Here are my presentation slides for my encore presentation from FLAM with links to what I mentioned!
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B_jfUujjoeDHUEx1ZnVwNE1QaTg
Showing posts with label teaching. Show all posts
Showing posts with label teaching. Show all posts
Friday, October 27, 2017
Friday, October 28, 2016
FLAM / KSWLA presentation: Stay on Target!
So I asked awhile back about people's thoughts on what I should present at FLAM this year. And here is my title, blurb.
Stay on Target! Ten Target Teaching Techniques & Tips
Presenter: Jeremy Jordan, Lee's Summit High School, Lee's Summit, MO
Jeremy Jordan of Lee’s Summit High School explains various techniques that he uses in his classroom to push TL usage to 90% or higher, while still helping class be a fun, positive yet rigorous place to be. Examples will be straight from Spanish class, but will be relevant to any classroom.
Audience: All Language: Presented in English Theme: Best Practices
And I came up with quite a loaded presentation.
If you want to see it, here it is! I tried to include a lot of activities I use or have used in the past to help push my students to using more TL in the classroom.
Of course, there are so many other things I have found success with, but these are some of the most powerful that I have used that have resonated with my students.
And here are my presentation notes in a convenient PDF for you!
Friday, April 29, 2016
What are your goals?
I think this is where we should all start as foreign language teachers, teachers, etc.
In my current job, I got myself into trouble
when I started. I think my department and I have come a long way since then and I should have started the tough conversations we had with the first question:
"What are your goals?"
Bill VanPatten has asked teachers this question on his program TeaWithBVP recently and I just thought it was genius. It makes complete sense.
So if you are a foreign language teacher, what are your goals?
In my current job, I got myself into trouble
when I started. I think my department and I have come a long way since then and I should have started the tough conversations we had with the first question:
 |
| a meme I designed for a recent contest #BVPmemes |
"What are your goals?"
Bill VanPatten has asked teachers this question on his program TeaWithBVP recently and I just thought it was genius. It makes complete sense.
So if you are a foreign language teacher, what are your goals?
Tuesday, August 6, 2013
TPRS year 4 - likening TPRS & CI to music
I was thinking about explaining TPRS and CI teaching to the Spanish teachers in the department at my new school.
It occurred to me that if we can compare learning a language to learning how to play music, the parallels are quite striking.
So there are different ways to go about learning how to play an instrument. I remember being in band when I was younger, and learned how to play guitar in college.
When I was in band, we might so scales every once in awhile, but we would spend most of our time playing songs and parts of songs. We would continually play the songs over and over and over again.
The scales were used to help us in our accuracy of the notes as well as speed. But after simply playing different songs over and over, we would slowly get better.
When I learned guitar, I would take songs I wanted to know how to play and I would play them over and over.
I never became a professional musician doing this but I can play a number of songs and slowly developed more rhythm. As I listen to music, I tend to listen to how a song is played and I can always add that in to my style.
Imagine going to a class where the teacher only taught you about the instrument and all the pieces to it and what each individual piece is used for. Then a few times they showed you how to play one or two notes on it and expected that you would be able to figure out three notes more even an entire song!
I would think that's how many view traditional (grammar-based) instruction in the foreign language classroom. We do very little for our students in modeling the actual language being used in context, but instead give them the isolated parts, and then maybe give them drills to do. But our hope is that they will produce more than we have taught them in the language.
So I liked this metaphor or the instrument and band because it's how I learned guitar. I learned first how to use the language through the whole (a song) and then later added music theory to my understanding as I was interested in why (grammar). In this way, I am not paralyzed with fear to play the guitar because strumming just for fun comes naturally since that is the way I learned. I didn't just learn scales and constant drills first,...
And as far as teaching Spanish, I really enjoy using TPRS and CI as this other way of giving the kids all the language possible (in context and simplified as needed) to help slowly build them up.
And as far as teaching Spanish, I really enjoy using TPRS and CI as this other way of giving the kids all the language possible (in context and simplified as needed) to help slowly build them up.
And I've found that when they're ready, they "make music".
Thursday, March 14, 2013
TPRS Year 3 - My "No English" Rule - revisited
I was looking at some of my old posts from my first year and came across this entry. In the entry, I am trying to come to terms with something I had read about "No English Rules."
