I don’t explicitly teach vowels in Spanish but try to find ways to incorporate them in my lessons through games or songs. The good news is that there are five vowels in Spanish and each of them has only one sound! That makes everyone’s lives easier!
An easy way to introduce the sounds is by using the song below. In the past, I have used a puppet to sing along. As you can hear in the song, the name of the vowel is introduced, and then the sound.
Having small posters with pictures that represent each vowel sound is helpful. One activity I have used is to show the vowel and then place pictures that go along with each vowel.
Another fun way is to create gestures or movements for each vowel. Write a list of words that your students already know, project them or show them to the class, and then have your students do the movement any time they hear or see a certain vowel. I like keeping it to just focusing on one vowel per word. If you don’t want to create a different gesture for each vowel, you can just use actions such as jump when you hear the vowel A.
As I mentioned above, I don’t teach vowels or even the ABC’s as a unit anymore. I just like finding ways to incorporate them and using them when needed in class.
ClickHERE to download the posters and use these activities with your students next time you see them!
This is a twist on the traditional “Veo, veo” song/game. I used a short version and added a movement component to it. This game has been a hit in my in-person and virtual classes.
This game can be used with anything you are teaching in your classes. I have used it to review vocabulary, with images from stories for retelling and more! As you can see in the video, I used it with my virtual students during our Zoom class and gave them access to the annotation tool.
How to play the game:
One student chooses a picture of the chart projected in class. That same student says “Veo, veo” (I see, I see).
The rest of the class responds by saying “¿Qué ves?” (What do you see?).
The student that said “Veo, veo” says the name of the picture and also chooses a movement for everyone to do. For example, “Veo una cara feliz. ¡Corre!”.
The rest of the participants start running (in place) once they see the picture.
Then the student asks a volunteer to point at the picture, and the game starts all over again with a new student choosing the picture.
April 22, the International Day of Mother Earth, was proclaimed as an official “day” by the United Nations in 2009. This day seeks to raise awareness of the different problems humans have caused such as pollution, global warming, overpopulation, and more! Now more than ever action needs to be taken to stop and reverse the harm done to our planet.
One way to introduce and talk to your classes about this topic is to brainstorm ways to help at home.
For example:
Reusa, reduce y recicla. Ahorra energía y agua. Planta árboles. Camina más.
You can also teach a song to reinforce your conversation about El Día Internacional de la Madre Tierra.
Last but not least. I have two resources on Teachers Pay Teachers that can support your teaching:
On the positive side of this COVID pandemic, many of us have discovered the joy of connecting with colleagues and friends via Zoom. To be honest, I never got to use Zoom before the pandemic, and it now has become a tool that I not only use to teach but to meet with colleagues and family across the United States and the world.
A few months ago I started a monthly virtual meeting with colleagues who are registered on my mailing list (by the way, if you are not yet, you might want to do so for a chance to participate in our next Café Virtual!). The attendance at the virtual gathering is limited to allow for colleagues to connect and share experiences with others. As part of the Café Virtual, I gave myself the homework (no really) to write a post about what happens in each café to share with other colleagues who were not able to attend due to the limited size of the group. So here is the first post for our first Café this year!
On February 13 I hosted my first Café Virtual of 2021, and thirteen awesome and inspiring teachers attended. We all left with some amazing ideas to bring to our classes. Due to the current situation, we started by sharing how each of us has been teaching. Some teachers are working in hybrid settings, some in-person, others remote, you name it!
Although this café was focusing on games, we ended up sharing many great tips, activities, and music that work well with elementary students. Here is some of what was shared during our café!
Games:
El líder: Ask one student to leave the room. Ask a student in the room who will make gestures and who everyone needs to imitate. Invite back to the room the student who was outside. The líder starts making movements and gestures that everyone else in the room imitates. The student that had been outside now has three turns to guess who is leading the group. Variation for virtual settings: Send a student to the breakout room while you decide who will be leading the group.
Use of TPR with Images: Show images to your students to invite them to move. For example Jumping Jacks. Also, read stories and ask questions. Have them respond by using movement or gestures
Jamboard Activities:Jamboard is a way to make Google Slides more interactive. This collection of resources on my blog were also mentioned as a resource that works well in any teaching setting.
