¿Qué día es hoy? - El Calendario

Wow!!! Talk about enthusiastic foreign language students, and on a Monday! My fourth graders loved their class today, especially because they had the chance to laugh, sing, and dance. Good visuals and music are invaluable tools to the World Language teacher because they are motivating, provide repetition (music), and help students connect to the material.  

First, we reviewed the months of the year orally, and then watched an awesome cartoon by SAS Curriculum Pathways. This video is excellent especially during Hispanic Heritage Month, as it touches on popular Latin-American holidays by month (including the dates), but especially focuses on the names of the months of the year in Spanish.



Second, we reviewed our numbers in Spanish orally, making sure to enunciate each word slowly. Many of my students can and try to say their numbers quickly, but then cannot pronounce them slowly, as they do not know them as well as they originally think. We reviewed numbers 0 - 10 first. Then we practiced 0 - 31 because those numbers are utilized in the monthly calendar. Finally we practiced counting by tens from 0 - 100. Then, as I began to play this video, I observed all their heads bopping, their arms and hands being raised, and smiles coming to their faces; they instantly sang along without ever having heard this number song before!

  

Finally, as we have reviewed the days of the week over the last couple weeks and they were already familiar with the terms, we jumped right into our song and dance. From a suggestion I learned at a FLENEF session two summers ago, I tried to incorporate movement in the classroom. We watched this wonderful video below and danced the macarena (at least the first 6 moves plus a swing of the hips)!



It is days like these that my students impress me with their enthusiasm, and I am reminded how much I love my job! 

Gracias a Uds. por todos estos recursos: SAS Curriculum Pathways, Sr. Ashby, y BASHO & friends!

https://www.sascurriculumpathways.com/portal/

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Spanish-Ser-Rap-Song-962828

http://bashoandfriends.com

What a (ka)HOOT!

Kahoot is a game-based classroom response system where one can create a game-show activity with questions one personally writes, making it appropriate for any kind of discipline or content. The teacher OR the students can create the games/quizzes. As explained by Educational Consultant Glenn Weibe: 

Using a simple drag and drop tool, educators create and manage “Kahoots” in the form of quizzes, surveys or polls related to the topics they’re teaching; either asking quick questions to get feedback or opinion, or more in depth questions for formative assessment.

One of the big differences between Socrative and Kahoot! is that the questions are projected on a screen in front of students – much like the video bar trivia game. Your kids use any smart device and browser – phone, tablet, or computer – to join the Kahoot using a specific PIN number. You provide the question and possible answers.  The kids see the answers on their device and select the answer they think is correct. This is the other difference between Kahoot! and other student response systems – it’s not an app, so it’s device neutral making it perfect for BYOD schools or for classrooms with a variety of devices.

(http://historytech.wordpress.com/2013/11/12/kahoot-equals-easy-fun-gamified-assessment/) 

In my Spanish classroom, after completing a recent "What I did last summer" preterite tense project with Spanish 2 students, I created this game as a review:

https://play.kahoot.it/#/k/65e36207-1e93-4812-bebf-bf01e34cb9f9 

Please see another example from my 6th grade review games I created at this link: https://play.kahoot.it/#/k/ad330c83-a734-4444-889c-0d0ba5ee3eb3

Please feel free to use or adapt any of my Kahoots.

Another one I used when teaching Latin American capitals is this good one here:

South American capitals: https://play.kahoot.it/#/k/967571f4-855c-4031-96be-93a44c26cb75

You have the option to copy them, and then edit them to your taste. What a FANTASTIC activity, and I promise your students of any age will love it! Now, my goal is to try to play it with another classroom across the globe simultaneously while Skyping -- stay tuned! 

Tareas de Vocabulario - Fiesta en Familia

After seeing and hearing about Task Cards for vocabulary, my students and I tried our hand with this creative method. Our topic was "Family Celebrations," and different levels of study had different quantity or difficulty of vocabulary words. Tasks were also distinct in that some required markers and paper, and others required digital tools and apps. The students, however, were gracious for the opportunity to choose a task of their liking.

