My bags are packed and I'm sitting at Starbucks waiting for my bus to pull up. I'm going to California for ACTFL 2015 and I'm so excited!! Stay posted for updates as I'm learning through the weekend.
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But instead I'm thinking. I'm thinking about my son, Angel and his fascination with Spanish that suddenly stirred this evening. He was working on his Spanish immersion, and suddenly had a burst of interest in making up his own silly sentences in Spanish. They were things like... El oso come el perro (The bear eats the dog), but these silly sentences started to lead him to questions like, "how do I write an ending for the Ud. form?" He's thinking about subject pronouns and verb endings even though he's never seen a conjugation chart! He's looking at patterns and making connections! Here let me show you what he did... So you may be thinking, sure... That's great. He's the Spanish teacher's SON! Of course it's going to be easy for him. Angel actually told me this evening that he finally feels like he's going to be doing better in class. Now part of that is because of the wonderful people who created Duolingo. Another part of that is because he started getting excited about communicating in a second language, and his excitement got him to ask the right questions. So my son jumpstarted my own inquiry about being a teacher, and how I want to help my students get to this place where they are making these great connections for themselves, and I am giving them the right tools so that they can do that on their own. What are the tools??!!?? There's so much more to read on that, but I got to a couple of helpful resources this evening while I was pondering instead of writing progress reports. Here's what I came up with: 1. This video highlights the importance of cultivating curiosity in our students. 2. On a typical Monday, I start class with a reading day. I think I might start to switch up Mondays so that every other week has more of a writing focus. The prompt will come from the New York Times blog linked below which invites critical thinking to figure out a picture posted on Monday. On Fridays the Times explains the back story for the picture. I'm sure there's more to say, but I have some progress reports to finish up.
Well, it has felt like a bit of a sloppy week. I can't seem to figure out if I'm coming or going. I am definitely in better spirits today than I was a week ago and there are several reasons why. 1. My red chair: I ditched my old desk chair, which was lovely and comfy, but had duct tape around one arm. It was gray, and there is something just wonderful about the color red in my classroom. 2. Gifts from Guatemala: Two of my amazing students went to Guatemala on a missions trip this summer. They brought back a mug (from which I am drinking gobs of coffee) and two bracelets. These gifts made my whole first week (maybe my whole month). I love when my students think about Spanish class during the summer or think about me while in a Spanish-speaking place! Am I ready for what's ahead? It seems like this particular eve of a new year has crept up far faster than usual. Today I chose to rebel. How did I rebel? I went to the beach instead of cramming last minute prep into my head and my computer. I feel a little off balance thinking that tomorrow my ducks may go waddling off without my notice, but I like being off balance. When we are off balance we start to learn what true balance is, and maybe as teachers we need to just begin to reconsider that we are the ones who bring everything to the table. Maybe just maybe we should begin by wondering what we will learn from these amazing humans that walk through our doors. What is the true purpose of our job? Are we simply imparters of knowledge to empty vessels? I think of the three little vessels asleep in the rooms next to mine. I am certain that they are not empty. They have so much to share. Do we ever take the time to check in? So this afternoon I peered into the beautiful clear water of Second Beach. I marveled at the tiny baby sand crab that Luis found. I shrieked when a seagull stole a peanut butter sandwich right out of Besty's hands. We talked about being teachers, and what are the most important things we hope our students walk out of the door knowing. It was a fuller kind of last minute prep... the kind of last minute prep where I remember that I am human. Tonight, instead of last minute prepping I ate s'mores with my community group and met an amazing woman who was born in Argentina. I learned that I was wrong when I told my students that 'vos' is a shortened form of vosotros. Students, do you know sometimes we teachers make things up, because we realize that you have us beat and we don't want to look like we don't know anything? It turns out we have LOTS to learn!! 'Vos' is actual a very casual form of 'you'... More casual than 'tu'. Wow! I had no idea it existed! I love that I discovered something brand new tonight, not because I was poring over second language acquisition theory and Pinterest inspiration, but because I went out to eat a s'more.