Here's what I have done since last year in my new school, which has worked for the most part.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Disclaimer:
First off, allow me to explain that if you are a foreign language teacher and you don't do this, I am not saying that you are wrong. I have found that some students need to be limited in their English only so that they don't distract us from learning Spanish.
I once had a student that after I asked, "What was there?" proceeded to answer and tell her own story in English before I could stop her. Thus, taking away from the tension of asking a question and having the students relieve the tension with a sentence or two in the form of an answer or suggestion for the story.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I have a "two words or less in English" expectation that I teach from day 1 in my class. All I do is I explain to my kids that if I ask them an open-ended question while we're going through class, that since the possibilities are endless, they can answer with anything (since everything is possible in my class), but if they have to use English, I will ask them to limit it to two words so we don't have to over translate and get lost in this long jumbled phrase we won't remember. Instead, we can take two words and easily work with them and they can evolve and be practiced more.
When kids use more than two words of English, I simply show them a hand sign I made up for it and smile, while not acknowledging their answer and shrugging my shoulders. They understand that it's simply part of the "game" of class and that I am not trying to make it personal.
Some might have a problem with this in their classes. After starting my first year of TPRS, I remember that over halfway through the year I tried to implement this. I wasn't consistent and it flopped.
So in the past two years, I simply taught it as a norm in my class from day one and my kids have responded wonderfully to it. Sometimes they get a little frustrated because they have trouble with circumlocution. But it's part of my class. So they respect it.
I think the key to any expectation you have is consistency from day one. There doesn't have to be a punishment or discipline all the time. If I teach the kids that's what they have to do in my class to be successful, it can be as simple as that for most of them.
Please share your thoughts below on if you think this could work for your class or if it wouldn't work!
Here's what I have done since last year in my new school, which has worked for the most part.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Disclaimer:
First off, allow me to explain that if you are a foreign language teacher and you don't do this, I am not saying that you are wrong. I have found that some students need to be limited in their English only so that they don't distract us from learning Spanish.
I once had a student that after I asked, "What was there?" proceeded to answer and tell her own story in English before I could stop her. Thus, taking away from the tension of asking a question and having the students relieve the tension with a sentence or two in the form of an answer or suggestion for the story.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I have a "two words or less in English" expectation that I teach from day 1 in my class. All I do is I explain to my kids that if I ask them an open-ended question while we're going through class, that since the possibilities are endless, they can answer with anything (since everything is possible in my class), but if they have to use English, I will ask them to limit it to two words so we don't have to over translate and get lost in this long jumbled phrase we won't remember. Instead, we can take two words and easily work with them and they can evolve and be practiced more.
When kids use more than two words of English, I simply show them a hand sign I made up for it and smile, while not acknowledging their answer and shrugging my shoulders. They understand that it's simply part of the "game" of class and that I am not trying to make it personal.
Some might have a problem with this in their classes. After starting my first year of TPRS, I remember that over halfway through the year I tried to implement this. I wasn't consistent and it flopped.
So in the past two years, I simply taught it as a norm in my class from day one and my kids have responded wonderfully to it. Sometimes they get a little frustrated because they have trouble with circumlocution. But it's part of my class. So they respect it.
I think the key to any expectation you have is consistency from day one. There doesn't have to be a punishment or discipline all the time. If I teach the kids that's what they have to do in my class to be successful, it can be as simple as that for most of them.
Please share your thoughts below on if you think this could work for your class or if it wouldn't work!
Monday, January 16, 2012
year 2 - TPRS - Native / Heritage speakers
There are two terms I am familiar with when talking about students in class who come from Spanish speaking families. I believe the terms are: Native speakers and Heritage speakers.
From my understanding, Native speakers are those students who will be fluent in the language (most likely first generation; moved to US) while Heritage speakers would be students who can speak the language but in a more limited context due to their parents speaking the language but they have been raised in Gringo-land. If my definitions are off, please correct me! :-)
The following is what I do with Native / Heritage speakers in my classroom.
