Story + Movietalk + Song - "Soy yo" by Bomba Estéreo (Spanish 1)

Still from "Soy yo" (Bomba Estéreo)

After the fun with the previous mini-unit on el chico del apartamento 512, I thought this would be a logical progression and I've wanted to use this song all year ever since seeing that Kara Jacobs did something with it.

So Bomba Estéreo came out with this great song called "Soy yo" (I am me) that is a really positive song about just being yourself. While Kara used it in the beginning of the year for repetitions of "SOY", I preferred to use it later on when my kids would have more language and I could relate it to deeper discussion in class about being who you are.  I know my stuff doesn't hold a candle to hers, but I think my students enjoyed it for the most part, which was nice since it's the end of the year.

Still from "Soy yo" (Bomba Estéreo)

Before showing them the reading, I brought up the first one of the year and told them we could warm up real quick. They read it without any problems. One student said in English, "Wait, that was so easy!" And I responded to him, "It is now. But when we first went over it, it was a little bit hard for you!" I wanted them to realize HOW much they have been exposed to this year in the Target Language and how far they have come in one year.

I really wanted to review some of the physical descriptions vocab, family vocab, places vocab, activities vocab, etc. The thing I love about storytelling (TPRS) is that you can really revisit things all the time because they can come up naturally in stories unlike with a textbook.


My structures were:

• viaja a - s/he travels to  (NEW)
• se ríen de - they laugh at / make fun of (NEW)
• sigue viajando - s/he keeps traveling (revisited)
• se va - s/he leaves (revisited)
• llegan a - they arrive at (revisited)

You might notice how I was reusing some phrases. But I made sure to use a different form of them in this story or added a different "ing" because just going over something once is NEVER enough for acquisition in my experience for lower levels. They need to constantly be exposed and re-exposed to vocabulary/structures throughout the year for long term retention.  The stuff they only hear once (for most kids) will most likely be forgotten to make space for more frequently used language.

Anyways,  here's the rough plan I used with links to the activities mentioned. It's bare bones, but hopefully it will inspire you!

My brief NTPRS story + a commercial!

So I went to a few different TPRS training workshops and was hooked. Then I found out there was this national week-long TPRS extravaganza for teachers called NTPRS.

Ever since I had wanted to go. One year it was in Kansas City, MO. This was before I decided to try TPRS.

Later it was in Chicago (8 hour drive but do-able). I had to go to my brother's wedding and wouldn't make it back in time.

Since then it wasn't a priority. Not going was easier than trying to go. Especially because it can be expensive after hotel rooms, food, and the registration (not to mention travel costs).

But I was heavily encouraged to go last summer and various kind souls helped make that happen and I was glad to go!  I got to meet so many teachers I have looked up to over the years and pick their brains about activities. I got to finally be in an environment that was friendly towards my teaching style. I have been in situations where it has gotten hostile due to closely held beliefs one what is "best" for students in the classrooms. At NTPRS, I didn't feel like I was crazy anymore.  There were others out there who were passionate about using any method possible other than the textbook who also found results.

And so when the guys at TPRS Books asked me to help them do a commercial a few weeks ago to help get people to go, I jumped at the opportunity.

I wanted others to be able to experience it as well and maybe to be prodded in that direction. I mean, if you share a hotel room with someone, carpool and are frugal with meals, it's completely do-able!

So here's what I made for them.

I hope you enjoy it and consider coming to NTPRS. Even if you aren't sure about TPRS, come!

It's a great way to get a week's worth of "input" about the method and to figure out how you could experiment with it in your classes. It's better than any video, blog post or book about the topic.

Read about my experiences at NTPRS last summer:

• Day 0 - the arrival
• Day 1
• Day 2
• Day 3
• Day 4
• Day 5
• On the way home

Story Script - the fake id (Spanish 2)

So as you might know if you've been doing storytelling for any length of time, ANYthing can be fodder for a story provided you can find ways to get reps in there and have your class help make it compelling.

When I was in high school, I remember making a movie for Spanish 3 in a group project where a guy (me) tried to get into a club/rave and had to eventually buy a fake id. If I remember, it was a commercial for fake ids.

