Are you required to do “warm-ups/sponges/bell work” at your school? Our administrators like to see them in classes at my school. I don’t like doing them just because we have to. If it is meaningless then I am just wasting our students’ time. Kara created this awesome format for a warm up and I tweaked it a little for my classes. Here it is.
- The date and the “How are you?” box are good ways to review and help students practice some of those basics.
- The “Yo puedo…” box is next. Students copy the goal of the day from the board, and it helps them focus on exactly what they should be able to do by the end of the class. I mention each classes’ goal everyday, but it seems that having the students put this on paper makes this task a bit more personal.
- I show a video clip in Spanish that relates to the lesson each day and they write about it afterwards. My students learned how to say “It’s about…” and “In the video, there is…” and really get good about giving their opinions and explaining why they feel that way.
- The last box is for my warm-up question, which I now do at the end of class. It gives students a chance to use what they learned that day. I walk around and give about 6 students instant feedback on what they wrote by marking the mini-proficiency scale on the side (Novice Low, Mid, High, Intermediate Low, Mid). You wouldn’t believe how many times they have asked me… “What do I have to do to become an intermediate low?” and I’ve got them right where I want them. 🙂
Later, when students look back over this it serves as notes for them. They see what day it was, the goal for that day, and then a little paragraph as a sample of them using what they learned.
I love this warm-up! It’s been a really good way to get things started and provides some closure to the class as well. It’s a work in progress, but I am starting to realize so is almost everything I do as a teacher!
Hope this provides a spark of inspiration for your classroom somehow. Have a great day!
Similar Activity in the Mercado: Adaptable Activities – Italian
I love this idea! It’s too easy for warm ups to be fill in the blank. Do you have this form on the blog?
Kara posted the link in her comment below… Enjoy 🙂
Can you make that spiffy sheet available to the great unwashed? 🙂
“You wouldn’t believe how many times they have asked me… “What do I have to do to become an intermediate low?” and I’ve got them right where I want them. ”
THAT WAS MY DEVOTIONAL FOR THE DAY!! THANKS
I learned from the best!
Excellent idea.
I’m not required to do warm-ups/do-nows. But, I find that it focuses the students. The sheet you show here in your post is well-structured. Per Miss Yvonne’s request, would you make the form available? In fact, you and Kara make such wonderful forms! I would like to have a copy of each one. 🙂
Tomorrow I will post it when I’m at school. Mine is a little different from Megan’s though.
I put Megan’s sheet on this site. It is free. Enjoy!!
http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Creative-Language-Class
What time of video clips do you use?
Anything! Commercials, songs, home videos, how to, etc. Megan gave me the idea to have students find videos. I was thinking I would assign them each a day to show their video and give a follow up question. It’s less for me to do and it’s a valuable learning activity.
I am so excited to find/use your blog….lifeCHANGing! 🙂
My question about the warm-up sheet = do you construct your question of the day vaguely (basically mirroring your I CAN statements) or specifically (“¿Cual tipo de ____ es tu favorito?”)
Thanks, Jenny! My “pregunta” is usually something that requires a personalized, opinionated answer that has to do with that day’s can do statement. It gets the class focused on the new topic!
Thank you VERY much for sharing your ideas! I’m a first-year Spanish teacher (8th graders) after teaching middle school Science for 11 years and 4th grade for 3 years. I am LOVING your ideas – YOU are helping me create my class and I am forever grateful!!!!! iMUCHAS gracias!
Thanks Melissa! Hope you have a great year teaching languages! It’s the best class to teach!
Do you have these printed off for your students everyday or do you have them ever copy them into a notebook? I wonder what have you found to work best. I’m straying away from using our old and falling apart textbooks, but I also am investigating what is the best way I think they should organize their notes to look back on and I absolutely love this idea!
I print them- front and back! They grab them every two days at the door when they come in and I collect them in packets at random! I still give feedback each day to 5-6 kids after they answer the daily question. It helps them understand the proficiency levels (Novice low, novice mid, novice high) a little better when they get more frequent feedback.
