As we know, “Core Competencies” include the ideas of “taking the initiative, engaging the public, and seeking the common good.” In order to practice them, we have designed some activities for teachers to make use of.

Students will be divided into groups and need to work together.

Pix-Mix:3-5 people in one group

1. The teacher shows the picture which has a lot of transportation mixed in one page.
2. The teacher asks the question: What kind of transportation do you see on the PPT?
3. Students raise hands and answer: I see a ___. (Q/A)
4. Teacher pastes the cards on the blackboard when students mention the words on the textbook.
5. Teacher mentions some important phonics rules about the vocabulary.

Word association: 3-5 people in one group

1. Students will get some hint or key words to guess what the transportation is.
2. Each member of the team takes turns writing down the answer on the small white board.
3. Rubrics of the game: The first team that shows the answer, reads it out and spells it correctly can get 3 points. The others can have 2 points if they spell and read the word correctly.The team who can either read it or spell it correctly can get one point.
4. The following are the hints and the answers.

• a. two wheels, Giant, no electricity, →bike
• b. two wheels, sheep, helmet, gloves→scooter
• c. ticket, platform, Taroko→train
• d. line up, stop, ticket, easy card→bus
• e. yellow, telephone→taxif. sick, water, slow, lake→boat
• g. Taipei, Kaohsiung, Taoyuan, no eating and no drinking→MRT

Winning Blocks: 4 people in one group
1. Put 5 blocks of 4 colors on 4 corners.
2. Four members play paper scissors stone to decide the color and order.
3. Each member takes turns throwing the dice.
4. Go __ steps forward or backward according to the dots on the dice.
5. Make a sentence according to the words on the grid.
6. When you go across others’ blocks, you need to make the sentences and take away one point from others.
7. After 2 minutes, the one who gets the most blocks is the winner.

Lucky Dice: 2 people in one group
1. The teacher explains how to play the game and asks the whole class to practice making the question and answer for each column orally.
2. 2 people in one pair.
3. Each pair gets a worksheet and a dice.
4. Play paper scissors stone.
5. The winner rolls the dice; the loser asks the question according to the dots. Bothanswer the question together.
6. Give it a check on the fourth line when you two finish any straight column.
7. After 2 minutes, see how many checks you will have on the fourth column.
8. If you can have 6 checks, you can get 6 points. 5 checks will have 5 points for your whole team.

Jigsaw Reading:
Home group→expert group→home group
-Home group: We divide the whole class into 7 teams. Each team has four students. All the number 1s are the higher achievers. All the number 4 are lower achievers.

-Expert group
1. There are 7 teams in class. All the number 1(high achievers) go to Desk A. All the number 2 go to Desk B. All the number 3 go to desk C. All the number 4(low achievers) go to Desk D.
2. The tasks for the 4 numbers (Desk A, B, C, and D)

• a. Number 1 from each team goes to the same desk, and designs some questions to ask the group members. He also needs to write down the questions they want to ask on Part A of the worksheet. (For high achievers)
  

• b. Number 2 from each team goes to the same desk, and discuss how to explain the sentences in Chinese. He also needs to finish Part B on the worksheet. Part B is to explain some sentences in Chinese.
  
• c. Number 3 from each team goes to the same desk, and practice how to leading reading the story. He also needs to finish Part C on the worksheet. Part C is to check if you can read each sentence and circle key words in each sentence.
  
• d. Number 4 from each team goes to the same desk, circle 3-4 key words(transportation) of this unit and look it up in your dictionary. The teacher will demonstrate how to do it. Students need to work together and write down the page number from the dictionary on the worksheet. (For lower achievers)

3. Each number will get a piece of the worksheet which is one part of a complete worksheet.
4. The teacher walks around to see if they need any help.

-Home group
5. Go back to your original team and share the ideas you’ve learned to your team members.

6. Number 1 asks the questions about the story.
7. Number 2 explains the meanings of the story.
8. Number 3 leads the whole group to read.
9. Number 4 shares the information of the key words from the dictionary.
10. Paste the four parts on the big poster and give it some decorations.
11. Count the points and give it to the teacher.
12. The teacher can paste it on the bulletin board.

Students show a lot of interest in the activities. Everyone including the lower achievers hasthe motivation to make efforts. This is a different view from what we have observed before in other lessons. The ideas of “taking the initiative, engaging the public, and seeking the common good” from “Core Competencies” really influence the learning attitude of students.