Perezosos / The Guardian

Ran into this guy in Costa Rica in 2007

I don't know how many people out there would agree with me on this but I believe that one of the greatest benefits of the "digital revolution" has been that the news has become interactive! I love the slideshows, videos, and blogs that online news sources provide. And none, in my opinion, is better at showcasing pictures from around the world than The Guardian.  Just check out today's selection!

I often try to incorporate these photos into lessons and earlier this year, right before we took the students to Costa Rica for spring break, I ran across the cutest slideshow I've seen to date on the website... Sloths! (Please click on this link. It's guaranteed to put a smile on the face of even the most exhausted teacher!) I put the photos in a PPT and used them as a basis for a discussion about what sloths ate, where they lived, etc. but, I really wanted to accompany it with a reading.

Well, I finally got around to it and you can download it below. It fits perfectly into our unit on Costa Rica and the environment and I'm looking forward to using it next year.

Perezoso

Of course, you can always extend the lesson with a little Movietalk:

Organizadores Gráficos

As the year winds down (we still have two weeks in DC!) I've begun to organize all my materials in preparation for next year. One of the things I've noticed as a teacher is that I gravitate much more towards reading than storytelling (something I need to work on for next year) in my classroom. It makes me so happy to see a classroom of language learners engrossed in a Spanish novel!  Still, I want to make sure that my students are getting all they can from the reading and, if I can reinforce some of those English Language Arts standards in the process, well, why not?! As usual I began with an internet search of graphic organizers that help students organize, interpret, and analyze the text. Here are three of some of the nicest collections I found for free:

This collection from Pomperaug Regional School District in Connecticut contains over 35 organizers in both Spanish and English and include organizers for reading comprehension, vocabulary development, interpretive and analytical skills, and study habits.

The site Organizadores Graficos has loads of organizers in Spanish with nice, clear charts and they allow you to download them for free. The best part is that you can modify them to suit your students needs.

Finally, Eduplace has a nice collection of organizers with fun graphics (I work in a Middle School where were all about the graphics!).

However, not content to to NOT remake the wheel, I decided I'd try my hand at making some of my own. Using this simple, clear and fantastic tutorial on how to use Pages on a Mac by Alice Keeler, I created three organizers. The first is designed to have students express and support an opinion, the second is for making predictions and, the last, is for making sensory observations. I'm looking forward to using them in the classroom and would love to hear any suggestions others might have for using graphic organizers in the classroom.

Organizadores Graficos by AnnaHenderson

Professional Development

Source: http://edtechreview.in/trends-insights/insights/605-professional-development-for-teachers-investment-or-cost
As a non-native speaking Spanish public school teacher who is a true believer in the power of effective professional development, I am constantly searching for teacher education that is steeped in both content and pedagogy. While I believe that the tide is turning for the better in terms of the variety, access and source of development opportunities, I still get frustrated with the one day workshop model which provides little in the way of sharing and/or reflection. In my search for some really interesting and meaningful professional development opportunities for the spring/summer, I've run across some programs that I thought were worth sharing. I think the opportunities below do a lot to address these issues. Some are local to me in DC and others require travel. If anyone has any experience with any of these opportunities or knows of any others, please feel free to comment and/or share.

ACTFL's Spring Webinar Series-- these might not be the best in terms of addressing my "one shot" complaint of mine but I think they're an easy way to get some PD in and they look like they might have some value! (Also, might be worth checking out if there are any PD opportunities in the form of MOOCs in Spanish content and/or pedagogy- I wonder if any Districts have figured out how to give credit for these...)

National Capital Language Resource Center and The George Washington University is hosting a Spanish Immersion Weekend! I've subscribed to them for some time and they offer some great resources in their newsletter alone.

Middlebury 4 Week Summer Program for Spanish Teachers-- Who better to get PD from than Middlebury?!

Bennington College- Their graduate language school is offering a weekend intensive language workshop in both French and Spanish. It's called Le silence et la voix or, in Spanish, El silencio y la voz. They don't have a website but you can check out the flyer below.

Bennington College: El silencio y la voz

The World Affairs Council-Washington, DC again offers its week-long Summer Institute on International Affairs for Educators. This year's theme is "Realities & Revolutions: A comparative look at civil society and its pathway to change," which will be explored from a historical and comparative perspective. Expect an intensive week of expert speakers, hands-on practical application, and developing classroom resources. Participants will receive 40 professional development credits/hours; three (3) graduate credits are available through Howard University ($300 total). To register contact Amanda Stamp at education@worldaffairsdc.org or 202-293-2051.

NTPRS- This is the annual conference for TPRS (Teaching Proficiency through Reading and Storytelling) and, if you're not familiar with it, is a research based methodology for teaching languages that focuses on acquisition rather than learning. This means that teachers teach with the objective of students acquiring the language instead of learning about how the language works. The underlying philosophy is that students acquire language through compelling and comprehensible input in the target language. I was introduced to TPRS by a colleague at our local High School and I've found it to be the most intuitive and effective methodology that exists. Further, it's focus on reading allows language teachers to align their objectives with many of the objectives of English Language Arts thereby allowing us to creep out of the corner of the "elective course" just a little.

CARLA Summer Institutes-- hosted by University of Minnesota's Center for Advanced Research on Language Acquisition

iFTL Conference 2014 I attended the conference last year in San Diego and it was an awesome learning experience for me. The conference was filled with incredible educators throughout the country and tireless Carol Gaab who was never short of fun ideas for teaching. I would recommend this institute which as it both laid back and incredibly informative to anyone interested in learning about CI/TPRS.

Rebeldes de Tejas / PBS

For our last unit of the year my Spanish two class began reading Rebeldes de Tejas by Maria Canion and published by TPRS Publishing (hopefully next year we can read this novel towards the beginning/middle of the year). Immediately, I began scouring the Internet looking for ways to supplement the unit and, at the same time, provide comprehensible input. The search paid off! I found an amazing video library of PBS's documentary series "Latino Americanos." The library contains six full episodes on immigration, immigrant rights and the changing nature of what it means to be "American." Each episode is around an hour long and, while this might be too much for your classroom, there are previews for each episode ranging from 30 seconds to four minutes. Further, there are 35 "clips" each about 10 minutes in length and mainly consisting of biographies of notable Hispanics. There are two videos perfect for teaching Rebeldes: One is a description of the Battle of the Alamo and can be found here and the other is a biography of the life of Juan Seguín found here. The videos are slow enough as to be comprehensible for my level 2 students with minimal scaffolding and vocabulary instruction. I made a couple of listening comprehension activities to accompany the videos but I'm not happy with them quite yet. I'll post when they're ready.