Appetizers: Criptogramas

This activity is to be used as a class starter (appetizer) to turn on your class attention in a dynamic way that will help your students to switch from other subject to Spanish and will help them focus on the language. 

Why cryptograms?

In order to solve a cryptogram our students have to confront a process of rewriting a word searching for meaning and at the same time they have to find and check a global significance for the phrase, sentence or complete message. 

Through this process students use a previous representation of the word that they will use as a guide to order the letters. Just the correct order of the different letters will result in a comprehensible final message.

By doing this our students are working out many different interesting skills (not just for language). If you want to know more, read the justification in the presentation.

If you want to reach somewhere new

you have to take a different direction

Lunaprofe 2/12/2018  2 comments

Bellwork

Bellwork is just an activity that students complete as they walk into the class before the bell rings for the lesson. 

That's the definition, but we don't need to be that strict when doing bellwork in our classes. Actually, there are activities in this bellwork presentation that will last 10 minutes, that will have a different impact in your instruction time depending on how long your classes are or any other factors. 

Anyways, the idea behind our bellwork activities is that our students are engaged as soon as they walked into your classroom and (hopefully;) focused on the subject. 

Different light: use these activities as an exit ticket from your class, or as flexible homework, or as enrichment, sub-plans, or ... 

It is impossible for a man to learn

what he thinks he already knows

Epictetus

Lunaprofe 1/15/2018  7 comments

Strategies: Diario de aprendizaje

This post is based on the GLAD strategy learning log. I learnt this awesome strategy from my super-pro-colleague, Rhonda and I've been using it since then because it really works to get the students start writing in a second language.
The purpose of this post is to help my students and their families to understand this strategy better.

What it is?

This document is a record of what happens everyday in class and the students personal life. To build up this connection we ask the students to think of something personal to connect to what they have learnt that day. 

Why?

A learning log is useful because it helps the student to keep everything organized, they promote metacognition and help them writing daily in a new language for them keeping the stress bar low. It also helps to create a safe and challenging learning atmosphere.
Because it is a great opportunity to practice the language on a daily basis and connect it to their academic and personal growth. That's why we ask our students to write just in Spanish. The only time they can write in English is when they use their cognates. 

How do we use our Diario de aprendizaje?

If we are familiariazed with patterns then we are all set, if not, a pattern is just a chunk of language that repeats and allows us to scaffold our students to express themselves in another language. For example, we can use the pattern Today I have learnt _____  to help our students express what they learn in class. As the students gain confidence with these strategies we will start moving to a more difficult/different patterns. For instance, we can move from Today I have learnt _____  to We have learnt ________ in Spanish class, offering variety of language to our students, exposing them to different important aspects of the language.

Sequence:

1. Students pay attention to the class and take notes to collect the necessary information.
2. At the end of the class the student spends five minutes writing down in their journals four things they have learnt during that class.
3. He/She connects the learning with his/her own life, through a personal connection.
4. Students need to jot down the date of every single entry in words and in Spanish.
5. Take a look to the visual and/or the pdf if you still have questions on what to do.

Step 2:
Now that the students now the strategy and they are confident enough you can feed them with language maintaining a slow stress class environment. Start changing the patterns like in this document.
Step 3:
Now that students also know that the patterns can change and through them they can learn new vocabulary, expressions, conjugations... change them all and increase the difficulty of them.
Step 4:
In this step we've changed all the patterns considerably and walk our students through a way more challenging task.

You can (should) keep increasing the difficulty of the task and using it to teach/learn language.

Related links:

• Get this strategy on pdf
• Glosario, a GLAD strategy
• Glosario step 2
• Glosario step 3
• Glosario step 4

Believe in yourself and all that you are. Know that there is something inside you that is greater than any obstacle.

Christian D. Larson

Lunaprofe 9/06/2016  No comment