Bananagrams, Dígame, and More

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I love adding games into my language teaching. Games break up the monotony and give students an alternate way to learn. Over the past few weeks, I have been buying some new games to add some spice to my lessons. Here's a quick look at the ones I am using...

I am looking forward to using Spanish Bananagrams  with my students today. I bought it because I read about it at Spanish Playground. {I LOVE her teaching tips and ideas!} I am not going to re-invent the wheel in trying to figure out how to use this with my students when she has written this stellar post with ideas on how to incorporate it into your lessons. You just have to check out this post! You can find it here.

For about two weeks now some of my students and I have been playing KLOO. {Here is my post about these games.} I am loving how these teach kids vocabulary as they play. Students don't need to have an extensive background in the language to enjoy this game. They need to be able to read well in English and sound out the Spanish words. I actually played this game yesterday with two girls who have only been studying Spanish for a couple of months! There are two different sets you can buy (each set has two decks).

KLOO's Learn to Speak Spanish Language Card Games Pack 1 (Decks 1 & 2) {Food and Clothing}

KLOO's Learn to Speak Spanish Language Card Games Pack 2 (Decks 3 & 4) {Everyday Objects and Places}

KLOO's Learn to Speak Spanish Language Board Game - Race to Madrid {The board game version with all four decks}

Finally, I have one more game waiting in the wings to figure out. I hope to "test drive" it with my husband and son (both speak some Spanish) this weekend. It is called ¡Dígame! . It looks like a lot of fun, and I love the idea that it is all done in Spanish! Here is a video about it. I will post more about it as I get more experience with how the game works.

Have fun playing and learning!

KLOO {Great Language Learning Game}

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Games are so vital to my language teaching. Through them, students can learn vocabulary and grammar in a less tedious way. A few weeks ago, one of my parents mentioned the game KLOO to me. I immediately went and ordered it and fell in love with it! 

The game requires that you can read in English and then have a basic knowledge of the sound system of the language you are learning. I would say that it is appropriate for late elementary kids all the way to adults. The players DO NOT need to know all the vocabulary to play. Actually, the point of the game is to play and learn the vocabulary as you go. 

The game involves sentence building, but your students don't need to know necessarily how to build a sentence in the language as the arrows on the cards indicate what type of word comes next. Points are earned by creating longer sentences and translating the words. After my students create a sentence, I do make them say the sentence in the target language before translating it. That way I can check their pronunciation. Because the cards are color-coded you can actually use them to talk about the parts of speech (noun, verb, adjective).

The game comes in Spanish, French, or Italian, and the vocabulary is based on vocabulary from Spain, France, and Italy. I have never been to Spain; I speak Argentine Spanish, but that in no way lessened the value of the game. There were a few words I didn't know. I would say it is just another opportunity to talk to your students about dialectical and vocabulary differences between countries.

Here is the KLOO game site with videos that explain how the game is played. {I believe there are several ways to play.} The original version, "Classic KLOO" is super-easy to learn in a few minutes. Here is a look at all the versions that are available:

Spanish

KLOO's Learn to Speak Spanish Language Card Games Pack 1 (Decks 1 & 2) {Food and Clothing}

KLOO's Learn to Speak Spanish Language Card Games Pack 2 (Decks 3 & 4) {Everyday Objects and Places}

KLOO's Learn to Speak Spanish Language Board Game - Race to Madrid {The board game version with all four decks}

French
KLOO's Learn to Speak French Language Card Games Pack 1 (Decks 1 & 2) {People and Food}

KLOO's Learn to Speak French Language Card Games Pack 2 (Decks 3 & 4) {Places and Everyday Objects}

KLOO's Learn to Speak French Language Board Game - Race to Paris {Board game with four decks of cards}

Italian

KLOO's Learn to Speak Italian Language Card Games Pack 1 (Decks 1 & 2) {People and Food}

KLOO's Learn to Speak Italian Language Card Games Pack 2 (Decks 3 & 4) {People and Eating/Drinking}

Happy Sentence Building!!

Harold and the Purple Crayon Activity in Spanish

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I love children's literature, and many of my students love to draw. There are several books out there that lend themselves well to drawing the scenes from the story after you read it to your students. I especially like the books in which I can incorporate prepositions for my students to review. Here is an example from the book, Si Quieres Ver una Ballena.

Harold y el Lapiz Color Morado  is another great book to use if you want your kids to practice or review prepositions. Basically, I read the book to them and then have them get a blank sheet of paper which we fold in half three times. This gives you eight "boxes". In each of the boxes, your kids will draw a sketch of what you say to them in Spanish. Here are some of the sentences I have my students draw, but you could definitely do your own based on the book.

La luna está sobre el camino.

Hay manzanas arriba en el árbol.

Hay un dragón debajo del árbol.

Harold está debajo del agua.

El alce está cerca de los pasteles.

El puercoespín está lejos de Harold.

Harold está encima de la montaña.

Hay una cesta debajo del globo.

El globo está enfrente de la casa.

La luna está afuera.

La ventana está alrededor de la luna.

La manta está encima de Harold.

El lápiz morado está en el suelo.

Have fun drawing with prepositions!

And by the way, if you have any great book recommendations for doing this type of activity I would love for you to leave them in the comments!

Using Realia in a Language Classroom

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One of my favorite activities with my students is pulling out realia (especially when we do a food unit) from Spanish-speaking countries for them to look at. They get familiar with several aspects of the language that we normally don't focus on in our lessons. For example, they get to see the metric system in use on food packages. They see how the number one thousand is written (1.000). They get exposed to the culture of the country the realia is from.

