Last minute gem - Una papa - simple song

I always find myself planning late at night before bed (for some odd reason) and stumbling across something that I really want to use with my students (because I LOVE to mix things up each year with new activities).

I stumbled across this really cute little song about potatoes that like to dance!

It could be great for elementary teachers or middle school/high-school students to get those wiggles out for a brain break. (Of course you know your classes better than I do. As a wacky teacher, I can often encourage them to do things like this or the mascota activity.)

video:

But I digress. I found this song a few minutes ago and HAD to use it tomorrow for the following reasons:

Noticias (news report)

I sometimes find that on Mondays (or Monday-like Tuesdays), I have a hard time getting into storytelling and PQA.

In previous years I swore by the weekend chat.  I haven't done that as much this year.  Maybe I should resurrect it.

Once I can get into a rhythm of a 1-2 week plan, that might be easier so I know what structures to PQA for the first day of the cycle.

Currently though, I don't have a lot that I have to accomplish and we've been reading some TPRS novels and doing extension activities.  But you can only talk about a short book so much!

So today I resurrected something I did two years back once or twice about a news report.

The idea was I found 3 news stories over the weekend and then tried to put them in digestible chunks to explain to my students in differentiating language.  I had some language goals I was working to accomplish (moreso with Spanish 2).  And I was working to expose my Spanish 1's to -ndo and some present perfect and to the verb pensar (to think).

My Spanish 1 students are stronger in Comprehensible Input since it's their first year in Spanish and we are using it, while my Spanish 2 students were taught more traditionally last year and they have a harder time with the CI due to learning through a different method last year.

Here are the powerpoints, feel free to take the idea and run with it.

For the most part, it went well and I didn't have to have as much energy to tell a story, but we got our brain breaks by having them walk to different parts of the room to see which person thought what answer was right.

The activity took about 30-35 minutes.  I could have added a quiz, but I did a quiz for the chapter in the novels we read afterwards.

I might try to resurrect this more often every few weeks.

See Spanish 1 news: here
See Spanish 2 news: here

TPRS year 4 - song - pulgarcito

So I've been continuing doing a warm up, basic conversation, TPR and PQA for my 90 minute classes.  It's going ok.  I started trying to do brain breaks about 20 minutes into PQA and then we finish more refreshed.

I think it also reminds my students how important their attention is.

But today, for the brain break, I wanted to do something a little different.  I thought a change of pace would be to turn around to the projector (which is strangely at the back of my classroom). And then I made a very basic PowerPoint with the lyrics to the little song: "Pulgarcito".

This is a Spanish version of a song "Where is Thumbkin," which I had never heard of, but saw on an episode of Sesame Street.  In the Elmo's World section, there was a Spanish version of it called: "Pulgarcito."  It's to the tune of Frère Jacques.

Here are the lyrics I used, I changed it slightly for my students and added a gesture for, "¿Dónde estás?"

Pulgarcito  (hands behind back)
   Little thumb
¿Dónde estás? (put hand up over brow looking for someone)
   Where are you?
Aquí estoy. (bring out right hand, thumb up, moving to say "Aquí estoy")
   Here I am.
Aquí estoy. (bring out left hand, thumb up, moving to say "Aquí estoy")
   Here I am.
¿Cómo estás? (move right thumb as if talking)
   How are you?
Muy bien, gracias.  (move left thumb as if talking)
   Very well, thanks.
Ya me voy. (put right hand behind back)
   Gotta go.
Ya me voy. (put left hand behind back)
   Gotta go.

Then repeat as much as you want with students having them gesture and sing along/move their mouths so you don't know they aren't singing.

Most of my students seemed to enjoy it.  I saw them smiling.  Many of them are freshman/sophomores.  I think the simplicity of the language helped them and the fact that I explained how important music is in my classroom and how studies show how music can enhance learning a language.

Good activity!  Saving this one for later.

*revision: My mother swears she used to sing "where is thumbkin" to me when I was little (in English) but I don't have any recollection of it.

*revision #2: Some of my students will say "Ya me voy" as they leave class now in Spanish 1.