Tuesday, November 4, 2014

Comprehensble Input Update

This week has required lots of explanation. I am teaching time and holy moly questions arose when we got to the "menos" part of time. I found it helpful to tell them to count backwards and minus an hour from the one stated. For example, if I say "Son las dos menos quince/cuarto," they should do 2-1=1 and count fifteen minutes counterclockwise. This helped the kids tremendously although we didn't have enough practice with the menos so we are working on it tomorrow. I am thinking I will do a time bingo, some review sheets and an info gap between partners so that the kids stay in the TL even if I have to explain in English. I thus have concluded that if I know I will have to do lots of explaining in English, the kids need to do most of the output. Thoughts?

Also: rediscovery of http://minotspanish.wikispaces.com/ made time WAY more clear :)

Sunday, November 2, 2014

Teacher Observations AKA Freak out!

So like a crazy person I decided to VOLUNTEER for an evaluation. That's right I said it, volunteer. Every year our admin staff has to "calibrate" themselves by visiting classes and comparing eval notes. The goal is for everyone to have the same notes and scores. As a teacher, the evaluation doesn't go on my record but gives me the opportunity to go through the process and hopefully become less freaked out. Yeah... we shall see how that goes. Here are my plans for the 40 minute class tomorrow for Spanish 1. I would love feedback and of course, feel free to use, change and reproduce my plans posted on here :)


Objective: I can talk about time in Spanish and classify time as am/pm by applying knowledge of numbers and grammar.

Theme: Escuela y los horarios de escuela


Entrance Card: Count 1-10, grab differentiated warm-up (if they answer correctly, they must write the numbers 1-12, if they answer incorrectly, a word bank is provided.

Warm-up: Turn & Talk about answers

Objective: Have student read objective posted on board and copy onto "learning diary" paper located here https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4zpfD2U2Zs5VXd2YXEyZlRhaDQ/view?usp=sharing

Questioning: Ask why the warm-up would require students to translate numbers 1-12 with the theme of time and how does that relate to our more broad theme of school? (Turn & Talk, Share out)

Frase de la semana: ¿Qué hora es? Class repeats. Think about what it means (Act out) . Think time. Call on random person.

Challenge for the week: Re-write the times on your schedule last week to be in Spanish  (10 min)

Lesson truly begins...

Reloj analog review: big hands v. little hands  (2 min) hands up with big hand

Scaffolding: First, we are going to focus on the hours…

Have students show hours on clocks purchased at the dollar store. I will go over 3 numbers and then  the students with post its on desks will call to the class.

Introduce two words when doce appears
*el mediodía (noon) pm*
* la medianoche (midnight) también es un sandwich cubano  am*

Scaffolding: Next, we will focus on the time of day (5)

Show picture and they tell you de la mañana, de la tarde, de la noche. Have students repeat sounds. Say english, they hold up Spanish and cold call on kids to read. Copy of pics https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4zpfD2U2Zs5V0ZUd1VzTVh3cDQ/view?usp=sharing

Scaffolding: Little hands. Finally, we will focus on the minutes 12-60. Remind students that we just combine the tens and one place after 29. 

Choral response numbers 20, 30, 40, 50, 60

Silent Study: 3 min individual student looks over words. I used the h/o from Amy Lenord located here http://www.amylenord.net/uploads/2/3/8/2/23820400/numbers_in_context_-_spanish.pdf

Card Coach: Quiz partner on cards (3 min/partner)

Exit ticket: Twiccionario from ZachJones (http://zachary-jones.com/zambombazo/twiccionario-que-hora-es/)

De la manana, de la tarde o de la noche (AM/PM doesn’t exist in Spanish countries including México)

Tarea: Reflexión on your diario de aprendizaje