So I teach at his rural school that has seen a huge increase in the Hispanic population in the last fifteen or so years. As a result there are many students that are first or second generation Spanish speakers who are forced to take Spanish since no other foreign languages are offered here. Since teachers at this school tend to leave after every two or so years (what I saw at the last school I taught too) it's hard to establish any good curriculum or sense of stability for the schedule.
Consequently I have at least a few native speaking students in my classes who must feel insulted in their intelligence at times because obviously their needs in language instruction would be more like our high school English classes for Americans. Yet at my school there haven't been any incredibly talented teachers who have stuck around for long enough to change things. Students sometimes have been rubbed the wrong way by a Spanish teacher telling them that words that they use are wrong (because the teacher is too ignorant to know any better).
As you probably know from this blog, I've pretty much converted my teaching style of Spanish to TPRS. At my previous school I was able to teach students high frequency structures and more about the language in a digestible and interesting way. But my students last year were all non-Spanish speaking students. So they were all starting from about the same place.
TPRS is neat even for multi-level learning like I tried in my ESL classes with adults. But with the huge discrepancy of Native / Heritage speakers and native English speakers, I wasn't sure what to do.
So I haven't required a lot out of my native/heritage speakers. They can pretend like they are students learning Spanish like everyone else or they can read books in Spanish during class and write summaries. Most opt to participate in the stories. Now I have tried to talk to the native/heritage speakers outside of class and many of them have said that they enjoy class. Probably because TPRS makes class seem a lot more like playtime in the language with acting and compelling input activities.
Assuming that my school decides to keep me on next year, there has been talk about me teaching a Spanish class in the style of language arts to help the native/ heritage speakers learn how to read more as well as function better in their language. It's exciting but daunting because I am not sure if my Spanish abilities are quite up to par to accomplish this feat.
From my understanding, Native speakers are those students who will be fluent in the language (most likely first generation; moved to US) while Heritage speakers would be students who can speak the language but in a more limited context due to their parents speaking the language but they have been raised in Gringo-land. If my definitions are off, please correct me! :-)
The following is what I do with Native / Heritage speakers in my classroom.
So I teach at his rural school that has seen a huge increase in the Hispanic population in the last fifteen or so years. As a result there are many students that are first or second generation Spanish speakers who are forced to take Spanish since no other foreign languages are offered here. Since teachers at this school tend to leave after every two or so years (what I saw at the last school I taught too) it's hard to establish any good curriculum or sense of stability for the schedule.
Consequently I have at least a few native speaking students in my classes who must feel insulted in their intelligence at times because obviously their needs in language instruction would be more like our high school English classes for Americans. Yet at my school there haven't been any incredibly talented teachers who have stuck around for long enough to change things. Students sometimes have been rubbed the wrong way by a Spanish teacher telling them that words that they use are wrong (because the teacher is too ignorant to know any better).
As you probably know from this blog, I've pretty much converted my teaching style of Spanish to TPRS. At my previous school I was able to teach students high frequency structures and more about the language in a digestible and interesting way. But my students last year were all non-Spanish speaking students. So they were all starting from about the same place.
TPRS is neat even for multi-level learning like I tried in my ESL classes with adults. But with the huge discrepancy of Native / Heritage speakers and native English speakers, I wasn't sure what to do.
So I haven't required a lot out of my native/heritage speakers. They can pretend like they are students learning Spanish like everyone else or they can read books in Spanish during class and write summaries. Most opt to participate in the stories. Now I have tried to talk to the native/heritage speakers outside of class and many of them have said that they enjoy class. Probably because TPRS makes class seem a lot more like playtime in the language with acting and compelling input activities.
Assuming that my school decides to keep me on next year, there has been talk about me teaching a Spanish class in the style of language arts to help the native/ heritage speakers learn how to read more as well as function better in their language. It's exciting but daunting because I am not sure if my Spanish abilities are quite up to par to accomplish this feat.
Wednesday, November 10, 2010
Día 58 - ESL class
So last night I started a weekly ESL (English as a Second Language) class with some Spanish speakers that I know. I was curious how it would go since the levels all varied. The levels varied from advanced to beginner. I had six students and hope more come next week as well because the class is so much fun with more people and more ideas.