With the Broccoli story I had made for reflexive verb practice, I thought it would be fun to have a story script beforehand to preteach some other words that might come up in a unit on Food or just have fun with.

I needed to introduce: "le pide" (s/he asks for / s/he orders). This works in Spanish for ordering food as well as asking for something. So I had my main structure for the storyline. Now all I needed was a few other structures.

What I came up with was:

Structures:

• era más bonita que (she was prettier than)
• le pide su identificación (s/he asks him/her for his/her identification)
• odiaba (s/he hated)

*Could have used "se enamoró de ella inmediatamente" (s/he fell in love immediately)


General story skeleton:

There was a [girl] who was prettier than [someone].  She wanted to dance in [name], a club in/on [place].  There was a [person/animal] that was working in front of the door of the club.  His/her name was [name].   The girl went towards [bouncer] and he asked her for her ID. She showed/gave him her id and he didn't hate pretty girls. He loved them. He told her, "You are prettier than ___.  I love pretty girls. You can go on in." He returned/gave her her id.  And she went in. 

Someone saw her enter. It was a wet waffle. He thought she was prettier than [same person or different person/thing from earlier]. He was in love.  He immediately fell in love with her.  He wanted to dance with her. He went towards the bouncer. The bouncer asked him for his id. He gave him his id. The bouncer looked at the id but there was a problem. The bouncer hated wet waffles. He told the wet waffle, "Sorry, you can't go in. You are a wet waffle and I HATE wet waffles." (Optional: Maybe add backstory as to why he hated wet waffles). He gave the wet waffle back his id and the wet waffle needed a fake id.  

He left [place[ and went to [store]. In the store, he looked for a fake id and found one. The fake id cost [quantity] and it was for a Fat Pancake. The wet waffle hated fat pancakes so he went to another store. 

In another store, he looked for a fake id and found one. It cost [quantity] and it was for a strong chicken named Bruce.  The wet waffle thought it was a deal and bought it. He went back to the club and walked towards the bouncer. The bouncer asked him for his id.  But he didn't give him his id. He gave him his fake id.  The bouncer looked at the id and told him, "You look like a wet waffle but it says here you are a strong chicken. I don't hate strong chickens. I LOVE strong chickens. You can go in." He didn't hate strong chickens and the wet waffle could enter the club! 

The wet waffle went in and looked for the girl who was prettier than [person].  He found her and walked towards her. He asked her, "Want to dance?" She asked for his identification.  He gave her his id. She looked at it and said, "Sorry, I hate strong chickens. I prefer wet waffles. I wish you were a wet waffle." 

That's terrible!  She thought he was a strong chicken and she hated strong chickens!

*In one class, the bouncer liked what the id was of (pancake or something) and ate the character instead of letting him in. The ending doesn't matter if you have delivered enough repetitive, compelling, comprehensible input.

**Some structures used in the story were from previous stories in our class stories. I always try to recycle things from previous stories.

And here's a worksheet with the present tense reading that I was quite proud of with some routine reflexives and additional activities if you need them!

Let me know if you end up using it or tweaking it!

Word Chunk - A fun, minimal prep game/activity

I first heard about this from one of Ben Slavic's dvds that I purchased ages ago.  I have since experimented with it in my classes.

While you could simply do it as a quiz or silly assessment with your students, I prefer the group activity.

My students on Fridays have PAT. So they already have groups. You could easily have them form the groups that day for the activity. Mine have to say a group chant and have a group name already established so that we can simply play this game.

So while I could have a list of every single word we have gone over for the year (or for years if they are in Spanish 2 or another level), I prefer this on the spot activity.

"Secret Password" happenings

Last school year, I started out incorporating a secret password to get into class.  This year, I no longer teach on the block, so I am doing new passwords that I never had the time to get to last year!

So it's been neat. In conjunction, I have really been having fun to break away from the monotony.  While sometimes, I just wait for the password, I played around with these two recently.

Last week's was:

Ojalá = I wish (let's hope)

Each day I would ask students different questions in TL that were accesible to their level(s):
   Do you want a million dollars?!
   Do you have 5 bellybuttons?
   Is it Friday yet?!
   Is it June yet?
   Is it hot outside?
   Is it July?

