Each week, choose one good lesson, and make it GREAT!
At times I feel inundated with planning and creating fresh ideas for a proficiency-based classroom. I especially felt this way the first year I stopped using the textbook. I had to put everything in perspective: I’m trying something new and it will take time. I won’t always have a perfect lesson. I’ve found that if I try to take one good lesson and make it great, then it all becomes manageable.
Step #1: Find another teacher to plan with
Each week I plan one lesson with another teacher. Sometimes it’s a language teacher at another school, a new teacher, an experienced teacher or a teacher from another content area. It’s so nice to look at a lesson from a new perspective!
Step #2: What’s the authentic goal?
We are both teaching a health/doctor unit, so we chose the “I can describe body parts” goal. We wanted to include the monster listening activity where students listen to a command (draw 5 green heads), they draw it, then they pass their papers to the next person, give another commend, and repeat. Then we would give each student a monster and they would describe it to their partner. They love these activities, but we started asking ourselves the tough questions. WHY do they need to know how to describe body parts? Well, if they go to a doctor’s office, they may need to say “large red swollen finger”. So we rewrote the goal to be more measurable and specific. I can describe body parts including size and color. That meant that they would need vocabulary about size, colors, etc. That’s not that exciting nor is it new vocabulary for this group. Hmm.
Step #3: What’s the culture focus?
None! We had no culture in this lesson. Then we thought of using monsters from Spanish-speaking countries instead of the ones we had from Monster’s Inc. The ideas started flowing! She had a video of “El Cuco“. Great attention grabber! Maybe they could find a video with their monster?!
Oh! Goya painted “Que viene el Coco”. Grimm has two episodes about Hispanic legends (La Llorona and El Cucuy). Maybe that can be a homework extension activity?!
Now the vocabulary would need to be adjusted to include some words like “pointed” and “hairy”, so we rewrote the goal one more time.
Much better! Not only did I learn something new, I’m now excited to teach this lesson.
You posted this at just the right time for me! I am teaching Spanish 1 for the first time in a while and it is a continual battle to maintain the communicative focus. (The last time I taught this level was long enough ago that this wasn’t the way we taught!). I’ve been driving myself crazy, and this is really great advice! Thanks for all of your wonderful ideas and for giving me a little perspective.
It’s good to know we are not alone!
Fantastic coaching for all of us struggling to keep our students engaged, thanks so much. Could you please provide more details about the Monster Listening Activity, though?
Great idea to integrate culture! Here is a worksheet to go along with that El Cuco commercial https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_v2DAwhS8IQIGDb2QO9Djo3UNkDazwNhSn-A1j_wLfM/edit (perhaps for Sp2) and here is a wksht for a song called El Cuco https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ZDgyUvaCfDf0y_6-1qpcabfBMPtd4jXYZpHvMzsopfg/edit (perhaps for Sp3).
Also, have you seen the commercial for La Llorona: Got Milk? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=erhsuXTyDww
Thanks, as always, for sharing your ideas! What a resource your site is!!
Cute stuff!
Isn’t this a little bit subjective? How do you qualify what makes a lesson GOOD vs what makes a lesson GREAT? I have lessons that I consider great that another teacher might consider good and vice versa.
That being said, I really like what you did with this lesson. If only my school had such great access to technology (oh the joys of teaching middle school in a poor community!). Even without much technology, I’m always looking for new ways to teach the same old stuff. I’d love to see if I can get a book of Spanish myths and legends and use that to teach the body parts, etc. in the same way that you use youtube.
When I first read your comment, I couldn’t pinpoint the answer. Now I believe the answer is simple: culture. Culture is what they find interesting, not just language alone. And student engagement and learning are the true tests of what makes a lesson good vs. great!
I just loved the “el cuco” commercial!!!!
Have you watched one called ” me lo compras?”
Thanks for sharing such great ideas!