Take advantage of summer!

Summer is a great time to get some professional reading done... check out Multilingual Mania, a great resource for articles on language acquisition, program advocacy, trends in language education and more!

http://multilingualmania.com/

Sándwiches

I am always looking for new ways to use 'me gusta' and it's variants in authentic communicative ways. This year my Second Graders discovered a set of plastic sandwich ingredients manipulatives lurking in one of my bins which I had completely forgotten about, and boy did they want to play with them! So, out they came, each child putting together a sándwich we could comment on. This was a great way to practice three simple constructions 'me gusta', 'me gusta mucho' and 'no me gusta' in a genuine activity. As a take off on this, my students made paper sandwiches, as you can see in the photo, and each of us marked the chart as to how we felt about the sandwich they had created. We had such fun and they had the opportunity to take home their creation and share it with their family. Qué rico!

Back!!!!

I am back from almost a year away from my blog.....life became very busy, hectic, full.....fill in your adjective! I let this blog go, knowing at some point I would return. So, back in the saddle as it were. Over the last year, I have developed new themes for some of my classes, tried new activities, and brought back some old favorites. See my next post for a fun activity I just did with my Second Graders!

Ensalada de Frutas

My Kindergartners have been learning fruits, and to culminate the theme, we made 'Ensalada de Frutas', paper collages featuring our yummy fruits. The only precut materials were the bowls (they had to choose- in Spanish- what color) and the labels. Since most are unable to read, I called them up to my desk with their work, they told me the names of the fruits in Spanish, and I gave them the appropriate labels. What a wonderful job they did!

Maya for Kids

This blog/website is dedicated to all things Maya. It appears to be very kid-friendly, which is a major bonus!

http://mayankids.wordpress.com/

Compliment Valentines, reactions

So, the compliment valentines were a hit! Not only did the kids enjoy doing them (and practiced their vocabulary in the process!), but I was so touched by the things they wrote about one another. Really sweet!

I did decide to change how each kid got the names of the kids they were to write to. I picked the names ahead of time out of a hat, (and strategically assigned a few kids to others in the class.) We have some kids who just absolutely don't get along, and it seemed to make for a more pleasant experience if I monitored the choices a bit. In the end, I am glad I did it this way. No groans when the kids saw their list of names....

Compliment Valentines

I was trying to come up with a creative way to do Valentine's that included everyone in the class and worked to build community amongst my students. My fourth graders worked on learning adjectives to describe themselves earlier this year, so I came up with the idea of 'Compliment Valentines'. Each student picks three names out of a hat, then writes a 'compliment valentine' for that student. So, for example, Johnny picks Felicia's name and could write "You are kind." or "You are very creative." or another compliment using the vocabulary we have learnt previously in the year. Every student will end up receiving three compliments- some from friends and some from classmates they don't know well. It's a fun way to say something nice about someone else and use the target language at the same time!