Reading La Guerra Sucia in Spanish Class

I have read La Guerra Sucia, a novel written by Nathaniel Kirby, several times with my students.  Thanks to several teachers blogging about their lessons with this book (see Kristy Placido's lessons HERE and Carrie Toth's lessons HERE), I am quickly increasing the culture and connections when reading the book.    
Last year, Kristy posted a photo of herself with a gray wig and a white bandana which were the props she used when teaching her students about Las Abuelas de la Plaza de Mayo in Argentina.  When I realized that chapter 7 of the novel La Guerra Sucia was titled, "Las Abuelas de la Plaza de Mayo", that photo came to mind and I was inspired. With my $5 off coupon in hand, I headed to the local fabric store in search of some white fabric. The only thing I needed was some basic sewing skills and, within an hour later, I had successfully cut and sewn 11 white bandanas for the total price of $1.04. 

The following day when students entered the classroom, I had this photo projected on my white board.  The previous day the students had researched information about Argentina's history, and one of the topics was Las Abuelas de la Plaza de Mayo. We discussed what they had learned from their research and then I had them open their novels to chapter 7.  Then I pulled out the white bandanas and told them I created enough white bandanas for ALL the students to be able to wear one for the class - even the guys were included. 

I have great students, and even though there was a hint of hesitation at first, everyone took a white bandana and promptly tied it on.  I will share with you that after I finished tying on my white bandana, I looked up only to see the guys had tied their bandanas on "do-rag" style, but they obliged me and re-tied them the proper way.

They were so pleased with their white bandanas that immediately the cell phones came out and they were taking photos.  Before we could read they begged go down the hall to visit the Spanish 1 teacher and show off their new accessory.  I consented with the stipulation that they had to explain the significance of the white bandanas to her in Spanish and she then translated it to her Spanish 1 students. (A little promotion of upper level Spanish classes is always a good thing.) Then we returned to class and read the chapter.

Additional activities on this subject that we did or will very soon complete:
- Listen to a podcast - Notes In Spanish Advanced - Adopciones - start the Podcast at 5:00 for the discussion about Argentina 
- A Spanish article with questions that I had found last year
- Martina Bex's cultural activity 

Making the bandanas and wearing them for the reading was a minor change from previous years, but you can bet they are going to remember that part of Argentina's history better than they have in the past.  

Picto-Frases - An Activity to use with Fiesta Fatal

I recently stumbled across a website named Pictotraductor. On the Pictotraductor website, you can type in a sentence in Spanish and it will generate the sentence using a mix of sketches and words for things that cannot easily be illustrated. (See below for link of paper shown on the left.) I can think of several uses for this, but since my students are currently reading Fiesta Fatal, a novel by Mira Canion, I created an activity to use after reading chapter 6 of Fiesta Fatal.  

I read Fiesta Fatal with my Spanish 2 students.  I am doing increasingly more grammar pop-ups on the ellos form of verbs, which means I point out the verbs that show the action of Vanesa and Julieta, and the two men that pursue them.  All of the sentences on the Picto-Frase activity include the ellos form of verbs.

I have two classes of Spanish 2, so after the first class, I changed a few things, and after the second class I changed a few more things to improve it. Below are the instructions on how I used it:

1. Read chapter 6 of Fiesta Fatal.
2. Showed examples Picto-Frases of other sentences from chapter 6 of Fiesta Fatal on a power point. Students said the sentences in Spanish.
3. Distributed the above Picto-Frases paper (find it HERE). Students looked for the sentences in chapter 6 and wrote the Spanish sentence below the pictures.
- Next time, I will ask the students to highlight or circle the word that shows the action that two or more people did.

After we read chapter 6 I realized I forgot to do the sentence Bingo game that reviews Chapters 1-5 of Fiesta Fatal.  Mira Canion talked about this idea at CSCTFL this spring and then Martina Bex created the game which you can find HERE and download for free.  I love this version of the game because it uses sentences rather than single words.

Response to: What do You Really Write About?

This morning I was reading tweets from #langchat and clicked on a link that took me to Señor Fernie's blog.  He is a kindergarten through 8th grade Spanish in Florida. His most recent post was titled, "What do you really write about?" In the post he explained how he copied the text of his blog and put it into Wordle to see what words were most common in his writings.  In the ending paragraph of the post, he encouraged other teachers to do likewise.