I have been reading your blog off and on all school year, mainly due to becoming extremely busy early Spring until the end of the school year. I have been reading previous posts all week and I have to say I admire all of the authors who contribute to this blog and I strive to be like you all every day in my class. I have learned more in these past few days about how to better reach my students than anything I ever did in grad school! Thank you ladies for being wonderful educators and sharing your talents with us!
Thanks for sharing Chelby! It’s all about the students and inspiring each other. Enjoy your summer break!
What level of students do you do this with? Spanish 1?
I have used them with level one and two.
I LOVE this idea. I’ve been looking for something different to do for warm ups. I just don’t think the traditional grammar warm up is working and I’m always looking for ways (and time) to talk about overarching ideas, etc. I’m thinking of doing a mix of grammar, culture, overarching questions about globalization, opinions, etc.. My question, however, is what do they put in the “se dice … en español” section of the page?
Also, do you have suggestions for video clips that you use? Any go-to websites or blogs that you use? I mainly teach 1, 2, 3….1 and 2 this semester.
I can help with the video clip question. In our menu bar we have one called “Chispas” where we are collecting our favorites. You can also use Pinterest, #langchat #authres on Twitter and good old YouTube.
If you still want to include grammar, just give it a communicative focus. So change “I can conjugate in the past tense.” -> “I can talk about what I did yesterday.” This will hook your students and give a reason to learn it.
I think Megan gave a word/phrase of the day for the “se dice” part.
Each day I would ask a quick ¿Cómo se dice…”_________” en Español? It served as a quick review of vocab or phrases from the past that would help with the new lesson.
For the video, I would use YouTube to find something authentic that connected with the daily goal. Luckily, Kara and I just started our “Chispas” page with tons of authentic readings/videos. http://www.creativelanguageclass.com/chispas-authentic-resources/ Click the tabs at the top to modify your search. You can find videos for almost any topic and we’re adding more all the time! Hope that helps!
That is so wonderful! Thanks! I write out the daily objective with the “I can talk about what I did yesterday” format, so I think this will work really well. Our district, I just found out, is adopting thisislanguage.com, which has amazing leveled videos for languages. You choose the language, level, topic, etc. I think I’ll use that for some video resources as well.
I just discovered your Chispas section and it’s awesome! Thanks so much for sharing! This is only my 2nd year teaching (school starting next week!) and I’m really looking to get out of survival mode this year and really work on all of the things I’ve learned in grad school that I used to believe in before I was sinking in survival mode.
This warm up option is great! I’m going with it!
Do you ever get moans and groans from kids about having to fill out the same sheet over and over? I can picture that being a complaint with my students at times.
I’ve never met a student that didn’t complain about something!
Some didn’t like writing but others grew so much (because of the proficiency-based feedback) that they could tell it was helping them!
The video of the day really was a highlight and kids loved watching something new every day so I think that offset the routine.
Maybe you could mix it up and write one day, speak as a group the next, read another day, and share with a partner. There’s no one way to do it! Good luck!
Thank you so much for all the ideas. I’m very new to teaching and at times I still feel super overwhelmed when planning. I was wondering if you could post a student example of how this might look once completed.
I told my students right away that I want to try to write 4 sentences. At first it was sort of spanglish – but they get it in Spanish pretty quick! I’d ask an open-ended question that led into the day’s lesson like…
(Excuse the lack of punctuation/accents… I’m working on a different computer!)
Quien es la persona mas interestante en tu familia? Por que? (family unit)
Describe el desayuno perfecto. (food unit)
Dime sobre tu mejor amigo. (descriptions unit)
I would then give them about 5 minutes to write a response and then would walk around and give 5-6 students immediate feedback on their warm-up by circling NL (novice low) NM (novice mid) NH (novice high) etc. — If you haven’t heard about PROFICIENCY… you should check it out! It transformed my classes! Here’s a 5 step “getting started” series! http://www.creativelanguageclass.com/planning/the-proficiency-path-step-1/
Thank you for the quick response and the link to the proficiency path.