And they would respond with: "Ojalá" (I wish).

It was a lot of fun and later gave me the opportunity to throw Ojalá + past subjunctive in a reading for Spanish 1 that some kids were able to figure out (once they knew "ojalá" was like "I wish"). Cool!!

Simple story - Black Friday

I was thinking a lot of a Tripp Script that I saw recently on his blog. It is basically for telling after Thanksgiving.

Here are the structures:

• pounds (lbs)
• after eating
• takes a nap

And it lends itself to talking about overeating.  I thought it was nice and clever.  And it lends itself to Spanish 1 and also just a rainy day story to talk about things on these sometimes monotonous days.

But then I had an epiphany for my own storyline.

I thought about Black Friday and how much people tend to spend on that day. Since we're working on compra and some different clothing items (in stores) for vocab, this lends itself to that very easily.

• arrived / got there
• saw the perfect __.*
• bought it for only __.
• it was a bargain!

*this wouldn't be a goal for me, but might work better in your story or replace "found" for "saw"

Super simple version:

John arrived at Target Friday morning. He saw the perfect shirt. He bought it for only two pennies.

It was a bargain!

Simple version:

John went to Target for Black Friday.  John arrived at Target Friday morning at three in the morning. He saw the perfect brown shirt. He bought it for only two pennies.

It was a bargain!

Somewhat simple version:

John went to Target for Black Friday. John was at Target Friday morning at . He saw the perfect brown shirt for his little dog named Fluffinator. He bought it for only two pennies and a kiss.

It was a bargain!

Etc, etc, etc.

*Then you could do a similar reading (but with culture) involving el regateo (bargaining).  And throw that into the mix. Since it's a vocab/cultural idea I am supposed to hit this "unit".

structures:

• arrived / got there
• saw the perfect __.*
• bought it for only __.
• it was a bargain!
• it normally costs
• he haggled with the store clerk

Slightly simple version:

John went to Target for Black Friday. John was at Target Friday morning at . He saw the perfect brown shirt for his little dog named Fluffinator. It normally costs 100 dollars.  He haggled with the store clerk for one hour. He bought it for only two pennies, a kiss and his jeep.

It was a bargain!


And of course, if you're a Spanish teacher and have a Señor Wooly account, you could do a Movietalk and show the "es una ganga" music video as an extension activity in the week!

TPRS year 7 - secret password tweaks

Here's the evolution that I have had in my teaching.

4 years ago, I decided to stand at my door to greet students.

3 years ago, I continued to do this.

2 years ago, I thought it would be great to add in a handshake while greeting students.

1 year ago, I decided to try out a secret password with my students so that they could get in my class. (see post)

This year, I have continued with the secret password, but continue to experiment.

While I think they really helped me have something else to play around with during targeted and non-targeted comprehensible input during class last year, it also just added that extra element of fun.

Nevertheless, the way I did it last year made it a little disjointed.

As I have been reading on Bryce Hedstom's blog, I have found that there are passwords that are almost call and response. Or they are an interaction that kids have to go through before they can enter.

Last week, I tried out, "Of course!" (Claro que sí).

Lots of Spanish 1 TPRS resources

So after the relative success of my last post about what I did with the commercial: "Me voy de casa", I decided to go ahead and share a majority of things that I did last year in my Spanish 1 classes.

Feel free to open the folder, download things to your Google Drive or to your computer and enjoy!

My hope is that you can find a new activity or a new spin on an old activity you have used. Or maybe something to inspire you as you try out more communicative-based teaching via TPRS or Comprehensible Input methods!

I tried to include a plethora of things to give you an idea of what you could do in your classes as well to push kids towards proficiency by de-emphasizing grammar in actual grammar lessons each day (Don't worry, I, Señor Jordan, still teach grammar to my kids. But it's more of a back-door approach!)

Let me know what you think and happy perusing!

So click here to see my google drive folder (minus Agentes Secretos stuff since some of that has images from the teacher's guide by the very talented Mira Canion).