I tried out the Blaine Ray Materials: Look I can Talk. It cost about $50 I think for the teacher's book and the student book. It turns out that they structures are basically like the Spanish ones only translated. So I could have saved 50 dollars. But that's ok. It's an investment in the lives of these people, many of them that have become special in my life in the last few years.
The class is once a week for two hours due to busy schedules. In the first hour we have a one hour oral portion where we tell a story in the past tense. Then we take a break and have a one hour reading session in the present tense.
Part 1:
Because you focus on structures in TPRS, we started with the following three structures:
There was a boy.
He wanted to have
He liked and went ___.
After lots of circling and adding details, it became...
There was a boy. The boy's name was Carlos. Carlos wanted to have two small cats. Carlos lived in Washington. There were no small cats in Washington. Carlos went to Missouri. There were small cats and big cats in Missouri. Carlos was happy.
(parallel story)
Alicia was in Missouri. Alicia wanted to have 10 expensive dresses.
Part 2:
In the second hour, we had the reading in the present tense which was very similar to the spoken story. The students did a great job of adapting from one tense to the other. Even the beginners were doing a pretty good job of following. When we finished everyone seemed to be very confident that the lesson was interesting and a success.
Reflection:
I tried out the Blaine Ray Materials: Look I can Talk. It cost about $50 I think for the teacher's book and the student book. It turns out that they structures are basically like the Spanish ones only translated. So I could have saved 50 dollars. But that's ok. It's an investment in the lives of these people, many of them that have become special in my life in the last few years.
The class is once a week for two hours due to busy schedules. In the first hour we have a one hour oral portion where we tell a story in the past tense. Then we take a break and have a one hour reading session in the present tense.
Part 1:
Because you focus on structures in TPRS, we started with the following three structures:
There was a boy.
He wanted to have
He liked and went ___.
After lots of circling and adding details, it became...
There was a boy. The boy's name was Carlos. Carlos wanted to have two small cats. Carlos lived in Washington. There were no small cats in Washington. Carlos went to Missouri. There were small cats and big cats in Missouri. Carlos was happy.
(parallel story)
Alicia was in Missouri. Alicia wanted to have 10 expensive dresses.
Part 2:
In the second hour, we had the reading in the present tense which was very similar to the spoken story. The students did a great job of adapting from one tense to the other. Even the beginners were doing a pretty good job of following. When we finished everyone seemed to be very confident that the lesson was interesting and a success.
Reflection:
- Since I teach Jr High and High School every day, the dynamic really surprised me. The people wanted to learn English. They realized the need and I was helping them. Unlike my students just wanting to have fun, the adults diligently took notes on the ways I asked questions and were very attentive. They asked lots of questions and were very engaged.
- I was a little nervous because I do not have to think much about my native language but I thankfully remembered before teaching that 'Did' makes a question in the past tense. So I wrote 'Did' on the board and explained that we use it in English to make a question. Later I clarified that 'Does' is for the present tense to make a question
- The levels were mixed but the beginners were able to hear the language from others in the class and I made sure to go very slowly and to point. I felt confident about my pointing and circling enough. I might have circled too much, but some of the beginners needed that input
- I'm excited for the class to continue. I get nervous before teaching a new lesson but they're so fun once you get started and it doesn't feel like teaching when TPRS is done right. It just feels like you're hanging out with the group
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
Día 57 - MY students
A student from the local university needs to do a practicum in which they plan out and teach a few days for a few classes. It's nothing major. But it is something that could be incredibly great for your students or it could be something horrible for them.
She hasn't really learned much about TPRS prior to coming and observing last week. But she has been excited about the idea and was able to see a little bit of the language gains one can accomplish through TPRS. The day she observed, we only went over a written story and then made up some different parallel storylines. She came yesterday to do two lessons with two of my classes. The first class went ok. After watching, I'm really glad that I had a little bit of an idea already how to tell a story through TPRS thanks to the workshop this summer. Granted, I still have so many questions and things I need to improve on. The main idea is to circle structures with questions and to go somewhat chronologically.
I noticed I hadn't explained it very well because the first class went in all sorts of different directions and the students (as well as the student teacher) were having a really hard time trying. The good thing is that I was able to model it a little more for her during the 2nd period class and she improved quite a bit between the first hour and the third hour classes.