I followed the same method as Señor Fernie, but I only copied my blog posts from October 2014 through present, instead of the entire blog. There was a total of 10,360 words. (If I want to do that I should set up my blog with a RSS feed to make it easier.)  My resulting Wordle is shown above. 

The Wordle is similar to Señor Fernie's - the two biggest words:  Students & Story.  And for those that know me well, you won't be surprised to see "cookies" made it into the Wordle. :-)

An interesting experience. I, like, Señor Fernie, encourage others to do the same. 
 

Retention Rates

Springtime is the time of the year when we receive the list of students' course selections. After receiving them I reach into my files and pull out the previous year's list and numbers and compare them to the new information.

Retention rates is a topic that is often discussed on language forums.  As World Language (WL) teachers, we want to see students that begin in level 1, continue through level 4 and higher.  But, at times, I wonder about the amount of pressure we put on ourselves and our departments when it isn't realistic to expect 100% retention rates.  A few things to consider:

1. Let's be honest: What percentage of students are mainly in the WL classes because (a) their high school requires a minimum of X years of language study, or (b) they want to meet college requirements of X years of language study.  
Question: Why do we automatically assume that students take a language class with an initial goal of becoming fluent or proficient in the language?

2. Of the students in WL classes that sincerely want to become fluent/proficient, do they realize the time commitment and the number of hours needed to reach that goal? (They learned their first language from infancy, but most likely have not considered the amount of input they received in their first five years of life. As a child they had to learn the language in order to communicate their needs and desires. They didn't have another language to use as a back-up if they weren't understood.) If they do realize that, how many are willing to make that commitment and work towards fluency? 
Question: As WL teachers, we were not deterred by the amount of time and commitment needed to become fluent in the language, but then we wanted to teach others the language so we had some mighty strong incentive to want to master the language. Will students not planning to teach the language in the future have the same dedication or time to continue their language study, especially when their major will demand a great deal of their time. 

3. In the junior and senior year of high school, many students take AP classes to give them a head start at college.  The schedule for those classes are often at the same time slots as the higher levels of Spanish. 
Question: If you were planning to go to college for a science degree, and the AP class was offered at the same time as the level 4 or higher Spanish class, wouldn't you also choose the class which parallels your planned future studies at the university level?

4. Knowing a second language, especially Spanish because the Latino population is increasing at a rapid rate, will certainly be beneficial to students in the future.  
Question: That's a long-term benefit and we live in a world of short-term goals and rewards.  Are students prepared to invest time in something that is not in the near future?
   
5. When a freshman enrolls in an art class, do the art teachers expect that student to continue to take art classes throughout his high school years?   
Questions: Do art teachers, or business teachers, or even core subject teachers, track retention rates like WL teachers do? What percentage of students that take the first level of high school math are sitting in Calculus classes as a junior or senior? If the percentage is less than 30%, or 20%, or 10%, is that viewed as a failure of the program or the teachers?
Likewise, if a high school requires 4 classes/credits of English in order to graduate, does the English department have expectations that the students will continue to select additional English classes after the requirement is met?

This year when I received the course selection information for next year, I was pleasantly surprised to see that our Spanish numbers were up by more than 100 requests, an overall 22% increase from the present year to next year.  Every single level, from Spanish 1 to Spanish 5, saw an increase from the previous year. The requests for Spanish 1 was up by

1 student, which means the other levels accounted for the 100+ increase. The biggest increase was incoming freshman that chose to double up on Spanish 1 and Spanish 2 in their freshman year, causing the Spanish 2 numbers to skyrocket. Rough numbers show that 31% of the students that started Spanish 1 had signed up for Spanish 4, and 18% of the students that started Spanish 1 had signed up for Spanish 5. (I'll update this with actual percents soon, which I believe will be 2-4% higher than the rough numbers.)

Those percentages have steadily increased over the last ten years.  I believe the increase is due, in part, to the method we use to teach language. (Other factors include a change in our Spanish program for 8th grade students and a 5x5 schedule at the high school.) But even with the steady increase, the percentages are not near 50% retention through level 4.
 
