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Feliz día del amor y la amistad <3

Lovebots art by Ziggle Designs

It has been such a long time... I have been a very bad blogger. I'd like to change that, but I can't make any promises.  I just put together this little St Valentine Day activity for my Spanish 3 students & thought I'd share with anyone who doesn't have a thematic lesson plan for tomorrow (yikes! I do work best under pressure).  I pulled images from a Google seach with "amor y amistad" & put together this quick presentation. I will have my students identify the affirmative & negative commands in the cards & answer a few comprehension questions...

¿Qué tarjeta viene de muy lejos?

¿Cuál es para animar a alguien que rompió con su novi@?

¿Cuál(es) expresa(n) amor romántico?

¿Cuál(es) expresa(n) amistad?

Happy Valentine's Day!!!

 

Five for Friday: 5 uses for movie clips

My students are constantly trying to convince me to see a movie in class.  However, it’s rare that I show a full length film.  My intermediate students don’t have the language skills to view a full 90 minute movie in Spanish, and many of the movies filmed in Spanish speaking countries have inappropriate language or scenes sprinkled here and there.  I still try and incorporate authentic language via films, but I use short clip throughout the year with a variety of lesson plans.  Here are five ideas to use in class.

1.Show a movie clip and have the students ask each other questions about what they saw.  I usually will show the clip and model the kinds of questions they can ask, then I will show the clip again & have the students jot down questions for each other as they see the clip again.  

    ¿Dónde vive la chica? ¿Qué ropa lleva?

    ¿Qué estación es? ¿Quién está con la chica?

2. Show a movie clip with specific conflict between two or three characters.  Now have partners role play a short conversations between the characters.  I keep this very short about-- 4-6 lines of dialog per character, and I encourage my students to come up with the conversation off the top of their heads rather than write the conversation. I love this Pixar collection of short films for this activity.  Most of Pixar’s shorts have little dialogue, and will have vocabulary that beginning students can manipulate. 

3. Another variation to the activity above that focuses more on written communication, is to have the students narrate or describe what will happen next in the movie.  I usually keep it short-- maybe a paragraph, and then ask them to share their work in small groups.

4. I always introduce preterit vs imperfect with a short movie clip.  My favorite one in the last couple of years has been a 10-12 minute section from El Orfanato.  The selection I chose has little dialogue, and with a little bit of backstory, the students can follow the action because it is so visual.  I will stop the movie at strategic times to explain what tense I would use if I were re-telling the story to a friend.  The next few days, I will continually refer to the examples from the movie in class when explaining preterit or imperfect.  Of course you could use a movie clip to introduce or practice other specific grammar points.

5. A short clip from a movie can be used to introduce a cultural topic or theme. Pan’s Labyrinth comes to mind for advanced students as a way to start studying the Civil War in Spain.

What other things do you do with movie clips?  Can you recommend other movies that are high interest and/or school appropriate in the target language?  I'd love to hear your ideas.

 

Scavenger hunt

I have never seen my students so excited! Today was the Spanish 3 Scavenger Hunt. Yesterday students worked with a partner to write out directions from my classroom to anther school appropriate location.  At this location the students on the hunt would find a prize placed by the first set of students. My principals are fabulous to support this activity, and most of our staff is willing to join in the fun by allowing the kids to come in their classrooms to "search" for a clue.  My students are  practicing using  plural commands with this activity, and many realized the value of giving clear directions. Another take-way for them was the need to retain vocabulary from previous lessons.  They didn't have dictionaries or vocabulary sheets with them as they hunted for their prize, and had to rely on what they remembered to be successful.You can find the handout I gave my students here. Let me know if you try this with your students.