Today she came back and did even better. The kids were enjoying the language and she was having a good time with them. Overall, I think she did a great considering she'd never learned with this method or really seen it modeled well. Tomorrow she'll come back for a reading with the kids.
But while I've been observing, I have found myself feeling kind of territorial with my Spanish students. They're MY students. I want to teach them. If something isn't taught how I would have taught it, I feel myself get uncomfortable about the concept. It's strange. It feels weird to give up my class to some stranger.
Lastweek I had a student transfer schools and in their new school they told me the teacher is just doing conjugation (the traditional way of teaching) and she's probably going to drop the class! That makes me sad because she did a great job in the class with the language with TPRS.
Long story short, I guess I care about my kids more than I thought I did.
She hasn't really learned much about TPRS prior to coming and observing last week. But she has been excited about the idea and was able to see a little bit of the language gains one can accomplish through TPRS. The day she observed, we only went over a written story and then made up some different parallel storylines. She came yesterday to do two lessons with two of my classes. The first class went ok. After watching, I'm really glad that I had a little bit of an idea already how to tell a story through TPRS thanks to the workshop this summer. Granted, I still have so many questions and things I need to improve on. The main idea is to circle structures with questions and to go somewhat chronologically.
I noticed I hadn't explained it very well because the first class went in all sorts of different directions and the students (as well as the student teacher) were having a really hard time trying. The good thing is that I was able to model it a little more for her during the 2nd period class and she improved quite a bit between the first hour and the third hour classes.
Today she came back and did even better. The kids were enjoying the language and she was having a good time with them. Overall, I think she did a great considering she'd never learned with this method or really seen it modeled well. Tomorrow she'll come back for a reading with the kids.
But while I've been observing, I have found myself feeling kind of territorial with my Spanish students. They're MY students. I want to teach them. If something isn't taught how I would have taught it, I feel myself get uncomfortable about the concept. It's strange. It feels weird to give up my class to some stranger.
Lastweek I had a student transfer schools and in their new school they told me the teacher is just doing conjugation (the traditional way of teaching) and she's probably going to drop the class! That makes me sad because she did a great job in the class with the language with TPRS.
Long story short, I guess I care about my kids more than I thought I did.
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
Día 42 - I don't know enough Spanish
I've been trained to speak Spanish according to the rules of grammar and there are many things I can probably not talk about at great length from lack of conversational practice in those areas or lack of interest. The daunting task when one teaches with TPRS is that a teacher might never quite know where the story could go if they are asking questions and relying on the answers from the students. Sure they can guide the students in their information.
But today I have come across some words I had to make sure of in the dictionary during class. I don't think that it's necessarily a bad thing. I am hardly a dictionary in class. There are many words I have never had to use in Spanish such as 'cheetah'. Yesterday as I looked it up during a storytelling session, the students were amazed that I had never learned the word in Spanish. But hey, I can talk for hours upon hours about literature analysis thanks to my college classes. I mean, that's the important stuff right?
Doesn't do my students much good. The idea I am working on is to model to students that it's ok for me as the teacher to not know every word in the Spanish language. I also like storytelling because they reveal to me the things I am not sure how to say and thus I have to learn them. Through teaching, I have probably learned quite a bit more about Spanish than in my graduate classes about the language because I was exposed to the questions I hadn't thought of about it by my students. Since I am no longer coming from a fresh vantage point, I appreciate my students pointing things out to me that I had not ever seen.
So in short, whether it be best practice for foreign language teachers or not, I don't mind admitting that I don't know all the words. ;-)
Heck in my previous post or two, I learned that 'snuck' is not standard English. The standard word is 'sneaked.'
But today I have come across some words I had to make sure of in the dictionary during class. I don't think that it's necessarily a bad thing. I am hardly a dictionary in class. There are many words I have never had to use in Spanish such as 'cheetah'. Yesterday as I looked it up during a storytelling session, the students were amazed that I had never learned the word in Spanish. But hey, I can talk for hours upon hours about literature analysis thanks to my college classes. I mean, that's the important stuff right?
