It was so great to meet so many elementary teachers during #TFLA2019. It was exciting to share with you about Comprehensible Input in the elementary Spanish classroom, and I truly hope you were able to use some of what I shared as soon as you entered your classroom on Monday.
As I mentioned at the end of my session, if you are really interested in bringing CI into your teaching life, I recommend you start out by reading the research done by Dr. Stephen Krashen. Once you have that clear, choose one or two strategies to bring to your classes as a starting point, and little by little start building your CI toolkit. The best thing about CI is the sheer variety of techniques you can choose from. You and your students will never feel bored, but remember to add your personal touch to anything you do.
During the TFLA session, we explored some CI strategies that I have successfully been able to use in my elementary classes. We peeked inside my classroom, saw a few routines in action (e.g. la frase de la semana y el saludo). We also talked about MovieTalks and Story Listening, and I was able to incorporate some brain breaks and breathing techniques throughout the session.
If you are new to CI, I highly recommend you start with this video:
I won’t share my full PowerPoint presentation here since it might be quite overwhelming if you didn’t attend the session. But I hope this is a nice refresher for the teachers who attended this session and talking points and ideas for those who couldn’t make it.
Last but not least, stop by Comprensible to learn other CI techniques, and join our Facebook group where you can freely ask or share about CI.
Happy teaching!