I have collected realia over the years from my own travels and the travels of my students. I have items from Argentina, Uruguay, Mexico, Spain, and Bolivia. I saved ads and wrappers...anything with Spanish on them. This was before the days of the internet. You can now do online to find a plethora of realia items. Here is my Pinterest board collection...

Follow Debbie in AK's board Teaching Spanish- Ads and Realia on Pinterest.

Realia can be used in multiple ways...for example, you can use pictures of license plates from various countries to have your students practice letters and numbers. (NOTE: There is one picture of plates on my Pinterest board). You can use menus during a food unit. You can talk about how the ad works or doesn't work to entice people to buy. You can introduce cultural items through realia. The ideas are endless!

While it is far cheaper to find realia on the web or if you are already traveling to a Spanish-speaking country, there is one resource available that uses realia to teach. Big Book of Spanish Realia Volume I & Volume II is on the pricey side, but provides you with realia in different categories (food, fashion, home) and activities to go with them. I have not personally used these volumes so I can't speak to how well they are put together, but it might be something to look into. If anyone has personally used it I would love to hear about the activities!

More teaching tips can be found here...

Picture Dictionaries in Language Teaching

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Picture dictionaries are a great jumping off point for conversations in the target language you are teaching.  I love using the types of dictionaries that have "scenes" that you can use to talk about many different topics.  The dictionaries I have listed here are {at the time of this posting} out of print {at least the Spanish versions are...other languages are available}, but they are readily available on the used market through Amazon and other sites.

Picture dictionaries with scenes can be used in a variety of ways.  Here is a list of ideas:

{NOTE: All of these activities are done in the target language...on both the teacher and student side.}

1. Ask where certain items are in the target language and the student points them out.

2. Counting items on the page.

3. Show them a scene and they have to describe it in the target language.

4.  Practice prepositions by describing where things are located.  I normally do this by giving the student(s) two items in Spanish.  They then have to tell me how the first item is positioned in regards to the second item.  For example:  El gato esta encima de la mesa.

5. Call out an item and the students give you an adjective for it.

6. Have the students describe the actions going on in the scene.

7. Discuss the emotions of the people in the scene.

8. For pages with lots of food pictures on them call out a color and the students tell you the foods that are that color.

9. Also, for food pages, call out an adjective like sweet or salty and have students list foods that fit that description.

10. Call out a letter of the alphabet and see if students can list any items on the page that start with that letter.

Let's Learn Spanish-Picture Dictionary-I love this dictionary particularly for its opposite page {see above}.  With this page I ask questions like, "Where is the fast mouse?"  "the tall mouse?", etc.

First Thousand Words in Spanish-This dictionary is the one I have used the longest in my teaching.  Scenes in the middle with vocabulary around the sides.

Everyday Words in Spanish-Most of my younger students love this book with claymation type characters. Once again there are scenes with vocabulary on the sides.

I have found that if I have enough copies of dictionaries (they don't all need to be the same) that my small group of students can have a little friendly competition. I call out a review word and each student looks through their dictionary to see if they can find a picture of the word first.

More teaching tips here.

Language Facts in a Classroom

Last year I started making mini-posters to display where my students could read a few facts about Spanish. Many times there just isn't enough time in a lesson to go over concepts, history, or other facts about a language. These tidbits of information can be read when students have down time. So here is a look at some of my fact cards. These can be done for other languages also. It is just a matter of finding information on the language or the history of it. I also do a series of cards called "Which word do I use?" to show my students the variety of vocabulary in the language. For languages spoken in several areas of the world these cards are great for exposing your students to the idea that there are many differences in the language.

Need some more ideas for teaching another language?

Book Series for Kids in Spanish

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When I am teaching younger kids I always take the opportunity to read to them. Children's books are a great way to listen to the language and pick up vocabulary along the way. I especially like when I can find a series of books to read to my students. They get familiar with the characters and fall in love with them. They also start predicting what will happen, because of their familiarity with the personalities in the books.

Recently, I found two great series my students have been enjoying, the Estela books and the series of books on the lady that swallows everything (i.e. flies and the like). Many  of them are out-of-print, but easily found cheaply on Amazon.

The Estela Books

Estela and her brother Sam have great adventures at the beach, in the snow, in the forest, and at night. The conversations they have are super cute. Sam is always asking his older sister about the world around them with questions like, "Do snow angels fly?" or "Do seahorses gallop?". There are four of them available...

Estela, la estrella del mar
Estela reina de la nieve
Estela, Hada del Bosque
Estela Princesa de la Noche

The "There Once Was an Old Lady" Books

My youngest students love the Lady who Swallowed a Fly! There is a whole series of books in which she swallows different items related to a theme. The language in these books is repetitive which aids in retaining some new vocabulary.


¡Un día una señora se tragó una mosca! -the traditional version
¡Un Día Una Señora se Tragó una Caracola!-filled with beach vocabulary
Un dia una senora se trago una campana!-the Christmas version
¡Un Día Una Señora se Tragó unos Libros!
Una Senora Con Frio Se Trago Un Poco De Nieve!-Vocabulary related to winter


The Froggy Books

I have mentioned the Froggy books several times here in the past. My students adore Froggy and the antics he does! Actually, they love him so much that I have even gotten a few of the books in English and translated them into Spanish for them.

Froggy Books in Spanish

More ideas for teaching another language.