In addition, when August rolls around and I receive my class rosters, those percentages in the upper levels will decrease due to scheduling conflicts.
  
More than ever, instead of focusing on retention rates and percentages, my goal is to focus on the students in my current classes and set my sights on helping each one to have a successful experience in the language classroom.  Some will return to the next level of Spanish the following year and some will not, for various reasons as listed above, but ALL will be equipped with improved language skills and proficiency because of the time I, and others in my department, have shared with them.   
  

La Casa Tomada resources and other short story resources

My all-time favorite Spanish author is hands down, without a doubt, Julio Cortázar. Thanks to Carrie Toth for creating 3 embedded readings for Cortázar's story, La Casa Tomada.  First, she took a section from the middle of the story for the first reading, making it comprehensible by limiting the vocabulary and adding clip art for words that may be unfamiliar.  In versions 2 and 3, she added more information and vocabulary from the original.  The embedded readings change what could be a frustrating experience for students approaching the intermediate proficiency level, to an enjoyable reading experience.

You can find Carrie's three versions of the story HERE.

There is a short YouTube clip of Cortázar explaining how he was inspired to write the story and his reaction that many people have different interpretations than what he was thinking when he wrote it.  The Spanish subtitles helped with my students' understanding of the interview.  Find the interview HERE. 

After reading and discussing the story, and comparing it to previous stories we read such as El almohadón de plumas, (HERE is Kristy Placido's embedded readings of the story;   HERE is Mike Peto's blog post on the story; and a stop-motion video as an alternative to the video suggested on Mike's post.), we will watch a short film of the video, pausing throughout to discuss and retell.  

Next up, Chac Mool! -  another embedded reading gift to all from generous Kristy Placido (found here).

"Survivor Cubes" in the MFL classroom

If you are a fan of the TV show "Survivor", then you are familiar with the memory type game that the contestants play with cubes.  The host of the show, has a set of cards with pictures on them.  He shows the cards in a sequence to the contestants.  Each contestant has a cube with the same pictures and, one by one, they must turn the cube with the picture facing toward Jeff in the correct order.  Contestants that answer correctly move to the next round.  Those that answer incorrectly are disqualified from the competition.

I modified the activity to suit my focus words for the day, oyó=s/he heard and oyeron=they heard. It was a fun, fresh way to give the students a large amount of repetitions of the focus words without them realizing how many times they heard the words.

1. First, I made 5 cubes, each with the same 6 clip art images. I made origami cubes after I watched this video. (To get even more mileage out of the activity, I used an image for "footsteps" because I knew we would be using it later in class for a MovieTalk.  This activity introduced the word and when I asked how to say it later in the class period, I got a resounding answer from the majority of the students! I should have been more selective with the other 5 images.)

2. In class, I asked for 5 volunteers, and then I chose another student to help them.  The helpers' job was to hold up a clipboard to block the other students from seeing which image the student selected for each round until it was time to reveal their answer.

3. On my computer, I had 6 tabs open from the website FreeSound, that matched the clip art images.

4. Before handing out the cubes to the 5 students and their helpers, we listened to the 6 sound bytes from the FreeSound website.  They were super easy to identify.  I also wrote the vocabulary on the board because the students were going to write the words during the activity:  un tren, un perro, una persona que se ríe, los pasos, una guitarra, una vaca.

5. Then I played a sequence of 9 sounds with the open tabs.  (I had made a recording using QuickTime, but I had problems with the sound, so I kept the tabs opened and selected each one as the students listened.)

6. The 5 students with the cubes selected their answer, facing the clip art image toward me.  I called the name of a student, who then revealed their answer, as I said, "Elisa oyó un perro. Dennis oyó un perro. Anna oyó un perro. Carlos oyó un tren. Hannah oyó un perro.  Cuatro personas oyeron un perro y una persona oyó un tren." 

7. Students that were observing (not those with the cubes nor the helpers) had to choose one person and write a sentence about the person using "oyó".  Ex:  Hannah oyó un tren.  Every multiple of 3, the students had to write two students' names that heard the same sound to get practice in writing "oyeron".

8.  If a student revealed the incorrect answer, he handed the cube to me and both he and his helper joined the others in writing a sentence for each round.