Use Bingo Baker to Create Online Games: This is a paid online platform that allows you to create online bingo cards using your own pictures. The game will generate individual cards for each participant. You just need to share the link to the game with the students. There are also many games already created on the platform.
Find more games for online and in-person classes here!
YouTube Channels and Other Online Resources
Songs also were a topic during our Café. Here are the ones that were mentioned. Make sure to add them to your list if you haven’t already done so!
Pre-Record Videos of Yourself for In-Person Classes
Some of these teachers have been making videos of themselves that they show during in-person classes to avoid the fatigue that teaching with a facemask might give you. This also helps the students to continue seeing the face of their teachers and keep them engaged during class. If you haven’t done it, all noted that this requires extra work but is well worth it!
Remove Adds from YouTube Videos:
This little tip is one that every teacher should know! Showing a video and have an ad pop up in the middle of a YouTube video is a teacher’s nightmare! This will save you! You will need to copy the link of the YouTube video and open it in another browser. Add a hyphen between the letters T and U, and voila! All the ads are gone! (i.e., change “youtube” to “yout-ube.”)
Interested in participating in the next Café Virtual? First, you will need to subscribe to my newsletter. One of the newsletters will include a link to register for the Café and the discussion topic. Space is limited. Only 15 participants can attend! If you are among the first 15 registrants, I will send you an email a few days before the Café Virtual with more info.
This year I decided to take a different approach on Valentine’s Day and focus on activities for the Random Acts of Kindness Week promoted by the Random Acts of Kindness Foundation.
I used this video with some of my classes as the basis for conversation. Just like many world language teachers do with clip talks/chats, I wrote a script based on the story and pre-taught some of the vocabulary using tools such as Quizlet and WordWallwhich, by the way, my students love because it gives them different possibilities to practice words at their own pace without the pressure of competing with other peers. I love it too!
Going back to the script, these are the words and phrases I focused on:
Colorea el mundo con actos de bondad, bondad, colorea, agarra, le da, tiene, come, corre, camina, se cae, llora, duerme, and chistosa (I put this last word on the list because, even though it is not a high-frequency word, I still wanted my students to learn it).
Here is the script:
Hay un niño y una niña. El niño tiene hambre. La niña tiene hambre.
El niño agarra una manzana y un sánduche.
La niña está sorprendida. La niña agarra un banano.
El banano está malo. La niña está triste.
El niño le da la manzana a la niña.
La niña agarra la manzana. La manzana es roja.
La niña come la manzana. La niña tiene colores.
La niña camina. El señor corre. El dinero se cae.
La niña agarra el dinero. La niña le da el dinero al señor.
El señor agarra el dinero. El dinero es verde. El señor tiene colores.
Hay una abuelita. La abuelita camina con una maleta.
La maleta se cae. El señor agarra la maleta y la pone arriba.
La abuelita está feliz. La abuelita tiene colores.
Hay una mamá y una bebé. La bebé llora. La abuelita lee.
Las personas no están felices. Las personas está enojadas.
La abuelita mira a la bebé. La bebé llora más. La abuelita tiene una idea. La abuelita es chistosa.
La niña está feliz y la mamá está feliz. La mamá tiene colores. La bebé tiene colores. Las personas tienen colores.
La mamá mira la computadora. La abuelita duerme. La bebé duerme. ¡Todos están felices!
¡Colorea el mundo con actos de bondad!
During the video
I paused the video and asked questions related to what we were watching, but also based on the script I wrote. I also made sure to ask the children after every situation “¿Es un acto de bondad?” to reinforce the title of the video.
I didn’t do a lot of extension activities this time, but as a closing activity, we brainstormed some acts of kindness that later were used in the craft shown in the picture below. Each child chose a picture, wrote on the cover of a paper heart, and inside wrote their name and a sentence explaining why they chose that word. Some of the children shared their words and read their sentences to the class. I was surprised to see that many of them wanted to share. My home learning students also got to participate through an activity on Seesaw, and the results were beautiful!
This is a simple idea to help bring the topic of kindness to a world language class. I placed their actos de bondad on a bulletin board that is currently in one of the classrooms where I teach.
