TPRS year 5 - Agentes Assessment

So I was looking at one of the assessments for the Spanish 1 book Agentes Secretos y el mural de Picasso.  Let me be clear in that I felt quite rushed in the book this semester with block scheduling.  And I personally got tired of having an entire quarter revolve around the book and not have as much fun with storytelling.  But I think I know what to do to improve that next semester when we do the Piratas book.

The way that we assessed was in four areas: Reading, Writing, Listening, & Speaking*

TPRS year 5 - speed dating and Agentes Secretos

Something I was trying to do with my Spanish 1's to help them read Agentes Secretos y el mural de Picasso was an activity I got from a presentation at FLAM a few weeks ago.

The presenter mentioned "speed-dating".  And instead of talking about themselves, the characters talk about the topic for 1-2 minutes and then switch.  This way they can get another pass of the information from a chapter or a concept and when we change to another person, we can change the information we ask of them.

It also brings movement and interaction into the classroom, which are so necessary in a block class or for a rainy day (or chilly cloudy day in October).

I numbered my students off (1-15 twice), told them to form two lines in order.  I explained they were going to talk about Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Paula, Luis, Los agentes secretos, etc and they had two minutes.

I didn't want to hear English.  I only wanted to hear Spanish.  Their pronunciation wasn't the most important part (gasp) because they were interacting with the text, and I think for some this made them aware of their shortcomings in pronunciation of a word so maybe they will listen more for that word later.

They were allowed to have their books as a security blanket.  Some kids read the information from the chapter (but they had to find the important information about the characters or plot).

Not a bad activity!  I might have to bring it in every once in awhile.  Definitely not bad for a 10 minute chunk in the middle of class or for another pass of the chapter in a completely different way.

For some 2:00 was an eternity.  But for others, it was about right.  They usually opted after the first round to do 1:30.

My mind is thinking about the other possibilities for this type of activity...

Stations for review

Seems like everyone is talking about stations lately.  Or at least to my twitter feed, it seems like the new buzz term for foreign language teachers.

Regardless, I have to show I am a team player at my school and tried to find a way to get them to work (more or less) with what I do.

We have to take a test over the entire Agentes Secretos book in my department for Spanish 1.  I had heard the other Spanish 1 teachers made stations to review, so I did the same.

So I grouped my kids together according to level and here were my stations:

1. 1. re-read chapters 13-14 together
   
2. write/draw/pass of some sentences from chapters 13-14
   
3. memory (match description to pictures from teacher's guide from chapters 9-14)
   
4. one scratch paper, describe pictures from chapters 9-14 with as many words/sentences as you can in 1 minute per picture.  Then compare with your group.
   
5. Who am I?  - I statements from different characters/places in the book I wrote down.  Took turns reading one, everyone else had to guess. Place confusing ones in a pile.

Each station was supposed to take 12 minutes.  I never finished the activity in any of the classes. Each group was able to get to one less station than they were supposed to!  (I must waste more time than I realize or I just use a lot of time at the beginning of class on "how are you" and the menu, and weather.)

What worked:
I did make sure to generally put together the high performers with the mid performers and the mid performers and the low performers.  The highs and lows don't mix well.  The highs tend to push each other and those groups were fun to watch in the production (output) activities).

I think this was a nice way to put the wind back into some of the kids' sails at this point in the year.

They had enough language to be able to do the writing part about the pictures.

What didn't work:
The first day, I put too many of the lower performers in the same group instead of staggering them with some of the mid-range performers.  This made it harder to push them to try.

I also accidentally put a star performer in a group with lower / mid performers and she outperformed them and discouraged them.

Final thoughts?:
I should do this every once in awhile to offer something different to my kids.

I also think it helps them get more comfortable with one another.

The prep is ridiculous though.  Not a fan, but since it wouldn't be all the time I think I could handle it.

I would share the document with all of the activities here, but it has some images from the Teacher's Guide of Agentes Secretos by Mira for the memory game.

Agentes Secretos - Caramba (Game)

Today is a reflection of a game called "Caramba" (see rules here at the top)

So something that I love about teaching is how my activities continue to evolve each year.

My few years, I had NO technology at my school.  Therefore, no powerpoints, etc.

I originally had some notecards with vocabulary words and then a few Caramba cards.  We would play the game as the rules describe.  Then, I started making Caramba's into powerpoints.  That was more fun and of course was more polished.

I slowly transitioned into making "Caramba" more of an immersive experience with TPRS/CI.  I no longer wanted students to just translate something from one language to another (not that that might not have merit in reviewing structures we're going over), but I wanted to keep the game in the language and reinforce the words in context.