Doesn't do my students much good. The idea I am working on is to model to students that it's ok for me as the teacher to not know every word in the Spanish language. I also like storytelling because they reveal to me the things I am not sure how to say and thus I have to learn them. Through teaching, I have probably learned quite a bit more about Spanish than in my graduate classes about the language because I was exposed to the questions I hadn't thought of about it by my students. Since I am no longer coming from a fresh vantage point, I appreciate my students pointing things out to me that I had not ever seen.
So in short, whether it be best practice for foreign language teachers or not, I don't mind admitting that I don't know all the words. ;-)
Heck in my previous post or two, I learned that 'snuck' is not standard English. The standard word is 'sneaked.'
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Día 39 - Song day
I think I've mentioned this before. Once a teacher said that you should do one thing every day that you as the teacher enjoy. If the students hate it, no big deal. We need to show our passion to the students and see what they do with it!
I've often tried to incorporate music into my classroom but I wanted it to be purposeful to the students and to have to do with a certain grammatical structure we're going over. That would be swell. But my memory of songs in Spanish is not that great and therefore I wouldn't add as many songs only because they didn't have the grammar or vocabulary that I wanted to practice.
What?! Craziness... right? But this year, I decided to introduce some children's songs that I found on youtube and then it evolved into showing different kinds of musical styles as well from the Spanish speaking world. I like to incorporate pop culture into classes. A lot of Latin Artists are crossing over anyway these days like Shakira, Enrique Iglesias, Daddy Yankee, etc. So it's not a bad thing for me to want to incorporate music into classes.
I've been getting lucky lately because it might appear to the students that we aren't learning anything on music days. What I've been doing each music day is to show them a piece of music and then to have them listen to it two times. A lot of times, a video accompanies it on Youtube. They have to fill in the blanks of words that they should be able to recognize but also maybe that they can pick out thanks to a wordbank at the bottom of the sheet.
The next pass involves us talking about the meaning of the song line by line and I might have them circle or underline certain idiomatic expressions that would be fun to use in class as well as good words. At the end, their reward is to listen to the song again and we can sing along as well. I usually encourage them to at least sing the chorus with me. They don't always. But they're listening to the language and they have the words in front of them to follow along.
Curiously, it might seem boring, but most students really enjoy it. They're being exposed to new music that they can go home and download onto their computer (and some have!) and they are also learning some new words in Spanish. I don't think that it matters if there is a song with somewhat complicated grammar. If I don't make a big deal out of it, they won't either. But they're being exposed to the language and they might learn a word in the song because it's in the song, which they happen to like.
Ultimately, I've realized that my goal is to establish connections between the students and Spanish speaking culture. I can do all that I can to teach them Spanish. But if they are not passionate about learning about Spanish outside of class, then all they will get is inside the classroom. So this one day a week is so important to teach them about the culture and they have been responding positively to it. I've gotten lucky in that the last few weeks they've really liked the songs despite picky musical tastes at the school I teach... [cough: "country music"]
See today's song of the day: click here.
I've often tried to incorporate music into my classroom but I wanted it to be purposeful to the students and to have to do with a certain grammatical structure we're going over. That would be swell. But my memory of songs in Spanish is not that great and therefore I wouldn't add as many songs only because they didn't have the grammar or vocabulary that I wanted to practice.
What?! Craziness... right? But this year, I decided to introduce some children's songs that I found on youtube and then it evolved into showing different kinds of musical styles as well from the Spanish speaking world. I like to incorporate pop culture into classes. A lot of Latin Artists are crossing over anyway these days like Shakira, Enrique Iglesias, Daddy Yankee, etc. So it's not a bad thing for me to want to incorporate music into classes.
I've been getting lucky lately because it might appear to the students that we aren't learning anything on music days. What I've been doing each music day is to show them a piece of music and then to have them listen to it two times. A lot of times, a video accompanies it on Youtube. They have to fill in the blanks of words that they should be able to recognize but also maybe that they can pick out thanks to a wordbank at the bottom of the sheet.
The next pass involves us talking about the meaning of the song line by line and I might have them circle or underline certain idiomatic expressions that would be fun to use in class as well as good words. At the end, their reward is to listen to the song again and we can sing along as well. I usually encourage them to at least sing the chorus with me. They don't always. But they're listening to the language and they have the words in front of them to follow along.