9. The winner received +1 bonus point in the first "game" when they listened to 9 sounds.  In the second round, students listened to 11 sounds, and the winner of that group earned +2 bonus points.

The first few sounds are very easy for the students.  They start getting confused with sounds 5 and higher.  

Update: Vicki Antequera emailed me with the document on the right that she will use for her students to do the Survivor Cubes activity.  She was kind enough to permit me to share this document with my readers.  You can access it HERE.


After this activity we watched Vampire's Crown. (See the blog post with additional information and resources about it HERE.) I used the MovieTalk method to narrate the action using vocabulary that the students knew.  The focus word "oyó" was recycled in the video because the vampire HEARD the boy drinking, HEARD the noise of the sign, HEARD the footsteps, of the dentist, and the dentist didn't hear the footsteps of the vampire.

If the idea of making several origami cubes sounds like too much work, you can simplify the preparation by using cards with the images instead of cubes. I liked the cubes to make it more like Survivor.  (Because this was one of those ideas that came to me before I arrived at school, I very quickly made the cubes, as you may have noticed if you looked closely at them.)

Esperanza - A Verbal Book Report

Student sketches for Esperanza novel

My Spanish 4 students recently completed reading Esperanza by Carol Gaab, TPRS Publishing, Inc. I use this book in my Immigration/Guatemala unit of the curriculum.  The story opens up many opportunities to talk about immigration and why people are so desperate to enter the U.S.  I also like the book because the students learn about Guatemala.  There are so many interesting mini-lessons on the culture of Guatemala, the geography, the currency, the civil war, that can be explored while reading the novel. My recommendation, buy the Teacher's CD and a lot of that work is already completed for you.

For the final assessment on the book, I wanted a project that gave them the opportunity to explain what they thought were the key events in the story.  

For the final assessment on the book, I decided on a verbal book report in which students choose events key events of the story, sketch them, and then record their verbal book report.  Students chose to work alone or with a partner to sketch 10 events in the story on a long strip of white butcher paper. Then they   videotaped their verbal book report using a flip camera.  

The day the students recorded the videos, the class went to the atrium in order to have room so they could record without being really close to another group that was recording.  They taped their sketches to the wall and took turns filming each other. 

Below is a screenshot of the rubric.  I designed the rubric so that the sketches and events are worth 10 points, providing base points that all students should earn if they followed the requirements on the rubric.  The remaining 23 points focus on the actual verbal presentation.  With the first 10 points as a base points, I could more fairly assess the verbal presentation. (Find the pdf of the rubric HERE.)

I strongly dislike the traditional 100 point grading scale with A-90-100, B=80-89, C=70-79, D=60-69, and F=0-59. The rubric is my attempt to offset more points dedicated to a failing grade than a passing grade (59% failing and 41% passing).   

10 Ideas for using Monoface in the WL classroom

Have you seen the website named MonoFace? It's a website that has photos of different people with different expressions.  By clicking on the right eye, left eye, nose, mouth, and head and shoulders, you can create 759,375 characters and expressions (according to the website).  

I saw the link for MonoFace either on Twitter or on Facebook.  Since we didn't have school today, because of the lovely snow, (yes, I still think it is beautiful), I had time to explore the site.

How can this be used in the World Language classroom? For one, I'm always looking for images on Google for different stories and activities for class, which makes this a perfect resource for quick creations.  Or for more specific suggestions...

Create the character(s) and then:
1. Describe his/her physical characteristics
2. Describe the character and create a backstory for him/her.
3. Describe the relationship between several of the characters.
4. Make the character the star of your class story - co-create a story with your students about the person.
5. StoryASK with your students. AFTER creating the story, have the students create a character on the website that they think best suits the person(s) in the story. This can be done as homework to preserve class time for comprehensible input. Or, use this activity as a brain break.
6. Change the expressions of the character and add screenshots of the person in the typed version of your story to add more interest.
7. Give the students 5-9 shots of the character (same person but only the expressions are changed - mouth, possible nose and eyes).  Let students choose from the pics to match the person's emotions or reactions in a pre-made story.
8. StoryASK information about a set number of people (ex: 5 people). Then project on the screen some people you have made and students choose which person belongs to which description.  Students have to defend their choices, in the TL, of course.
9. (similar to #8) Project a collage of people you created, and read information about a person's life or past. Students listen to the details in the story and then decide which person they think best fits the story.  Once again, they will need to defend their decision.
10.  Ask students to think of x number of occupations and list them on  the board.  (x=the number of characters you have created on a collage)  Project the collage and students work in small groups to assign an occupation to each person. Compare the answers from each group to see how many are similar. 
(variation to #10) Brainstorm fears that someone has, or an embarrassing moments, or (fill in the blank w your idea). Then project the collage and decide which person had that fear, embarrassing moment, etc

