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Posted on May 21, 2017 by spanishplans

We have been nominated once again for by bab.la and Lexiophiles’s Top Language Learning Blog. We would love your vote. You can vote everyday.

Click here to vote and use “Control + F” to find “Spanish Plans”

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged TLL, TLL17 | Leave a comment

What students are saying about FVR

Posted on May 17, 2017 by spanishplans

In our most previous post, students shared how reading a novel in the target language made them feel, offering wonderful insight into the reading experience in the world language classroom. Another question we asked on a student survey, was for students to say what they liked about Free Voluntary Reading (or silent sustained reading) in class. Here’s what they said: Continue reading →

Posted in reading, Uncategorized | Tagged FVR, reading, student survey, TPRS | Leave a comment

The effects of Reading in WL class

Posted on May 14, 2017 by spanishplans

If you want to see how effective reading can be in the world language classroom, just ask your students. As our year is winding down, I had students fill out a google survey to get some of their feedback and thoughts on this year. This first survey focused on getting feedback on reading a class novel as well as FVR.

The first question and answers that I’ll share this week was “Being able to read a novel in Spanish makes me feel….” and students finished the sentence. Read what they said: Continue reading →

Posted in reading, TPRS | Tagged class novel, feedback, reading, Spanish novels, student survey | 2 Comments

Summer Acquisition

Posted on May 8, 2017 by spanishplans

With summer vacation on the way, students can’t get comprehensible input from their teacher. But there are some activities that can provide enrichment for students over the summer or allow them to access to some input.

The following infographic gives you a few categories that students can practice language over the summer: Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged acquisition, enrichment, Summer | Leave a comment

Reclaiming Cinco

Posted on May 4, 2017 by spanishplans

You may think that celebrating cinco de mayo in your Spanish class is a fun reward for students at the end of the year to celebrate a year of language learning. But what are dangerous effects? As an educator are you OK with promoting stereotypes? Sure, you may teach the what Cinco de Mayo really is, including it’s history. But what are students going to remember? It won’t be a lesson in history. It will be: We had a party on Cinco de Mayo. I’ve seen it first hand. My students ask me every year if we are going to have a party. Why? “We had one last year.” For what? “This is Spanish class!” So? “It’s a Mexican holiday”

I’m sure you already have your own opinions and this blog post is not going to change your mind. But please, keep an open mind on what message your are sending to your students. Certainly no teacher wants to perpetuate stereotypes. So please, make sure your students know that the Mexican Culture is #MoreThanSombreros / #MasQueSombreros and that putting on a fake mustache can be offensive to many people. And just because you have a Mexican friend who is not offended, does not mean that no one is.

In this current political setting, Mexicans are feeling more marginalized and under attack than ever, so it is important to recognize their positive impacts in our society.

For further reading, please check out Tolerance.org article: What is Cinco de Mayo?

I think most of you will find this article eye-opening as well: Rethinking Cinco de mayo

Watch this video:

Posted in Culture | Tagged 5 de mayo, cinco de mayo, cultural appropriation, masquesombreros, mexican culture, morethansombreros | 1 Comment

Tone Reading

Posted on April 30, 2017 by spanishplans

The following is another CI activity that you can use with a chapter reading or with random sentences using a targeted structure. This activity gets in extra reps of the phrases in an engaging and fun manner, which is really the key; trick students into hearing the same phrases without getting bored.

If you are using a novel in your class, you can also use this activity Continue reading →

Posted in reading, TPRS | Tagged activity, CI, Emoji, Emotions, Tone Reading | 1 Comment

Justo o Injusto

Posted on April 25, 2017 by spanishplans

While reading the Fluency Fast novel Esperanza by Carol Gaab, one of the main themes is la injusticia. While I know that some teachers use this book in high levels (2/3), I use it with my level 1 students in eighth grade. The vocabulary includes many words that my students have acquired through storytelling throughout the year already, so there is not Esperanza Injusticia much pre-teaching I have to do in terms of vocabulary.

The themes such as unions, justice, and immigration are all worthy topics to explore.

We had just finished chapter 3, where the workers decided to strike. We previously had read the lectura from the Teacher’s Guide about Sindicatos, but I still had to give examples of what the point of a union was. While giving a short reading comprehension quiz (also from the Teacher’s Guide) I decided to make a simulation. As I was passing out the quiz, I said Continue reading →

Posted in reading, TPRS | Tagged Esperanza, Injusticia, novel | 2 Comments

Sorting Activity for Class Reading

Posted on April 23, 2017 by spanishplans

If you are reading a novel in your world language class, this activity is a great way to make sure students take away the most important events. Similar to a Yellow Summary, where students highlight the most important, this activity is more hands-on. It also provides even more input of extra reps as students are re-reading certain phrases to

Sorting_Activity_for_class_novel

determine what category to put them in. Continue reading →

Posted in reading, Storytelling, TPRS | Tagged CI, Esperanza, novels, reading, sorting | Leave a comment

FVR Printable Novels

Posted on March 20, 2017 by spanishplans

After implementing Free Voluntary Reading (FVR) in my class this year, I’ve been looking for ways to add comprehensible readings for my novice level students. I originally started by adding our class stories to a binder. But something about a binder full of page-long stories don’t seem too appealing to students.

So I’ve started printing out mini booklets using our class stories. Continue reading →

Posted in reading, Storytelling, TPRS | Tagged FVR, reading, SSR | 2 Comments

Uploading to Lyrics Training

Posted on March 5, 2017 by spanishplans

Yesterday, we showed you how to create your own cloze activities on LyricsTraining.com. But what if the song you want to use as an activity isn’t there? Well, it’s easy to add a song by adding your own lyrics and we’ll show you how.