Special Person Interviews

Posted on August 16, 2019 by

This is a guest post from Christy of Christy’s Classroom who tells how she incorporates the Special Person Interviews in her Spanish class.

This quarter in my middle school classes I have been incorporating special person interviews. This is a great way to get to know your students, build relationships and establish a positive class culture.

I am using the interviews and information from the interviews in a variety of ways to maximize input. Some ways I’m maximizing input beyond the interview are:

Continue reading →

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Back to School 2019

Posted on August 7, 2019 by

Summer is coming to an end. A summer that we’ve been busy: planning a wedding, taking online courses, creating new lessons, working on our website, going on vacation, watching the Women’s World Cup ,and more all while being abroad in the beautiful country of  Colombia.

So here’s an update on what we’ve been working on in case you missed it:
1. CI Teacher’s Guide: We’ve put together a book for world language teachers that is perfect for new teachers or just teachers who are learning more about comprehensible input strategies. This includes strategies that we’ve successfully implemented in our own class and have kept us in the target language. This 48 page document details specific CI strategies to use as a lesson as well as specific reading strategies that will help you get the most out of any text.

 

2. Dolores Huerta Unit: This past school year we introduced our class to this important historical figure with a lesson starting about farm workers. After working refining the lesson for months, we finally published it. This lesson plan includes a set of storyboards about farm workers, various texts (including an editable version), prompts to go along with the documentary, Dolores, and a FVR Booklet that you can print and make available in your classroom library.

 

3. Everything CI Bundle: We’ve combined ALL of our CI materials into one mega download. This combines our MovieTalk Bundle, our TPRS Stories Bundle, and our FVR booklets and stories.

4. New Stamp Designs: We’ve already been working a lot on our Stamps available from SpanishTeacherShop.com
New Country Stamps: We’ve updated the designs for several countries: Bolivia, Panama, Costa Rica, Peru, Paraguay, Estadios Unidos, y Guinea Ecuatorial. See the designs of all 22  country stamps:


We’ve also have been expanding our selection of proficiency and feedback stamps to other languages.

We also updated our “My Favorite Part Stamps” and have them available in multiple languages including Spanish, French, Latin,  and Chinese. Note: we can customize any stamp, so if you need a different language or are interested in something different, just let us know.

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License to speak

Posted on July 17, 2019 by

In the past we’ve used the analogy of acquiring languages as being like learning to swim. Is it best to jump in the deep end of the pool with no support? Is it practical to learn the techniques and physics of swimming before you get into the pool? Can a spray bottle simulate the same experience as being in water?

You can see our ever expanding Language Acquisition memes here.

Recently, we created this new meme with a new analogy: You don’t need to know how an engine works to drive a car. And you don’t need to understand grammar rules to speak a language.Learning Language and driving Continue reading →

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Teacher Appreciation

Posted on May 5, 2019 by

This week only we are offering our lowest prices ever on our latest feedback stamps. Included is our “Me Gusta”, Me Encanta”, and “Mi Parte Favorita” stamp now available in this “3 stamps for the price of 2” deal. Get the deal now and check out all our stamps from SpanishTeacherShop.com.

Discount available now until Friday, 5/10/19  4pm ET.

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Using Peardeck: a tutorial

Posted on April 16, 2019 by

After our Billy y Las Botas 3 lesson on making predictions using Peardeck, some teachers wanted more information about PearDeck. So here’s a brief tutorial:

If you prefer to read,  Continue reading →

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Previewing a Wooly Story

Posted on April 14, 2019 by

After months of anticipation, this week we started the third (and final) installment of the Billy y las Botas saga. I like to use a variety of strategies when telling a Wooly story, so this time we focused on making predictions. This is a great way to preview the story, as well as letting your students show their creative side and impress you with their language.

Step One: I started by pulling out 12 slides from the Powerpoint of Stills available in the extras section of every story with a SenorWooly.com Pro-subscription (if you don’t already have this, leave this post, buy it, and come back).

This activity is similar to the “Bunches of Hunches” activity combined with “A Parallel Universe” story that some of you may have used during Wooly Week 2019. Careful, not to give too much away and certainly no spoilers; you want to leave some ambiguity.
Predicting Senor Wooly story with stills from VideoStep Two: Continue reading →

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Essay in Spanish with Rubric

Posted on February 20, 2019 by

This past week we finally watched the 3rd video of Senor Wooly’s epic Victor Trilogy (Guapo, La Confesión de Victor, Feo). I also needed to get a summative-type assessment grade in the gradebook, so I decided to try something new and see what my students could do. After sharing the results on twitter, I’ve had several requests for the rubric, which I will share below. Continue reading →

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March Music Madness 2019

Posted on February 7, 2019 by

Are you ready for this year’s March Music Madness? As one of the first teacher bloggers to write about the idea of March Music Madness, we are excited for our sixth annual tournament. This year we have teamed up with Senor Ashby who has assembled hundreds and hundreds of teachers nationwide to partipcate in a Locura de Marzo bracket.

This year’s bracket is as follows: Continue reading →

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Leveling up

Posted on January 31, 2019 by

When a gamer beats a level of a game and moves on to the next level, it is called “Leveling up”. In certain games, you can increase your chances by earning more points, collecting coins, or obtaining specific weapons to help you defeat the opponent.  Gamers have their strategies on what they need to do to level up. Our students also need to know what strategies they have as language students so that they too can “level up” on the ACTFL proficiency levels. Does a novice student know what they need to do to work their way up to the intermediate level?

My initial inspiration for this post started many months ago when I saw a tweet by Bethanie Drew (@lovemysummer) when she posted a link to her blog with placemats for “Weekend Chats“. In her document, she included this:
levelupsbybethaniedrew

This encouraged students who were ready to add to their simple sentence by adding more details. I realized that students don’t know how to level up their language. In order to show higher proficiency, students must realize what that looks like. A few months into the school year, I went over the ACTFL proficiency ratings and its cone shape and that the more input a student has the more advanced their language will be. Then we went over this presentation.

levelingupinworldlanguages
Then I gave students sample sentences and had them work with partners to come up with the extra details.
You can download a copy of the presentation or the student handout sheets, which includes the as pictures above or a blank copy if you wish to fill it out as a class.

Take a look at how the following sentences were “leveled-up”:

 

Another way to talk about proficiency is to use the ice cream cone imagery, to encourage students to “Add an extra scoop” of language. See our previous post “Get a scoop of proficiency” which includes a free download of posters explaining the different proficiency levels.

Leave it to Bethanie, who also would go on to blog about this later as well. Look at her strategy to encourage better writing in her students, in her blog post “Level Up Language Framework (Structures to support student learning and teacher sanity, part 6)“

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FVR Reading Log

Posted on December 17, 2018 by

One new thing that I implemented this year with FVR was a reading log. On one side of the sheet of paper I have all the books listed and on the other side is a chart that students can use to keep track of what page number they left off on. The following week, they can check their log and pick up on the page they left off, and when they are done, they can put a checkmark or write the date they finish.

As we come back from winter break, I have a new updated sheet for my students. This includes a tracking of the number of books they read each trimester as well as a place to count the number of words they read in Spanish.

I am posting what it looks like. You are welcome to make a copy of this document and edit it based on the books in your classroom. (Click on image, and then make a copy). This sheet is the only “accountability” factor that needs to result from FVR. But I think it also serves as a way for students to track their growth in reading. Continue reading →

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