paper anymore, when I do, when students finish, I ask them to turn over their paper and draw something and write something about it in French. I’ve gotten some great results over the years!
Gimkit Draw That is a favorite in our class. This is a really fun way to review vocabulary that involves the whole class and does not involve using English. Click here to learn more about this game.
I recently gave a quiz where students had to listen to ten audio recordings of essential classroom expressions and pick five to draw. Because students no longer have touch screens on their devices, I had them do it on paper. I got some great drawings, and I like this way of assessing students, but ultimately, some struggled with the drawings, so going forward I will not use drawings for this type of graded assessment.

There are probably a million different ways to incorporate drawing into your lessons. Do you have a different way? Please leave it in the comments!

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2 Replies to “Using Drawings to Show What They Know”

  1. I love all the drawing activities in here, especially Write Draw Pass! There are so many helpful links in this post and I’m going to have to go through them all. I will be going into my first year of teaching French next year, and I was wondering – have you seen any difference in engagement with these activities depending on whether students are drawing on their devices or on paper? In this pandemic world, I’m trying to feel out what my use of technology might be like next year, and I’d love to hear your take! Do you have a starting place you would recommend on your blog for a new teacher trying to get started?
    Thanks! 🙂

    1. Hmm, I’m not sure if there’s a huge difference in engagement. I tend to veer more towards using technology for the drawings these days because it’s quick and easy. I used to use whiteboards all the time but they took so much time to pass out and the students would constantly doodle on them, but they really enjoyed them. As for where to start, I would suggest searching for the topics that are of interest to you, or looking through the categories to see which areas you want to hone in on. I hope that helps!

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