TPRS year 2 - Spanish 1 Story idea

So yesterday during our weekend chat activity... I had the following two structures to talk about my weekend that I thought could really turn into a riveting storyline later...

• me desperté (I woke up) 
•  sentí (I felt)

Of course these quickly switched to the third person when I started asking about a student:

• se despertó (s/he woke up)
• sintió (s/he felt [object])   vs.  se sentía (s/he felt [emotion])

And through circling, the storyline quickly developed into someone waking up being disoriented and feeling something (possibly a body or something else).

In one class, two students woke up in a prison and one was still unconscious.  In another class, a student woke up with one leg in a bathroom and a cat.  In another, a girl woke up in a the trunk of a car with 6 dead skinny people with big butts...

As you can see, the variety was interesting according to each class and we practiced the structures.  I wonder if the kids related to this becuase of movies like The Hangover.  Either way it was fun to play around with.  Also you could go backwards as well as forwards in the storyline.  Most of my students like to say, "No recuerda" (S/he doesn't remember).  So most of the questions were very unanswered, but the kids got interesting, comprehensible input as they continue to learn Spanish.

So maybe next year, this might just become one of my standard stories for Spanish 1 or maybe even for Spanish 2 with some different structures.

TPRS year 2 - Weekend chat

Well so I guess this weekend as well draws to a close.  I thought I would share and think around a PowerPoint I made for last Monday.  I decided that sometimes my information about my weekend is boring.

Here's an explanation of how I tend to do my weekend activity.  It involves me coming up with a few phrases I can circle with my students.  But then I can shift those things onto my students.

This year I have realized that my students might have something completely unrelated to talk about.  So I try to ask the question, "¿Qué hizo?" (What did s/he do?) after circling with another person and finding out they didn't do what I did.

But I've been finding my weekends consist of the same structures OVER and OVER again.   So last weekend, I was reading some different news stories and decided to start off my weekend with...

• leí (I read)

I circled around it with the class and then they didn't know what I read.  I finally pointed out that it was obvious and I had read the news!  I knew they wouldn't like talking about the news.  But I then had made a PowerPoint of a few news stories I had read.  I explained a little about the news story and then asked them to guess something about the news story.  Then we moved onto the following one (or maybe we chatted a little longer about one).  I thought it would be good to introduce some words we haven't really seen much and also just to do something a little different.  For the most part, they were interested in it.  I would like to turn it into an activity next year almost as the first activity leading into our weekend chat.  Or using something I had read to then circle the structures using students in class.  I think there is a lot of potential!

Día 40 - Pumped up students

There are times when I feel like I am doing the best I can every day when pumping up students.  I try all week and there are times when their lack of energy just drains me completely.  It's so important to have them onboard with me telling silly stories.

I found that by the end of last week, my students were responding to my trying hard all week.  Usually on Monday we all start the same.  No one really wants to be back.  Well, few people do.  But I'm still required to teach them.  We do the weekend activity.  Sometimes it's dull even though I try to create parallel story lines that are funny and goofy.  But hey, as long as it's in the language, right?  And if it is comprehensible input.

So today was the finish of a hard week.  But the students did a great job telling stories today.  I feel excited after a few days of a bit of a lull and lack of enthusiasm.  It might be because I had strayed from the formula of storytelling.  But I try to give different activities so my class is never the same.

We'll see how the rest of the year continues to go.