Those are a few ideas for using MonoFace in the World Language Classroom that I can think of at the moment, but I'm sure there are MANY more possibilities.

I'm sure there are some other obvious uses that I have overlooked at the present time. If you have some suggestions for how to use this in the WL class, please feel free to share your ideas and activities in the comments below.  

Bulletin Board - Why Learn a Second Language

As World Language teachers, part of our responsibility is to educate others about the benefits of learning a second language.  I have a Pinterest board on which I store articles about language learning and developing proficiency.  I imagine that the majority of language teachers have read similar articles.  But, what have we done to share that information with the population outside of the World Language teaching profession?

This week we had our second Back-To-School Night because students started a new semester and new classes in January.  This is also the time of year when students, and their parents, are scheduling their courses for the next school year.  

To promote our program and educate others about the benefits of learning a second language, I decided to create a display on the bulletin board in our hallway. First I contacted students that have graduated from our school and asked them to send me a statement in what ways they have already benefited from being able to communicate in Spanish, whether it is in college, a job they have while going through college, travel experiences, or how they are using Spanish in their career since graduating from college.  My Spanish 5 students also wanted to contribute, so on a small white marker board, they explained why they have continued through level 5.  Then I took photos of them holding their whiteboards and added those photos to the bulletin board.

I could have added more information and statistics, but this time I focused on individuals and the benefits each of them has experienced.  Do you have any ideas for something I could add to the present board? 

Sketches with High Frequency Words in the Past Tense

Storytelling doesn't always have to encompass the full story. In fact, today in class, the students and I created a lot of stories, but it was only the first part of the story.  The beauty in telling only the first part of the story is that it allows a large number of repetitions of the same verbs and there is no time for the story to become boring.

I wanted to recycle the new words (había-there was, quería-s/he wanted, fue-s/he went, and estaba-s/he was) from last week, and introduce a few new words: se llamaba - his/her name was; no tenía=s/he didn't have; and, (no) encontró = s/he found/didn't find.

1. I greeted the students at the door and gave them a quarter slip of paper.  The instructions on the board told them to number the paper 1-4 and write the following:  
                1- the name of a person
                2- what someone wanted
                3- a place
                4- an emotion
When finished, the students put the papers in a basket.

2. We read the story we created last week about the person in the movie theater, (see this post), to review.  Then I distributed several short stories from previous years with the above words and we read them together.  We also watched a short story that I had made into a video with Educreations using the same words.

3. I projected a paper with 9 squares onto the board. Then I randomly pulled a paper out of the basket to find a name of the person.  (There was a boy whose names was Elmo) and I sketched a person in the first square.  Then I pulled another paper to find what the person wanted. (Elmo wanted a dog. He had a cat and two rabbits but he didn't have a dog.) The extra information about the animals that Elmo did have are another opportunity for more comprehensible input and reps.

4. I continued the above to find TO WHERE the person went.  Students told me if the person found or didn't find the item (if the person found it I circled it and if the person didn't find it I put an X over the sketch). The final frame shows how the person felt.  To find the emotion, I pulled another paper and used the emotion that was listed.

This was an easy way to provide repetitions and model the activity.  It kept the students' attention because they didn't know if I would pick their paper, and they wanted to see if I could somewhat sketch something that resembled the information on the slips of paper.

5. To change the pace, I then gave each student a half sheet of paper with 3 boxes.  They had to sketch a person, what the person wanted, to where the person went, indicate with a circle or X if the person found the item, and sketch the person's emotion in the last square.

