...at Buzzing with Ms. B that is! I am guest blogging for her today while she is away on vacay!
Wednesday, July 4, 2012
Come visit me!
Tuesday, July 3, 2012
Monday (..or Tuesday) Made-it!
I know...already posted today...but I just wanted to link up to Made-It Monday! so bad...and before it turned into Made-It Wed/Thurs/ or Fri!
I know many of you are already familiar with the clipboard-redecoration...but I have been slaving away on these bad boys..so I just had to show them off!
To create my clipboards I used 12 x 12 scrapbook paper and ribbon in my class colors and the materials pictures below.
I found the foam brush to work quite nicely, because then all those little bristles didn't get stuck in my work! I used the xacto knife to cut off excess, and then used my handy little corner rounder on each of the corners so that they matched those of the actual clip board.
Here are the 27 BEAUTIFUL products of all of my hardwork.
While I was in the groove, I took a moment to create on for my wonderful mother, whose birthday just happens to be today!
Happy Birthday Mom!
(She is a nurse ;))
Monday, July 2, 2012
Guest Blogger Week: Teaching Vocabulary
I know what you are all thinking....wasn't this week supposed to end on July 1st? Yes, you are correct....but when Jenny emailed me asking if she could still contribute, I just couldn't resist extending this week of learning for one more day! I am so glad I did, because she has some great ideas to share about teaching vocabulary that as she so nicely states- will not only benefit our language learners, but all students!
Hi everyone! I'm Jenny from Luckeyfrog's Lilypad. I taught 2 years as a 2nd grade interventionist in a low-income school, I've taught 1 year in my own 2nd grade room at a very diverse school, and I'll be staying here to teach 3rd grade next year. I'm still pretty new to teaching and LOVE teaching science more than anything!
When I was in 7th grade, I had an amazing Spanish teacher. He was the teacher who truly made me enjoy learning Spanish, and I still like it, despite a couple of truly awful Spanish classes since trying to take that away from me!
At the time, he was using something he called TPR- he described it to us because he knew that we would struggle at first, but he also knew it was worthwhile. I distinctly remember learning motions to go along with words, and then including the words in a story that we would re-tell in English and Spanish in different tenses all week.
Well, once I was teaching, I figured that if it helped me learn unfamiliar words, some aspects of it would help my students learn unfamiliar words (ELL or not!).
See, here's the secret I learned from our ESL coordinator at my last district...
Almost all kids benefit from so-called "ESL Strategies."
Particularly there, in a very low-income school- so many of our students had small vocabularies.
Every week last year, our story came with vocabulary words. In my new series this year, it will come with "Robust Vocabulary." In my previous school, it was through the Beck Vocabulary program (LOVE!). It would be perfect for during Expanding Vocabulary in CAFE. The point is... you can use this in any school, with any basal- and it won't take you as long as you think.
I have a vocabulary routine that I use most weeks.
Monday- introduce the words and definitions, and let students come up with a motion for each. (For instance, "relieved"- deep breath in, and out with the back of your hand crossing your forehead)
Tuesday- Answer a question that uses the word.
Wednesday- Interactive- act out or draw the word in partners, in groups, one in front of the class, etc.
Thursday- Identify the part of speech (if we've learned it), and use the word in a sentence. Have a few share out loud, and then everyone shares with a partner or in Inside-Outside circle.
Friday- Define the words in their own words, and assess with a cloze activity or quiz.
Every day we do motions for the words. On Fridays, I'll often see kids do the motions to themselves during assessments. At the end of every 6 week unit, at least, we'd review ALL of the vocabulary from the unit- and they would remember almost all of it. I really think the motions were a huge part of that!
Vocabulary only takes us about 15 minutes, tops, every day. I also super encourage them to use and find the words, so I see a lot of kids running up to me with a book, saying, "I found the word relieved!!!" even weeks or months after we've learned that word.
This year, I want to encourage that even more, so I'm planning to make a Vivid Vocabulary Vine.