This works great with novels.  So in Spanish 1, we're going through Agentes Secretos (and thankfully it's pretty easy for my students due to the groundwork laid).

Today for their PAT (Preferred Activity Time), they needed something fresh.  So we played Caramba (see rules).

However, today I was able to add an element to the rules.  Since they already have predetermined groups for PAT, they sat in those.  They have team names and a chant already.  Before in Caramba, teams would take turns and of course, engagement would be ok.  If a team missed one, they missed it and we moved on.

Today, I allowed groups to steal the question for a point, but of course, they had to do their group chant that we do for review basketball normally.  It added so much more and just creates a more intense, competitive, yet fun atmosphere.  The chants have really enhanced my class this year to get more students involved.

I told my students Caramba is usually the favorite of many of my students (usually they either really love it or really hate it).

Here's the PowerPoint I made for today.  Feel free to use it in your class and change any answers.
Also, you might download it, since Google Docs tends to change formatting.

TPRS year 3 - review

Well the school year ended a week or two ago and it was my third year of using TPRS and CI.

As far as the year, I would say it was a success.  It was probably the most intense year I have ever gone through with ups and downs and the variety of activities.

I worked hard in making sure things stayed fresh while at the same time maintaining the general consistency of class.

In first quarter in my Spanish 1 classes, we did PQA about the students, their loves, their interests.  They picked up some basic conversational words and a lot of the third person forms of verbs that interested them.  Then we finished up with TPR of the body parts and some other concrete action words that we could act out.

By the time we got to second quarter, I introduced the routine of class:

Monday - Trending Tweets and Weekend chat

Tuesday - Joke and Oral Story (past tense)

Wednesday - Miáucoles and finishing Oral story

Thursday - song 

Friday - Fail and written story

We continued to prep the Spanish students' understanding of words that would appear in the first book Agentes Secretos y el mural de Picasso.  

Then by the time we read the book, we still did a little storytelling and the usual warm up activities and by the time second quarter had ended, my Spanish 1 students felt a sense of success.  A couple of the kids weren't doing as well as the rest for various reasons, but they were still learning.  Some did hate the book.

Third quarter, we started off with a PQA activity because of a structure common to Spanish 1 students and in the next book to be read, ir + a + infinitive.  So I had the students talk about a goal they had for the new year.  We talked about those for a few weeks and I tried something new out….

I wanted to try to get some of the first and second forms into the verb paradigm.  In my first two years of TPRS, I noticed students didn't do much more than the 3rd person singular of the verbs.  This is the most easily acquired form in language, which is why children speak in 3rd person at first.  

But I still figured we should try to introduce those other forms little by little in the year.  So I had the question written on the board, "¿Qué vas a hacer?" (What are you going to do?) and then underneath I wrote "Voy a ____r" (I'm going to…) and "va a ____r" (s/he is going to __).  

Then I asked kids to own their phrase so that when I asked them, they could respond, "Voy a _____."  It was a great attempt.  Some kids didn't seem to get it as well.  Perhaps to have butcher paper on the wall for different classes so that the words stayed on the wall until the unit was over might be nice.  Maybe next year we can do that.  Otherwise, I thought it went well.  The complete conjugation of verbs is something that not even traditional Spanish students completely get the hang of.  So I figured I was doing a better job.  They had a pretty good understanding of the "n" at the end meaning "They" from second quarter.

So long story short, I think we managed to get the other forms hit during the year.  

After the PQA activity, we started storytelling and further prepping the kids to be able to read the second book Piratas del Caribe y el maps secreto.   While reading, we continued doing the other activities (storytelling, jokes, songs, etc).  

By the final test on Pirates, I was able to see that my students were learning this year and were learning to write sentences to express their understanding of the book. 

All in all, I would say the year was a success.  Many of the kids retrospectively appreciated the books because they realized how much Spanish they had learned this year.

I would say that this year has further reinforced my love for TPRS and CI teaching.  Throughout the year, I was able to converse with my Spanish 1 students daily.  I was never able to converse with my Spanish 1, 2 or 3 students as well before when we "covered" grammar and vocabulary.

I look forward to the coming years!

TPRS year 3 - Agentes Secretos (teaching book)

So before Christmas, another Spanish teacher (at another small school) and I had planned out a unit of sorts for the first semester.  The goal was to teach the kids enough of the structures in the novel Agentes Secretos y el mural de Picasso.

The following is a reflection of the reading of the actual book as well as other activities that we did during the unit...