Ser vs Estar mnemonic poster

I am going to be spending a little more time reviewing and practicing Ser vs Estar at the start of the school year with my level 3 students. I created a poster with DOCTOR ELF as a mnemonic device. I did not know about this device until I saw it on Easiest Spanish blog post. Thanks!  I also want to thank all the people who contribute quality photos over at Morguefile.com for commercial free usage. My Elf photo came from their files :)

Download Ser vs Estar

Summer learning: Bacilos y Mi primer millón

Cover of Caraluna by Bacilos

How are your students using their language skills over the summer?  The end of the year is always bitter-sweet to me because I’m so proud of how far my students have come in a year with their communication skills, but I worry about how much they will forget over the summer.  

My son took Spanish in a formal classroom setting for the first time this year.  I was very pleased with his progress.  His teacher did a fine job of including all aspects of the language learning while maintaining a rigorous and manageable pace.  My son was able to talk directly to his step-mother in Spanish for the first time this spring, and uses the language with humor and creativity often.  I want him to retain the vocabulary and language structures until next school year, so I’m working with him informally over the summer to practice and use his skills.  

He loves music, plays several instruments, listens to all kind of genres, and blogs about his passion. So music is my gateway. I hope to share lessons that worked well with him, in hopes that you might use with your students. 

Primera lección

Mi primer millon: Bacilos

I printed the lyrics to the song, and asked Nathan to read and get a general idea of what the song is about.  I felt it was important to explain what “pegar en la radio” meant since it is idiomatic (maybe slang?), but holds the key to the song’s theme.  Other than that I told him not to worry about the tenses or words he did not recognize and just get the gist of the story.

On the way to get ice cream later on that day, we heard the song in the car.  He recognized the music because he’s heard me play it off and on for the last couple years.  We went over the song lyrics together over a milkshake & sorbet (sound like bribery?). I let him explain what he understood from his reading, and I filled in the gaps.  I explained some of the grammar he hasn’t formally learned but has heard (the nosotros command vámonos para Miami and the future tense in será mi primer millón).  I also pointed out formal grammar that he learned this school year like ir+a+infinitive  (Me van a escuchar en la radio) and direct object pronouns in comprarte una casa grande.  

I could tell most of the humor of the song had been lost to him in his first reading, so I wanted to move up from translation to interpretation. I asked him some open ended questions.  

Was the narrator a reliable narrator?

Did he really want to become rich & famous to buy his girlfriend a house or was he motivated by other things as well? What else motivated him?

Why would he feel the need to explain that Paulia Rubio is “sólo una amiga”?

Why does he feel he has to go to Miami to become rich & famous?

I asked Nathan to point out lyrics in the song to support his opinion as we talked about it.  On the way home we listened to the song again, and I asked Nathan if he was better able to make out the lyrics this time around.  He could.

His follow up assignment was to write a paragraph telling me what he is going to do with his first million dollars.  We talked about using the “formulas” his teacher taught him like ir+a+infinitive and pensar+infinitive. 

This morning I read a paragraph about a monkey he was going to buy... Hmmm...

Segunda lección: ¿Quiénes son Paulina Rubio, Alejandro Sanz y “Emilio”?

 

Por vs Para partner Tic-Tac-Toe

We have started comparing the two prepositions POR vs PARA in our Spanish 3 class. I use mnemonic devices whenever possible, and I will be using ATTRACTED to remember POR usage again this year.

A - around a time or place

T - through a place/location

T - transportation or means of communication

R - reason (porque/ por eso)

A - going After something

C - cost

T - thanks for..

E- exchange/ substitution

D - duration (how long)

As a way to introduce the material had my students look and listen to the Voicethreads last year’s Spanish 3 students put together using this mnemonic device.   Monday I had partners practice using the preposition by creating original sentences in Spanish.  They used a TicTacToe grid labeled with the corresponding mnemonic device in each block.  When the student got three in a row before their partner, he/she won.  I asked partners to play at least three games, and they were not be able to  repeat similar sentences  used in previous games.  

You can download the PDF of the grid below. 

