Cuentas Conmigo (Story 5) - Carlos Prickly

Hey everyone.

I had a yearning to do something fun that can be released to the masses since my other creative project (Súper Lápiz) is only for Voces Digital consumers..., and was inspired to do another Cuentas Conmigo story on Youtube on my storytelling channel.

The idea of Cuentas Conmigo (if you're new around here), is that it's basically a TPRS® story that is done completely through feedback via the comments section on Youtube.

There is a new episode each Monday and this requires voting on the question at the end to be done by Wednesday. I foresee this being used by classes, or learners of any kind who want to practice Spanish in context.

This is the 5th story like it so far. The most popular was probably with Juan Cena. Nevertheless, I have been proud of each and every one of them.


Here are some ways this one is new though!

• Narrator is voiced by a Native Speaker
• I wrote a theme-song
• I think my style is getting more established as I do these

Check out my Teachers Pay Teachers store for free Teacher notes on the first episode which includes some ideas on how to use the series, episode and even has a short quiz or guided notes page for students.*

And I hope you and your classes will tell the story along with me!

Check out episode 1 in the present or past tenses!

*I'm selling the other ones to hopefully eventually offset the cost of paying a native speaker narrator for each episode.

See previous Cuentas Conmigo stories on these playlists.

New storytelling adventure (Fall 2016)

I've been doing another Youtube endeavor under the title of "Cuentas Conmigo".

This is the fourth story. I just wrapped up episode 6 yesterday and I am really proud of how it is turning out.

In the previous Cuentas Conmigos, there was very little emphasis on anything cultural.  And I realize that that might be seen as a weakness to the videos. If teachers use them in their classes, perhaps it would be best to add in some more little cultural tidbits. In this way, teachers could use them as springboards for discussion or as a nice little culture pop up.

The first episode you can really see this is in episode 5 where we learn that the narwhal can't do any tricks. While he is painting a familiar painting (well mural actually) should be seen. It's something I learned a lot about thanks to Mira Canion and her wonderful TPRS reader: Agentes secretos y el mural de Picasso.

And in this week's episode, the main character finds himself going to a Spanish-speaking country, where (as it was a country I visited many years ago), I threw in some different places that he could potentially have gone to!

New storytelling experiment - first and second person

So I am doing a side project this semester with anyone willing to join in.  I decided to do another storytelling experiment this semester in the past tense and also do the same story in the present tense (depending on school climate where the video is being watched).*

In my first story, it was mostly narrating in the past tense. There wasn't a lot of first/second person forms of the verbs (past or present).

In my second story, I tried to have the turtle say more, but you didn't hear him talking about it as much as I would just have the bubble with the first person form.

This time around, I wanted to really expose learners to language in context and thought the best way to get the characters to talk about themselves is similar to in the classroom itself! Interview them. So I will periodically be interviewing the actors in the story to ensure we have the correct information (and also that their voice is being heard).

Check out my attempt at this in episode 2!

Present tense - episode 2

Past tense - episode 2

*Even some teachers who like to use stories and CI find themselves locked into a textbook that predominately goes over the present tense in level 1.