Here are some samples of what my students produced:

Haiku Deck (cards were later used for CandyLand adaptation game):

Luciano (6)


Fiesta - Created with Haiku Deck, presentation software that inspires

(Hayley-7) 
Interactive Book on Tiny Tap:
http://www.tinytap.it/games/gbqg/Game-4

PuppetPals video

BuddyPoke video

Kahoot game

Popplet - mindmapping, graphic organizer

Quizlet by (Ali-7)  - http://quizlet.com/49341950/familyspanish-flash-cards/

Crossword Puzzle (made with Discovery free puzzlemaker)

...and many more!  

If you would like a copy of my Task Cards (which include both digital tasks as well as pen-and-paper tasks,) you can download them for free here: 
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0Bw3RhX4eIalNT1pVUjN6TFVMUlU/edit?usp=docslist_api

Instagram--ing about LA FAMILIA! (oh, and a POPPLET too!)

Thank you to Srta. Barragan for this awesome activity idea! It works best with students who have their own personal device and who have an Instagram account. As we were talking about family members during our class, students shared pictures of their family members, while also writing a descriptive sentence in the target language. Then, classmates were asked to comment. The activity went very well, except that not everyone had a personal device or account. Those students (without a personal device or account) participated in a "dummy" forum on our school's Learning Management System, and it also worked well.

I would give suggestions to students before they begin the activity with regards to commenting. One word comments are not appropriate. I suggested they ask questions, or state a specific thing they like/dislike about the image. 

Here is the original idea on Srta. Barragan's post: http://senoritabarragan.com/2012/04/23/instagram/

Here are some examples of our posts:

As part of another activity to work with La Familia themes, use the Popplet Lite app to exhibit relationships between family members, instead of designing the "traditional family tree." 

Here are two student examples:

http://get-puppet.com/v/dUwFqhiv4Fg?autoplay=true

http://get-puppet.com/v/d51_lnOsuUw?autoplay=true

How's the weather up there?

It is September, and it is the time I usually teach the students about how to talk about the weather, en español. This time of year in Florida is always interesting because the weather is still very warm and we typically get a lot of thunderstorms. Unfortunately, when the weather is bad, the students do not get to play outside at recess; therefore, they are quite interested to know when the rain will "go away."

This time, I created a beautiful Haiku Deck presentation to capture my student's interest, and also to help orally teach the words of a song I used to use from the Realidades program.

Here are a couple links to use and/or share:

http://www.phschool.com/atschool/realidades/hiphop/level1/L1_PE2_lyrics.mp3

http://www.phschool.com/atschool/realidades/hiphop/level1/pdfs/L1_PE2_lyrics_text.pdf



El Tiempo - Created with Haiku Deck, presentation software that inspires

Un video de SAS Curriculum Pathways:


More ideas:
Use the "Weather +" and "Google Earth" apps to investigate the weather and location of Latin American countries. Utilize information found to create "El Pronostico de Tiempo" of certain country capital cities around the world.

Me presento...

Fifth graders practiced their listening and speaking skills with the following assignment/discussion post on Schoology:

Por favor, mira el video primero. Segundo, contesta las preguntas de "Papa Caliente" por escribir y hablar.

Watch the video first please. Second, answer the "Hot Potato" questions by writing them and speaking them. 

1.  Watch the video. Here is what he is saying:

Hola ¿qué tal? Mi nombre es José, ¡mucho gusto! Soy estudiante de literatura en esta universidad. Soy de Colombia. Esta es mi amiga Alejandra. Ella es de Perú. ¿Qué van a hacer esta noche? Quizás podríamos ir al cine o algo parecido. Nos vemos más tarde. ¡Gusto en conocerlos!

http://www.laits.utexas.edu/spe/vid/beg08ex.html

2.  Answer the "Hot Potato" questions by recording yourself. 

To complete this assignment, you will need to audio/video record yourself, using the Schoology app. Within the assignment on the app, click on the "+" icon, then write your answer. Second, click on "attach," then click on "video," and then record your video. Click "Save" to submit. If you have a problem or if you need technology, please see Mrs. Siracusa for help on Wednesday or Thursday after school in her classroom. 

¿Cómo te llamas?

¿Cómo estás?

¿Cuántos años tienes?

¿De dónde eres?

The Pencil Metaphor

What kind of teacher are you? 
I love this blogpost, and I am reposting it here. Thank you Elizabeth Charles and Teach Thought.com!
http://www.teachthought.com/technology/pencil-metaphor-how-teachers-respond-to-education-technology/

By the way, I am somewhere between the SHARP ones and the LEADers!