The spring semester dance elective was a wonderful exploration of choreographic principles and how to tell a story without being too literal and didactic. How do we let the dance speak for itself? The following is a beautiful description of the artistic journey that Rachel took through the course of the semester and her culminating work: "Before choreographing this dance we looked at the story of Esther. We read about her unwavering faith and courage to go beyond what was expected of her. Esther had to wear a mask for so long because her true self was unacceptable to others, but when she found strength in God and let the world see the real her they found a beautiful and strong leader. We found the song, "The Real Me" by Natalie Grant, which talks about God's perfect image of His creation. He sees the person underneath the mask. The song spoke to our ideas of being bounded by stereotypes, misconceptions, and expectations that are put on everyone. It continues to say how God releases us from this bondage because He sees the real us. The real us may be tattered, scarred and flawed, but He only sees the perfection that He created. When we look past the views of other people and seek how God sees us, we begin to see ourselves in the eyes of love. We do not have to be bound up by preconceived notions, but rather be freed in the freedom that comes from God. When we look through His eyes we can see how the "real me" should be perceived, with love and confidence. We must be like Esther and be confident in God's love in order to break out of our shell and be what He truly intended us to be, His image." Thank you Rachel for your vulnerability and bravery in sharing this gift with your school. Lots of posting today... But this is mostly so that I remember what I'm thinking about. This video is the culmination of a project that I did with the 4th grade class. We spent the early part of the project listening through Marc Anthony's description of himself on his official music video. The students then wrote a description of themselves based on similar phrasing, but personalized to themselves. We learned the first verse and the chorus of the song, and my hope (too idealistic?) is that the language from the song will become part of the fabric of their Spanish brains. Finally, we learned Salsa as we listened to the song. This became an opportunity to incorporate some cultural elements into the project, and it also gave my energetic 4th graders a chance to get out of their seats which was a win for everyone. Take aways?
I want to keep doing stuff like this, but stuff like this takes a LONG time. Am I ok with that? How can I make a project like this beneficial on multiple levels so that it's worth the time and energy? Overall, it's fairly easy to justify this type of project in an elementary classroom where I am the visiting teacher once each week. I am not grading these students. I only see them 25 minutes per week. I don't have as much responsibility for hard academic work. I am allowed to be the 'fun' teacher in this context. How do I transfer this to my middle and high school classrooms? I believe it's worth the work to figure that out. Google+ does this great thing where they publish stories for you made of your own pictures and locations. Click on the picture to see an example. I'm still trying to figure out just how to manipulate the story, but it's an interesting way to think about some a different way of sharing a student journey through the school year. This is the time of year that feels like an important time for reflection. If I don't reflect now, I won't remember all the new thoughts that I had going through this year, and I will become stagnant. Here is what is on my mind lately:
1. The importance of story - Story is a powerful tool, hence the Bible, the ongoing popularity of LOTR. We love stories. It's why we watch movies. So, if language is going to be powerful and engaging it needs to also somehow be part of a larger story that students are invited to participate in. TPRS is a language teaching tool that starts to get at this, but is it enough? I'm particularly thankful here for ideas like MOVIE TALK. One goal that I have moving forward is to have more conversations with the wonderful counselor at BCA, Pam Halligan about STORYLINE design. 2. Taking advantage of the 'Selfie' generation - My students all want to be famous (more or less). One thing that I have learned this year is that I truly enjoy making videos/taking photos of great work that my students are doing in class. They seem to be more engaged in writing a play or reading a story aloud if they know that their completed work will be available to a more public audience. Here is my first try at this type of work. 3. If we are going to teach collaboration we must be doing it as well - I had an opportunity this year to work with our science teacher and tech administrator on a collaborative field trip and follow up project. It was amazing (and challenging) to share space in each other's rooms and schedules. I had to be comfortable with kids working on science work during Spanish time and vice versa. A great challenge to this kind of work was figuring out how to assess students fairly and across our two classrooms. 4. We have to get OUT of the classroom - Particularly with my high school classes, I have the gift of small class sizes. I can fit a whole class in my mini van. Why have I not done more of that this year? One time - ONLY ONCE - I took my 10th graders out for lunch at a local restaurant. We tried new foods and they ordered in Spanish and then conversed in Spanish over lunch. It was amazing! They realized that Spanish has real application, and I realized that they can behave outside the walls of the school. They were called to something outside themselves and they responded well! I wish I had done this at least once each quarter. Next year I really hope to start to build an ongoing relationship with one outside resource. I'm sure there's more, but I think these are some of my top reflections as I go into the summer. Thoughts? Feedback? In Spanish I-A we have been acting out some very interesting stories, like this one...
La chica y el chico estan en el restaurante. El restaurante es muy elegante. La chica mira el menu. La chica lee el menu por mucho tiempo. El chico va a Boston. En Boston corre en el maraton. Es divertido correr en Boston. La chica todavia mira el menu. El chico vuelve a Espana. En Espana va a Pamplona y corre en la Corrida de Toros. Es divertido. Entonces, el chico va al restaurante. La chica esta en el restaurante. La mesera camina a la mesa. - Que quisiera comer? La chica responde: - Quisiera el agua. El chico responde: - Quisiera el pollo con arroz. La chica esta contenta. Es una noche divertida. El fin! Well, this has been the worst blog ever, but if I'm going to keep it up, it's better to start late rather than never. I have been thinking a lot lately about the importance of storytelling in teaching a language, and particularly the importance of inviting students to be characters in that story. So one plan that I have is to create more video content to share for students to show their parents, to make them famous.
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AuthorShannon Norquist, teacher of Spanish and Dance at Barrington Christian Academy, mother of 3 lovelies, wife to an artist, modern dancer, daughter to the King. Archives
September 2016
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