*Disclaimer* Please don't judge me too much for how I might have done an activity. I am far from an expert on teaching via TPRS. But I figure the best way to get better is to share with others who might be farther back on the path to encourage them and maybe the more experienced people can offer a suggestion or two!

Comercial - Me voy de casa

So this year in Spanish two, I have certain vocabulary points I need to hit for a unit and I have wanted to use this commercial for years.

I decided to do a lot of TPR first with my classes to build up their understanding of some words for sure.

So this folder gives you all of the things that I used with the Argentine commercial: Personal - Me voy de casa. (Folder Contains: screenshots from movie, TPR, warm ups, readings, Movietalk slides, instructions & reflection)

Commercial:

Here is more or less what I did.

Persona Especial - Observer

So the other day (I want to say it was two weeks ago), the teacher next to me has resource lab with students that have special needs in certain areas. They're given time to work on certain classes and homework.

And as my students are telling me the password of the week, I have that teacher tell me, "One of my students wants to observe your class today."  To which I responded, "Is that ok with you?" And she said it was fine. I told her that if he or she didn't cause problems, they were completely welcome.

So a student comes in, sits down and works on homework.  It's one of my rowdier classes (30 or so students). They have a great energy but need a lot of redirection.

And we go through normal class. The students applaud for the things we usually do. We went over the day, date, how they were doing and we interviewed someone.  We laughed, we joked, we stayed in Spanish most of the time.

After the class, I asked if the student got any of his homework done or what he thought of class.

He responded with, "That was awesome!"

I heard from the teacher next door that he just hears our class through the wall and it must sound so exciting that he just needed to experience it for himself.

NTPRS - day 5 - Embedded Reading, Closing Ceremony, Tahoe, In & Out, & Videogames,

*this is my attempt to keep track of what happened while I was at my very first NTPRS in Reno, Nevada 

Embedded reading presentation
In the morning I went to Michele Whaley's presentation on "Embedded reading: A Literacy Tool".

It was really neat to see! I have been using embedded reading now (or trying) for three years.

If you aren't familiar with it, it's simply creating a simple version of a text and then a harder (bottom-up) or using a hard version of a reading and making it more accessible in different versions (top-down).

Michele Whaley did a good job breaking it down and I could see how important it really can be to help kids be successful. So thankfully it reinforced what I did for my classes.

Mafia game - Presentation

This year I use PAT with classes to help with buy-in for being on task during class.

So this week we have a lot of accumulated PAT and since it's the end of the year, I thought we could play a simplified version of Mafia.

I got the idea from Martina Bex last year.

Changes I made:

• I decided for my Spanish 1 class to remove the doctor, because we never finish a game anyway.
• I added a point system because we never finish a game so that way it gives some more semblance of purpose

And here's the presentation I came up with for today to facilitate the game. The language for "se hace de noche" comes from an activity we do earlier in the year so it's familiar.

You could easily take away the language like "killing" to something else. I talk about how the mafia eliminates people, but might use the term "kill" if the classes are familiar with it. The people they accuse go to prison.


If you can use it in your classes, great!  The kids enjoyed the picture of their town in the presentation.

Music - using songs more than once

I got this idea from Kristy Placido in an online conference through tprspublishing a few years back.

Basically I used to just show a song for one day of the week and we would listen to it and do a cloze activity. It was the favorite day of a lot of my students.  We would go over the lyrics and listen to it various times. But there was never really much of an extension activity.

I don't see a huge problem since my most important goal was to expose them to new things. The songs could have similar and/or different perspectives and we could have a quick talk in L1 or TL about them as needed. Since storytelling revolves around high frequency structures, this is a great activity since many songs will have some part with comprehensible language that we can see later creep up in stories.

I also noticed many of the kids downloaded the songs that year.

What's the password?!

So if you walk by my classroom during passing period, you'll most likely see something a little out of the ordinary for the average classroom: a line of students.

In the window to get into my classroom there is a green sign that reads: "Puedes pasar" (You can pass) and "No puedes pasar" (You cannot pass). The latter makes me think of Gandalf talking to the Balrog in the Fellowship of the Ring. Although I am sure he would have said something like, "No pasarás" (You shall not pass.)