I plan on hanging this sign above it in my room- hop on over to Luckeyfrog's Lilypad if you'd like to find out more and get a free copy of the sign! (Bonus: If you follow me, you can see pictures of mine when it's done!)
Thank you, Krista, for letting me guest blog for you today!
What activities do YOU do to help your students internalize new vocabulary?
Sunday, July 1, 2012
Guest Blogger Week: Native Language Instruction
Todays post comes from someone I personally like to think of as somewhat of a "dual guru" as she is always providing her readers with wisdom in regards to dual language students and our language learners. Please welcome, Mrs. Candis Grover.
When Krista asked me to write about Best Practices for English Learners,
a flood of possibilities filled my mind.
However, the more I considered my own experience in the classroom as
well as the past few years of coaching other teachers in classrooms across my
state, I remembered my very best piece of advice:
When possible, do everything
in your power to teach students to read in their native language!
That might seem counterintuitive
if your goal is academic success in English-only instruction but let me provide
a word picture to explain. You can
see my simple graphic representation here:
Imagine that José shows up at
your classroom door one day and you quickly discover that he is an emerging
reader and Spanish is spoken in his home.
While you hear José converse very naturally in English on the
playground, he is unable to read in either Spanish or English and he struggles
to describe academic concepts in the content areas.
Now, pretend with me that you the
teacher have the opportunity to put José on one of two elevators that will take
him higher and higher in this building named “LITERACY”. One elevator provides small group
reading instruction in Spanish and the other in English. Which should you choose?
Because Spanish is spoken in José’s
home and was his first language, wouldn’t it make sense to begin the journey
upwards in literacy with the Spanish elevator? We know that all words in Spanish are composed of simple
syllables and all but a few letters have only one sound. Once José “cracks the code” of
letter-sounds and blending syllables (taught at levels 1-5), he is going to
quickly zoom up the levels as he develops fluency and comprehension.
If José were made to begin his
journey via the English elevator, it would be as if someone had stepped on a
very old, should-be-out-of-service elevator and pressed all of the
buttons. Because of the
complexities of English phonics AND all of the unknown vocabulary that José has
not been hearing since he was born, it will likely be slow-going for José.
Now, we know that eventually José
will need to become biliterate and proceed with his journey in the English
elevator. Will José have to take
the stairs down to the first floor to begin learning to read all over
again? In the words of Pete the
Cat, “Goodness no!”
José can simply step out of the
Spanish elevator at a floor where he has developed moderate fluency and
comprehension and be guided over by his teacher to the English elevator. He will take with him all of his
understanding about reading such as concepts of print, sentence structure,
types of text, thinking strategies, and cognates.
As he journeys on in English, he
will need support with vocabulary and some word patterns. Still, he will have arrived to that
level so much sooner than he otherwise would have because he was afforded the
time to learn to read in his native language.
If you are a bilingual or
dual-language teacher and have students like José, please know that the work
that you do in the native language is SO important! Do it strategically and do it well! If you are a monolingual teacher,
please advocate for your ELL students to receive native language reading
support whenever possible!
Saturday, June 30, 2012
Guest Blogger Week: Verbal Production Takes Time and Practice
Today's post was written by a fellow second grade dual language teacher who is always so incredibly generous in swapping ideas with me! Please welcome, Mrs. Beth T.
----
One thing I have learned about being a teacher of language
learners, is that is takes time to produce language. Just as we have all learned language, or have had the
opportunity to witness our own children growing up and first learning to talk,
receptive language comes first.
Children learning a second language, have language structure, but need
to be supported with their second language. Many times, I use sentence frames to scaffold their
learning. They need to understand
vocabulary and to have time to practice it before using it in more complex
setting. For best success, I
usually give them some examples, as I model using the language, using a mentor
text as our base. Then we talk
about ideas together as a group.
The students are given some time to think of how they would use the
language structures, then, they are given the opportunity to practice with
other students. After more
practice and confidence with the new vocabulary and language structures, they are
asked to produce it orally or in written form.
