Learn Spanish Online: Centro Virtual Cervantes

This is the website of the Official Organization for the Spanish Language. Cervantes is a company that has presence in 43 countries all around the world.

This might be one of your most visited sites if you have any interest in learning Spanish. The site is full of activities, workshops and online courses to learn and improve your Spanish. If you are studying Spanish as your second language the forums could be a great option for you to get to know more about a particular topic, grammar or history of the language. They have lots of interesting discussions to read and to participate in the forums would be a great idea to improve on your Spanish.For advanced students they have a section focused on Literatura where you can find Biographies of important Hispanic writers or if you are interested in Cervantes as a historic figure or as a writer you might want to visit Cervantistas which is an organization specialized in Miguel de Cervantes and his Don Quixote. 

It would be impossible to sum up everything they offer for you as a learner of the Spanish language so better take a walk on the Spanish side: http://cvc.cervantes.es/

To stay positive: do not be afraid to laugh at yourself especially when you make mistakes. Remember people make mistakes... and YES! We are people!

  

Lunaprofe 3/30/2014  2 comments

Free textbooks in Spanish: Anaya

These are free text books Anaya has online for a sneak peek. Although it's not the full version, we still can learn a lot from it. We can access 3 Units or 63 pages, which is a lot.
The advantage is that consist of a real textbook that kids use in Spain, so what we are doing is using a native speaker book for learning Spanish language (basic level, though).
The most incredible thing is that they have incorporated audios within units, related to specific content. So, don't miss the opportunity to improve on your listening skills!

It doesn't matter which level of Spanish you are in, I would recommend to just click on it and play for a bit. 
Try some audios, read some "Técnicas de trabajo" and let me know what you think!

Their website with full catalogs on books is:
www.anayamascerca.com

Remember to stay positive, open-minded and happy help you learn, and also work in your real life!

Lunaprofe 3/18/2014  No comment

Aprendiendo español con Apps: Duolingo

Hablando un poco sobre la historia de esta aplicación, su creador es Luis von Ahn, la sacó al mercado en 2012 y en 2013 fue nombrada aplicación del año por Apple. Tiene 12,5 millones de usuarios en todo el mundo. El truco de esta aplicación está en la forma en la que se construye la comunidad. Se puede aprender idiomas con documentos reales de periódicos, sitios de noticias o incluso la wikipedia de manera totalmente gratuita y es la aplicación la que cobra a estas empresas por las traducciones que sus usuarios hacen de forma desinteresada.

Duolingo puede ser un amigo fiel a la hora de aprender un idioma. Lo puedes llevar en tu móvil* o usarla a través de una computadora*.

Si lo usas con tu computadora puedes básicamente acceder a los foros dónde hay discusiones sobre la lengua que se estudia y traducciones de documentos reales a tiempo real de forma colaborativa.

Si lo usas con el móvil tienes disponibles varias lecciones de forma gratuita con las que podrás practicar tu español más básico.

Su página web es: www.duolingo.com


Glosario:

- ordenador: es la palabra usada en España para computadora.
- móvil: usado en España, Cuba, Guinea Ecuatorial y Ecuador.
- computadora: palabra usada en la mayoría de los países de América Latina, en Ecuador, Chile y Bolivia también oirás computador.
- celular: usada en el resto de países de habla hispana.

Recuerda que cuando haces algo que te gusta tu mente está más relajada y preparada para recibir conceptos nuevos. Si te gusta el móvil usalo para aprender.

Lunaprofe 2/19/2014  2 comments

Using Google: Expresiones con tener

Click on the link below or use the image and pay attention to the sequence:

You have three things to do:
1 Look for the mistakes in the bubbles.
2 Write examples for each bubble to show your understanding of the expression.
3 Send an email to your teacher with your examples.

Expresiones con tener

!Me encanta cuidar el medio ambiente!

Recuerda esta pregunta: ¿Cómo puedo modificar mi entorno para crear un mundo mejor?

Lunaprofe 10/29/2013  6 comments

Stem changing verbs

It is great when you start learning Spanish and you see that all verbs follow the rule... just take away the ending and replace it for the new ones. But we all know that life is not that easy, sometimes out there are always some guys that don't strictly follow the rules, and we are not talking about the rebels (irregular verbs) we are talking about stem changing verbs, they follow some other rules. 
Visuals are great resources to memorize important information and in this particular case we find it really helpful because you can see in just one picture the whole procedure.

If you like learning Spanish with songs this is a modern Spanish song from a Spanish band [Amparanoia] with activities to practice and learn stem changing verbs.

Activity:  A fun activity we do in class is doing the process backwards, we see this visual and students deduce what to do from experience, then they put their theories in practice, check if it works and finally write their conclusions down in their notebooks. Sequence: - show your students the visual to deduce the rules - give them 2 minutes to talk with their partners/teams/groups about it - let them share out with the class what they think they found out - check if their theories are correct - allow them to write down the process and a conclusion [if they have a journal or diary for the class, it would be the perfect place to do this]

Activity


If you are one of my students don't forget to click on "Enviar" to send your funwork.

Want to know more?

• Ven [song in Spanish to practice stem changing verbs] [pdf]
• Power Point activity [Agapito Floriano Lacalle]
• Connecting people and statements activity [Milena Ivanova Koleva]
• Image's source: https://profmargheritaquaglia.files.wordpress.com/2016/04/duermo.png?w=560&h=469

Lunaprofe 10/29/2013  No comment

Using Google forms to practice conjugations in Spanish

The time is now. We are going paperless in our Spanish class, inspired by our eco-units and the eco-school organization we try to use less and less paper in our class as we can. This is a personal and professional challenge that I feel ready to accept and my students seem to be ok with it too.

Remember: 15 trees are needed to make 1 ton of paper.

Lunaprofe 10/21/2013  No comment

Descriptions using Power Points

Descripción física from Espanolparainmigrantes

Características físicas from Espanolparainmigrantes

Vocabulario-Descripción Física by

 

¿Cuál es tu personalidad? from Espanolparainmigrantes

Descripción física, ropa y personalidad from Espanolparainmigrantes

http://youtu.be/1iDlAd1L9FM

Lunaprofe 9/03/2013  No comment