Vocabulary GIF and AR Activity

This activity was such an incredible lesson. My students chose three vocabulary words they hadn't quite mastered at that point. By using Google Drawings, they drew a visual representation of the word they chose, then used a GIF creator.

We then used Aurasma to create an aura for the words. This way, they could use the Augmented Reality word wall when they needed to "look up" a word.

Movie Talks!

Movie Talks are such a wonderful way to practice repetition in the target language while using technology. We begin by finding a movie short on YouTube. I found one that was perfect for practicing the past tense. "Anya" is such an endearing story, the kids responded positively to this activity.

This story is such a wonderful way for students to learn about real situations across the globe while using the target language at a comprehensible level. The story of Anya is about an orphaned girl who arrives at an orphanage in Russia back in 1996. We practiced words such as "era" ad "tenía". I pre-taught many of the words I knew they did not know ahead of time. WE created signs and/or motions for many of them. 

I did the Movie Talk with them and stopped frames and discussed each one in Spanish, asked questions, and reflected on the situation in the story, we then played the video with sound without interruptions. The kids responded very positively to the story.

So, it was such a great lesson in past tense, I created a story using the vocabulary words we were working on and had my students "Volleyball Read" it together. It was strictly a narration and I purposely chose not to include dialog. It was a great success! 

I took this lesson even further, and had them create a cartoon that plugged in the possible dialog or thoughts, of the characters in the frames they chose. Using Snagit, we cut frames from the movie short and used these to create our very own comic strips. They chose 3-6 frames, used PicMonkey to create a comic strip with the "collage" tool, then they inserted word/thought balloons with unique the text features.The beauty of this lesson, was the fact that the kids had to insert the dialog in the target language that was not present in the story. They had to infer what the characters might be thinking or saying since there was no dialog in the movie (with the exception of two single word phrase). This lesson was exciting for them and gave them skills to create. They included this in the e-portfolios as well and gave some great feedback. They were very excited to create these from scratch. I loved that it was evident what they inferred in the frames they chose.

Global Education

TCEA, (Texas Computer Education Association) this year, left me such an appreciation for the need for a global perspective in education, that I had to step back and ask, Why? Why are more educators not taking this perspective? We have an amazing opportunity to equip our students with tools that will help them become strong collaborators, creative thinkers, and amazing innovators.

We have been Doing Mystery Skype and MHO in Spanish; as well as connecting with students throughout the world. These activities have been such and eye-opening experience for my students.

On Friday, one class taught a lesson to fourth graders about Cinco de mayo. The kids had props and costumes. They first pronounced the vocabulary words then acted them out. They wrote a simple story in Spanish, and read it slowly and comprehensively while acting out the vocabulary words each time they were mentioned.

I was so proud of them as they planned the lesson and worked very well together. Their reflections stated how accomplished they felt and how fun it was to help others understand the history behind Cinco de mayo.

We have done several Skype Misteriosos with other Spanish language learners. This activity has strengthened their geographical vocabulary and their confidence to communicate in the target language.

Spanish Novel Reviews

Students playing a game that required the use of QR codes. The front of the card provided the questions and the back provided the answers.

We begin our class with SSR (Silent Sustained Reading) each day. We have many novels available so my students have choice in their reading. These novels can be found on the TPRS Publishing website. Their semester project was to creatively present a review of their favorite novel read this semester. 

This was no ordinary presentation. I decided to give my students a challenge and put a twist on things as they had to present their project through the perspective of a person, place, thing other than the main character; but the biggest challenge was that they could not use PowerPoint, Word (or any other word processing tool) or posters. I gave them a list of project ideas and told them they were not limited to this list, it was just there to help spark their creativity. I had some amazing projects and they were very creative.

Some of the more creative projects came in the forms of board games, skits, and animations. 

I found that allowing for creativity and giving my students this opportunity to really think out of the box, they surprised themselves. In their reflections, many mentioned how proud they were of their level of creativity and truly enjoyed this project.