Last year, students had to shake my hand to enter and I would say "good morning" or "good afternoon" to them.

This year, I have followed in the footsteps of some foreign language teaching pioneers and I make my students tell me a secret code before they can enter.

The secret code is posted on a small white board in the classroom with the Spanish and English translation.

Bathroom story (revised)

What's a storytelling Spanish class without a good bathroom story!

I'm sure you've all heard of Señor Wooly. He's fantastic. I admit that I'm incredibly envious of his talent and creativity and wish I had an ounce of all of his amazing abilities! If you haven't heard of him, he makes silly songs in Spanish with story lines that really resonate with students.

I don't personally have an account this year for his site, but he has the song: "Puedo ir al baño" on youtube.

Every year I have a bathroom story of some sort. In conjunction with the story, our warm up involves listening to the song by Señor Wooly and accomplishing various tasks (cloze, re-order lyrics, translate phrases from song, etc).  They always listen to it at least twice when class begins while completing the task, while I do necessary teacher duties (attendance, last minute prep, etc). I enjoy starting class with music whenever possible because it generally relaxes students to ease into class.

Click here to see post from last year.

In previous years, it was more like a traditional story from TPRS classes where a person goes to different people and asks them for information. Last year's structures weren't going to cut it.

Probably due to the nature of my class, it's always a fun time and I had no real reasons to change the story except the Spanish 2 teachers expect the kids to know some more information by next year that I haven't been able to really hit yet.

I need to use "to have to [do something]" and I thought that would go great with a bathroom story based more around the song: Puedo ir al baño by Señor Wooly.  And I could actually borrow the genius idea from Señor Wooly from the story within the song.

So here's what I came up with:

Some of the structures match the song more easily and/or I can use the song itself to create an embedded reading for the present tense while we tell a relatively simple story in the past. The part that I think is nice is how relate-able it can be (for some classes) or how farcical it could be for others. Also, we tell the story once we have TPR'd the phrases.

Remember that in anything it's always good to try new things and genre is always something you can play around with.  The best part about storytelling is that there are so many types of stories we can use. It's best not to limit ourselves to "character doesn't have ___. Character is sad. Character goes to so and so, etc.".

TPR (Total Physical Response):

Here's the TPR part where I have students get up and move a little bit for a brain break:

• Necesita ir al baño (hold tummy / cross legs)
• “Tienes que esperar” (point finger down at palm for have) / (hold out hand like picture for “wait”)
• Lo / la deja ir - let butterfly go free

And I always add more to it, "necesita ir al baño y se da la vuelta y sonríe" (s/he needs to use the bathroom and turns around and smiles). "Lo deja ir lentamente y grita en silencio" (S/he lets it go slowly and yells silently).

TPRS (Storytelling):

Here's my basic story skeleton. Let me know what you think!

Story idea - monster - follow-up

A few weeks ago, I posted about a story line I was wanting to do with my classes involving a grandmother (or any other character), monsters and silliness. See that post here.

So I had a class that was a little bit ahead of my other classes due to a late start and I wanted to have an additional activity (reading pass) for enrichment and to get those pesky yo forms of the verbs for them!

See abuela embedded reading.

I wanted to give them a google slides presentation instead of another piece of paper to read and while I thought about telling the whole story again from the grandmother's perspective, it occurred to me that it might be sillier to tell the whole thing from the monster's perspective.

If I did this right, here's the presentation for the monster story (part 4):



To make a copy of the presentation, click here to see it through my google drive!

Another Spontaneous Output experience

So one of the things that I allow my students to do from day one is:

they are allowed to insult the teacher and only the teacher (and no one else in class).

This way, they get to practice all of those negative words (ugly, stupid/dumb, smelly, big loser, etc).

While it not be your style, I have found it to make class so much more lighthearted. And I get to constantly remind them of my stupidity when i make mistakes (intentionally or unintentionally).  It has turned ME into the class buffoon so that they can relax a little more and have more fun.

Something I miss this year since I don't have any Spanish 2 classes anymore is that Spanish 2 is able to talk more and can carry on conversations a little better (due to more input).  So class is more lighthearted and laid back because they are a little older and it's a good time.