Went well:

• many students enjoyed reading a book and commented on that in their reflections on the unit
• students did well (minus a few outliers) on the test that was IN Spanish about the book and things that happened
• utilized different learning styles to help the kids understand the novel
• powerpoints with animations of characters 
• actors
• drawing
• reviewing
• the Native / Heritage speakers read the chapters for us as narrators

Improve on:

• doing more activities to vary review of chapters
• it seemed like we were rushing through the book near the end which made some kids uncomfortable
• start doing book a little earlier
• realize that not everyone likes reading
• talking about the students and linking language to them and their lives
• having students guess details in story...
• teaching the novel using reading strategies 

TPRS year 3 - Agentes Secretos - week 1

So this week we finally started reading Agentes Secretos y el mural de Picasso by Mira Canion in my Spanish 1 and Spanish 2 classes.  I thought it would be great for both levels and we could just do more in Spanish 2 with culture and embedded readings about history and culture to enhance the story.

This week for our TPRS structures and embedded reading, Josef Sallen (the teacher I'm planning this year with) had a great idea.  He decided to write an embedded reading about Francisco Franco (a dictator from Spain's history that also is mentioned in Agentes Secretos y el mural de Picasso).  It talked about how Francisco Franco is a boy and his dad is a soldier and Francisco later wants to be a soldier.  Then it gives some background about the Spanish Civil War and the two opposing sides in the war.

So it occurred to me that since we're going to be reading the novel and Joe had written the embedded reading about Franco, maybe we could find some other things from the era to help us go back in time and to understand the perspectives (that's national standards talk!).  So I found some propaganda posters that I showed for warm ups and had the students figure out which side they probably went with (the day after the embedded reading).  And on Thursday (on song day), we listened to Ay Carmela.  I saved a lesson plan about it.  It's a hymn for the Republican side of the Spanish Civil War.  It talks about the Battle of the Ebro (arguably a somewhat important battle in the Spanish Civil War).

I did a history lesson about parts of the Spanish Civil War with a PowerPoint in Spanish halfway through class.  My kids actually seemed to enjoy it!  Who knew that they could enjoy history in Spanish class.  The best part is that it only helps us to further understand the backdrop for the novel Agentes Secretos y el mural de Picasso.

Then today (Friday) we read the first chapter of the novel.  I haven't done a novel reading before.  I asked my kids to be patient with me since I was trying something new this year in teaching them.  Then we read.  One of the neat things was we have many Spanish speakers in class and I asked if they wouldn't mind helping me read the Spanish since they're so much better at the language than me!  It went over wonderfully. The kids were able to follow along and read while someone spoke in Spanish with a native accent.

Some problems of course did occur:

1. some students no matter how easy you might try to make it just don't like reading
2. the readings are way too easy for Native / Heritage speakers
3. only a few kids really bought into helping translate the novel as we went through
• I would really love for all the students to get excited about understanding and helping out
• How can I create a classroom atmosphere that will be more comfortable for all students?

Some things that went well:

1. For most students, the structures in the book were way easy to translate and it helped with confidence (still confusion between quiere and tiene among some Spanish 1 students)
2. Native / Heritage speakers read out loud as we followed.  I asked them if they wouldn't mind helping me read since they spoke Spanish way better than me while we followed.  Most jumped to the task since I asked them to hold back on helping us translate today. 

Ideas for future:

A teacher had an idea to get my kids to participate more when reading, I could have assign the students into groups with a color or animal and then periodically only allow that group to answer the questions.  This could be a much better idea for those big classes where some kids monopolize the answering.

TPRS Year 3 - Planning backwards from novels

I think I mentioned in a previous post that I was going to be trying out teaching this year by planning out the year with first choosing the novels I want my kids to read, and then backwards plan what structures I need to teach them.

There's a very talented teacher that I have the privilege of working with on this project, Josef Sallen.  He's in his second year as a teacher and we are both the foreign language departments at our small schools.

We decided to choose some different novels for our two levels of Spanish classes.  I opted to not read the Blaine Ray stories.  Nothing against Blaine Ray.  He obviously has been amazing in creating a method of teaching that I (and my students) have fallen in love with.  But they tend to be somewhat repetitive in plot.

So Josef Sallen and I picked some novels and looked at the structures in the novels.  Then we decided how our year would look (more or less) with the different novels in the different levels.  Obviously the novels are written for students (taught with TPRS).  But it would be nice to work the kids up to some actual novels by Spanish 3 or 4.  For now though, it's nice to have something to work towards. We did the first 4-5 weeks of the semester with PQA (getting to know you activiity).  Then we did TPR of some of the structures from the book.  Then we did a few weeks of TPRS with spoken stories in the past and embedded readings in the present.  The idea was to get them ready to be able to read most of the first book before we even read it.  So for both classes we chose, Agentes Secretos by Mira Canion.

I'll let you know how it goes.