Here is a sample of language structures and vocabulary for
Cause and Effect:
Written by Beth T.
2nd Grade Dual Language Teacher from Salem, Oregon
Friday, June 29, 2012
Guest Blogger Week: La Bolsa Magica (The Magic Bag)
Jennifer Manriquez, founder of The Bilingual Fun Company, has written a post for us today about a game she calls "La Bolsa Mágica". Sounds like one I am definitely going to have to try!
La Bolsa Mágica
This
is a fun, interactive guessing game
that may be easily incorporated into your daily routine or tailor it for
specific themes. The objective of
this activity is to encourage language production and vocabulary
development. Kids absolutely love
the guessing aspect and the anticipation of seeing what is in the bag. This activity is easily adapted for
either English or Spanish.
1.
Find a sparkly holiday gift bag. The more sparkles, the better! This will serve as your ‘ bolsa mágica”.
2.
Choose a theme for the week, so that children can make connections each day. For example:
los colores, los números, la comida, los juguetes, etc.
3. Teach your children the magic words/
Las palabras mágicas. This is a
very important aspect of the activity because it encourages their fluency by
repeating it together. You may
invent your own or use: Abracadabra, patas de cabra, ¿qué hay en
la bolsa?…. Dímelo tú!
4. Then have children help you throw ‘ la magia’ poof!
5. Ask kids to guess what is in the
bag. This is a great opportunity to illicit conversation and
fluency. Make guesses, give clues,
descriptions, hints, etc.
6.
Reveal what is in the bag and encourage
production by talking about the item, pass item around the room, use it
as a writing prompt, make connections using the item, etc.
Ideas for La Bolsa Mágica:
The
ideas are endless! Choose small
toys such as cars, doll house figurines, action heroes, bouncy balls, crayons ,
plastic food or real food items, number flashcards. Tailor it for the holidays
with items such as candy canes, ornaments, gingerbread men, snowflakes made of
paper, figures from a manger scene, etc.
Have fun and be creative!
Make
this a daily activity with your children or students and it will quickly become
an anticipated favorite!
Contributed
by Jennifer Manriquez, founder of The
Bilingual Fun Company. As a
bilingual educator of many and a parent of 2 young children who are being
raised in a bilingual household, she has created an award winning, nationally
recognized language program. The Bilingual Fun Company offers interactive
language classes and educational products for young children.
*Join
Bilingual Fun on Facebook
for tips, lessons, resources and more! http://bilingualfun.com
Thursday, June 28, 2012
Guest Blogger Week: Spanish Vocabulary Cube
Hello, everyone! I'm Tabitha Carro from FlapJack Educational Resources, and I am very appreciative to Krista for the opportunity to guest blog for her!
In this post, I would like to share a fun activity I did last year with my Spanish immersion students to practice vocabulary in a crafty, hands-on way. Since we were studying 3D objects anyways, I decided to have them make vocabulary cubes. Here's an example:
I found a random template on the internet and printed out enough copies for my students on cardstock. After the students put their cubes together, they were instructed to draw and write the name of an object in Spanish inside each face of the cube for the following categories:
1) A food item
2) A family member (prima, nieto, etc.)
3) A verb
4) An adjective
5) A body part
6) A noun
I asked them to try to think of words that maybe they hadn't learned yet in Spanish. After they completed the drawings and labels, they split up into groups of three. They took turns tossing each others' cubes and using the object they landed on in a sentence (If you have beginners, they could just translate the word to English.).
After a few minutes, the students got creative and started tossing two or three cubes at a time and making sentences with two or three words.
Next year, to create more accountability, I will probably have students copy their sentences onto a sheet of paper to turn into me as a team effort.
All in all, it was a fun, effective activity for practicing vocabulary. To make it run smoother next year, I've created my own template that is already labeled and has instructions. Just click on the image below to download your own FREE copy.
Muchas gracias de nuevo a Krista for this opportunity! If you'd like more info. on me and my resources, just click on any of the following links.
Tabitha Carro
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