Spanish 1 is a little harder because I have to keep them going going going with different activities (in the block) and we're constantly doing something (in CI as much as possible) and lots of brain breaks (still in Spanish though: songs, TPR, movement, quick transition, joke, etc).

And so I have missed having conversations with my Spanish 2s and also letting them run the class sometimes by building off of each other's ideas.

Nevertheless, this year I have been fortunate to have some very talented individuals in some of my classes and they have really been able to figure out the first person and second person forms of the verbs better than any previous year. So the insults, as you can imagine, have been even richer. And they are getting way more creative WITH the language.

Today in one of my classes, the students refused to ask me "¿y tú?" after I asked volunteers how they were doing today because I am not important. And they did a really good job of staying in the language. I couldn't believe some of the things they were saying (and being HILARIOUS in the language).  We were all laughing.

In the following class (last class of the day), I think we were similarly just talking about how people were doing for 20 minutes because of the hilarity that ensued from my students. I accidentally gave the student the impression that he was next to be called on, but I had said "ladies first" before that and as I asked a girl how she was doing, he responded with (in spanish) "you are playing with my head". (Something I tell them sometimes, but he said it perfectly in the second person and all).

When I later asked him how he was doing, he responded with "I am annoyed". And whenever they are mad or annoyed I prod them to tell me if they are mad at a person, mineral, plant or animal. And when they say person I ask silly questions with description words (that they know or don't). And it usually is that they are annoyed with me for some reason.
But the funniest thing all day was one of the cleverer students asked (in perfect Spanish), "Is his hair falling out?"

And I lost it. I went on to joke that there was a line (which I drew) and then I explained "and you are located over here" to which he walked over to that line and then said, "no, my line is here".

I wish I could remember some of the other things from that class, but as you might guess, I was laughing with them most of class.

It was nice to see how much they have been learning this year and to see them speaking (because they want to and because the context and environment allows it).  No one is forcing them and they are the stars of the show!

New Interactive Youtube Storytelling

A few years back I did an experiment called Cuentas Conmigo where I basically did a TPRS story but on Youtube. At the end of each video, people would write in the comments section the next detail, which I would add in the next video.

It was really fun!

Here's my new attempt.

I am going to do the same story in the present and past tense.

And I have some ideas on how to get more first person / second person forms of the verbs in there (interviewing the character).

I think it's going to be fun! Please join in by adding your details and if you're a teacher why not get your class involved to?

Present Tense:

Past Tense:

And you might subscribe to the channel where I wanted to do a new storyline each semester (maybe even one in the summer depending on how this one turns out!)


Check out my Cuentas Conmigo channel or playlists of old Cuentas Conmigo attempts.

TPRS year 5 - Movietalk/Song - Celos

There is a song I discovered years ago and always found a way to tie it into storytelling because of the themes in it of romance and betrayal.  It also has a lot of good solid TPR words like body parts and concrete actions (kiss, look, walk, dance).  It is seriously the best song.

I just found out it's a remake, but either way, it's the only version I ever knew and it's called Celos.  Fanny Lu (Colombian singer) sings the remake and the video is even fun.

In previous years we did a cloze activity and watched the video.  This year, I have some targets I want to hit on structures (busca, encuentra, quiere hablar con, se cae, camina, sobre/hacia) and thought this would be the perfect way to introduce those before we read Agentes Secretos y el mural de Picasso.

So here's the activity I came up with.  Let me know what you think!

TPRS Year 4 - Comercial - Snickers - Dramático

It's that time of the year when I need to throw in some other activities I don't normally think about doing, and also throw in some more authentic texts where we actually can figure out some of the language to realize we have been learning this year!

Here's a fun one I used in my Spanish one classes.  It has some out of bounds vocab, so I had that translated.

Here's the handout I used: (Click here.)

Possible Extensions:
1. Notice how they pronounce Snickers in Spanish... why is it pronounced "eh-snee-kayrs"
2. Is this similar to something you've seen in English?
3. Who is this most likely being marketed to? (Do they sell Snicker's overseas?)