Download Attracted to POR

 

Snowball fight in Spanish class

I am a grammar nerd.  I liked diagraming sentences in junior high, but I am well aware my students have no idea what diagramming a sentence means, nor do they need to diagram one to communicate.  I still believe I need to teach grammar in order for my students to become proficient communicators, and the longer I teach, the more I realize I need to vary the way I present grammar.  Giving notes or talking through a PowerPoint is fine sometimes, but that can not be the only way to introduce and explain language structure. 

Last November my school sent me and some colleagues to a Differentiation Assessment workshop, and I picked up Betty Holla's book. Her book has some good ideas on how to present material and informally assess students, and I modified the “Snowball” activity today during a mini-lesson on past participles.

Here is what we did:

Individually students read several sentences with past participles and answered leading questions on what they read.  They had to speculate on how the participles were formed and explain how they were used in the sentences. (The examples used participles as adjectives.)  I walked around the room praising the students who were on target & giving hints to the ones who were having problems seeing the pattern or who didn’t understand the questions. The next step in this grammar lesson was to have students share their answers with their partner.  I did my best to make sure that a peer explained the correct answer to students who were having problems understanding.  As a whole class, we went over the answers together.  I clarified concepts, put specific examples on the board, and gave them the irregular participles. 

 OK.  Here is the “snowball” part. I asked my kids to pretend they were a teacher and asked them to write three questions that would measure their “students'” understanding of past participles.  They put their name on the top right hand corner of their paper, and then wadded up their “quiz” into a paper “snowball”.  I had the kids throw their “snowball” to the  opposite side of the room from where they sat.  My students had to grab whatever snowball was close to them, and then answer the questions.  They wrote their name on the bottom right hand corner.   I collected their “quizzes” and read through the questions & answers.  It gave me a very good idea of who understood the concept.  I highlighted any “quiz questions” that didn’t make sense, and any answers that were wrong.  Tomorrow I will quickly follow up with those kids individually while the class works on a vocabulary review activity. 

A few students did not like having to figure out the grammar themselves.  Few were confident in their answers until I gave them positive feedback (and then, they glowed!). I think ALL of them loved throwing the “snowball”.  

I’m very curious to see what the retention of this grammar concept looks like tomorrow and next week.  This activity took the whole bell when you include the follow up worksheet.  I know that I could give them this information on a Power Point and it would not take this much class time.  I also figure that by the end of class today my students have been exposed to, explained, heard and/or saw this grammar point at least six times in a few different modalities. 

How do you vary grammar presentation in your class?  What are your thoughts on time spent on “discovery” learning vs. traditional presentation? 

 

Center work

I know that center work is not new in a classroom setting, but it was new to my classroom last school year. My students had done an outstanding job on a comic/cartoon project using the subjunctive, and I wanted them to spend some time reading and viewing each other’s work. The problem was I had too many students per class to do this in an effective manner, so during a brainstorming session at lunch & through email several colleagues (thanks again Charlie, Andrea, Gail, MaryAnn & Rod) helped me flesh out a plan. The most visually creative pieces were placed on a bulletin board for students to read and enjoy. Rod gave me some ideas on how to structure a student centered evaluation for the students to use with the pieces. In order to practice listening skills, I had former students record a mini-podcast of another comic strip, and my students did a cloze activity with it. A third comic was used as pronunciation practice in a station using dropboxes from CLEAR. Students selected a part and performed the script with each other. All of the Animoto and ToonDoo cartoons were viewed online. The rest of the comics were stapled in a booklet for small groups to read at a 5th station. The last station had students working on grammar and sentence structure with translation work. They had about 7-8 minutes at each station, and not all students made it through the six centers. 

The key to making the centers successful is having all the stations clearly marked and establishing how the rotation works before the groups start moving. The group members had roles, and students had to complete an activity at each location. Three students per group is ideal and five students were one student too many. The student feedback was extremely positive. They wanted to finish the centers they didn’t get to the next day, and several asked me when we would do center work again. I plan on incorporating more of this kind of work next school year. It does take a bit of prep time, and my biggest problem, because I share my room with two other teachers, was the setting & re-setting up of the centers during the school day.