6. Students put their sketches in a basket and then I assigned a student to randomly choose the sketches. We put them under a document camera and created the story together.  I said most of the story but paused and pointed to the sketch for them to supply the necessary word(s).

Example - the underlined words are what I pointed to and students gave the answers:
1st square: Había un chico que se llamaba Antonio.  Antonio quería unas hamburguesas.  No tenía hamburguesas en su casa.  Tenía helado y tenía avocados pero no tenía hamburguesas.  
2nd square: Antonio fue al supermercado. Pero no había hamburguesas en el supermercado.  Había pescado y había chicle, pero no había hamburguesas.  Antonio no encontró hamburguesas en el supermercado. 
3rd square: Antonio estaba triste porque quería unas hamburguesas pero no las encontró en el supermercado.  

Tomorrow we'll continue with more of the student sketches.  When we find a sketch that all the students seem particularly interested in, I'll use that one to create a full story.  

With only a few words, there are a lot of stories that are waiting to be created .

Storyline with Gerunds and Prepositions of Place

Below is a storyline idea to review or introduce prepositions of place or gerunds. 

Most of my students have learned the basic prepositions of place in Spanish 1, so this story, that I use in Spanish 2, reviews those prepositions as well as allows for several repetitions of gerunds. 
 
The storyline is about a person that went to the movie theater.  It was crowded and there was only one empty seat. He sat down and started watching the movie, but there were many distractions throughout the movie.

Ask the students to give suggestions for what the people to the left of, to the right of, in front of, and behind the person were doing.  Some of the ideas from my students last week were:
- la persona detrás de él estaba pateando su silla  
     (was kicking his seat)
- la persona delante de él estaba tócandose su bigote largo
     (was touching his long moustache)
- la persona a la izquierda de él estaba llorando
     (was crying)
- la persona a la derecha de él estaba durmiendo (y estaba roncando)
     (was sleeping and was snoring)
    
After we worked with this story, we watched episode #3 of BBC's Mi Vida Loca which just happens to be the episode in which Merche gives directions. (When I use series such as that, my goal is always to do more than have the student simply watch it.  We have a limited number of hours with the students and we need to be good stewards of that time, always striving to follow best practices and most effectively use the time we have in class.) Also, because Friday was one day before Valentine's Day, we ended the class watching Sr. Wooly's song "Billy y las botas", a love story, of course, between Billy and las botas, which has the lyrics "estaba caminando" and "estaba nevando".  It's almost as if I planned that. 

In previous semesters I had students act out the actions, but I didn't do that this time.  I have to admit, there was something missing without the actors.  My suggestion, add the actors whenever possible!  

One last note:
Shout out to @nellyhug (Nelly Hughes) for feedback at a moment's notice. :-)

Student Artists + Notability App = More CI Reps

I am guilty of not utilizing student artists in my class as I should.  However, this semester I am hoping to change that. This week I remembered to ask a student to sketch the story as we were creating a story resulting in the following:

 

Both of the stories above follow the storyline of the story I wrote before the class.  The structures are the same as my story, but the students' story has different details. You can access the story HERE in present and past tense.

I had the students use my iPad and the Notability app.  I used to have students use the Educreations app for sketches, but Notability is more user friendly, both when sketching and when moving the sketches to paper.

Providing students the opportunity to contribute to the class with their sketches has several advantages:

1. The student artist, and many times, the students seated near the artist, are undeniably focused on the story because the artist is charged with sketching the details as we develop the story, requiring him/her to pay close attention and neighboring students to provide help when needed.

2.  After the class story is completed, I project the sketches and I retell the story and circle the information and the answers.  The students are interested in seeing their classmate's artwork so they're focused on the story once again.

3. After class, it's easy to transfer the sketches to paper.  I make copies for the students and give it to them the following day for additional review.

(4) This is another opportunity to showcase the students' artistic talents.

Reps, reps, and more reps.  

Additional ideas for the copies of the storyboard sketches:

- Students use the sketches to retell the story.
- Cut the paper so there is one sketch on each square of paper.  Place the sketches face down. Turn them over one at a time, telling the part of the picture that relates to the sketch. Put in order as sketches are turned over.
- Chose X number of sketches and create a NEW story using the target structures for the original story.
- Teacher says a statement and students point to the sketch it describes.