Curiously, it might seem boring, but most students really enjoy it. They're being exposed to new music that they can go home and download onto their computer (and some have!) and they are also learning some new words in Spanish. I don't think that it matters if there is a song with somewhat complicated grammar. If I don't make a big deal out of it, they won't either. But they're being exposed to the language and they might learn a word in the song because it's in the song, which they happen to like.
Ultimately, I've realized that my goal is to establish connections between the students and Spanish speaking culture. I can do all that I can to teach them Spanish. But if they are not passionate about learning about Spanish outside of class, then all they will get is inside the classroom. So this one day a week is so important to teach them about the culture and they have been responding positively to it. I've gotten lucky in that the last few weeks they've really liked the songs despite picky musical tastes at the school I teach... [cough: "country music"]
See today's song of the day: click here.
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Día 20 - Goofiness
I can't underestimate the importance of goofiness with Junior High students. It's interesting teaching middle school and high school because their worlds are so incredibly different.
Middle school students have so much more energy and I am trying to use that. Part of me tries to calm them down a little bit so that we can learn. The high school classes often need me to encourage them and coax them into getting a little more goofy.
There is definitely something more fun about middle school students.
Yesterday we were reviewing a story and they were dying of boredom. So I introduced a new word while we were talking about the story. I figured it couldn't hurt to through in the word besar (to kiss) into the PQA. The students suddenly all got really excited when I asked if the character in the story kisses someone else. Of course he does not. But then the students start getting really excited and I have to ask if the character in the story kisses or if a student in the class kisses. Suddenly all of the students want to call out suggestions and contribute to the story.
And all I did was introduce the word kiss. I need to start thinking like a middle school student again in order to better teach them.
Middle school students have so much more energy and I am trying to use that. Part of me tries to calm them down a little bit so that we can learn. The high school classes often need me to encourage them and coax them into getting a little more goofy.
There is definitely something more fun about middle school students.
Yesterday we were reviewing a story and they were dying of boredom. So I introduced a new word while we were talking about the story. I figured it couldn't hurt to through in the word besar (to kiss) into the PQA. The students suddenly all got really excited when I asked if the character in the story kisses someone else. Of course he does not. But then the students start getting really excited and I have to ask if the character in the story kisses or if a student in the class kisses. Suddenly all of the students want to call out suggestions and contribute to the story.
And all I did was introduce the word kiss. I need to start thinking like a middle school student again in order to better teach them.
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
I'm going to start TPRS
I am going to do my best this year of incorporating TPRS (Teaching Proficiency through Reading and Storytelling).
I went to a 3 day workshop this summer and it has completely supercharged my expectations of myself in the classroom with my students. I really hope to be able to deliver the language to them through the TPRS method. However, one of the neatest things about TPRS is that it is so customizable and it builds off the personality of the teacher as well as the class.
The basic premise is that we can teach students through Total Physical Response actions as well as Storytelling. We start off teaching actions and then later build that into storytelling. Students acquire the language better through the narrative and the associations that are created through the meaningful narrative.
The better narratives will be able to evoke some sort of emotion. It seems as though the examples that were given were about goofy and crazy situations. However, someone once told me before performing improv that you do not have to make it funny. Some of the best scenes he had done had people crying at the end.
So I will start out goofy. But part of me wants to try out other storytelling genres with TPRS and see if the other narratives also have positive results on the memory of the students.
I went to a 3 day workshop this summer and it has completely supercharged my expectations of myself in the classroom with my students. I really hope to be able to deliver the language to them through the TPRS method. However, one of the neatest things about TPRS is that it is so customizable and it builds off the personality of the teacher as well as the class.
The basic premise is that we can teach students through Total Physical Response actions as well as Storytelling. We start off teaching actions and then later build that into storytelling. Students acquire the language better through the narrative and the associations that are created through the meaningful narrative.
The better narratives will be able to evoke some sort of emotion. It seems as though the examples that were given were about goofy and crazy situations. However, someone once told me before performing improv that you do not have to make it funny. Some of the best scenes he had done had people crying at the end.
So I will start out goofy. But part of me wants to try out other storytelling genres with TPRS and see if the other narratives also have positive results on the memory of the students.
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