El Gran Debate del Vestido y Starbucks Lovers

I have been captivated by the "Great Dress Debate" lately.  The more I look at the original photograph, the better I can see it either way - it's obviously blue and black . . . until it's not, and then it's obviously white and gold.  Very very interesting optical illusion.  In case you have managed to miss this debate, you can read about it here on CNN.

If you watch the television show Brain Games (recommended!) then you are used to these sorts of color illusions.  I'm always stunned to learn that the color I thought was yellow was actually brown or something like that.  I mention it because these sorts of discussions can be had with Spanish students - even ones at the very beginning of their language journey.

The following is not really a funny, since there is no humor value in it that I'm aware of.  But I put it together with the thought that it might make Spanish 1 and 2 students smile.

On Monday, I will be sharing this with my students and talking a little about illusions - optical as well as auditory.  For example, Taylor Swift has a song out right now called "Blank Space."  It is a catchy song and I enjoy singing along every time it comes on the radio.  I'm good at knowing all the lyrics to all the songs, so I was surprised today to learn that I had the words all wrong.  I thought Taylor was saying "I get along with Starbucks lovers" at one point, and apparently I'm not the only one that heard it that way.  This article at Metro Lyrics addresses the same issue.  Taylor is actually saying "I got a long list of ex lovers."  My daughter told me this today and I looked at her like she was crazy, but then I listened to the song again and, sure enough, it is as clear as a bell - long list of ex lovers.

When I was in Mexico for the first time (still an intermediate language learner at that time) I kept hearing people talking about chicken, or so I thought, in serious conversations.  Discussions about relationships shouldn't involve chicken.  News anchors shouldn't mention chicken when talking about foreign policy . . . .  It turns out the word I was hearing was apoyo - not pollo.  Things like this happen to us all the time - even in our own language (Starbucks lovers), so I hope my students will be gentle with themselves and their listening comprehension when they see how easily our ears and eyes can be fooled.

Hasta pronto amigos (y aficcionados de Starbucks),

--AnneK

Peligroso

I think this Oso obsession of mine may never end . . . but I saw this picture today and I just couldn't stop myself.

The original artwork is by Mikaela Puranen and is available for purchase, along with a lot of other great stuff on her website. 

As my principal says on the morning announcements ever morning, "Make it a great day, or not.  The choice is yours."

Hasta pronto,

--AnneK

Más Osos

Thanks for the comments and emails, amigos.  I am very inspired to create more oso art because of all the support and ideas I've gotten.

Delicioso seemed like an obvious one, but it took me awhile to find the perfect picture.  I didn't want a honey pot with English - or worse, improperly spelled English (hunny).  These little strawberries did the trick nicely.

Then I figured I would tackle generoso but, let me tell you, it is not easy to find a generous bear out there.  On the other hand, I found quite a few greedy bears.  So, in the interim, here is "poco generoso" which will allow us to explain to students how poco + adjective works.

Poco is one of those words that we learn in the first days of Spanish 1 (as a noun).  

-- ¿Hablas español?
-- Un poco.

But the word is more complex than most students realize and it can take a long time to learn how to use it correctly.  Interestingly, when it is used as an adverb paired with an adjective, it translates as "not very" or even "not at all". 

And, with that, I'm out for the evening.  I am poco energética tonight.  I have a cold that just won't release its grip on me, so I'm off to bed.

Hasta pronto,

--AnneK

"Osomanía"

Students and amigos keep suggesting more osos . . .

What can I do?

Estudioso, gracioso, and talentoso.  I hope you enjoy them! 

Hasta pronto,

--AnneK

Ataque De Las Tarjetas De San Valentín

Give your students some artistic freedom and they will shock and amaze you!  Look at the following picture - evidence that students have ideas and inspiration that are beyond anything you might be thinking about when you create an assignment.  (Yes, that's me being victimized by the "face-eating" valentine.)  :-)

From looking at this, you might think that this was a waste of class time, but I assure you there was a Spanish project behind this image.  There was a rubric, there was a process, there were guidelines, and there were examples given.  And still my student managed to come up with this . . . and I absolutely love it!

Inside this (admittedly unorthodox) valentine card, there is a message in correct Spanish that uses a verb of volition, an example of the subjunctive, and several descriptive adjectives from recent vocabulary lists.  It never would have occurred to me to create a card like this - and that is one of the things I love best about my students.  They are an unending source of amazement and joy for me.

This student and I have a similar sense of humor and an appreciation for the absurd.  (My husband and I celebrated a zombie themed Valentine's Day a few years ago, as a case in point.)

The take away from all of this?  As long as students are doing the Spanish and they are not doing anything inappropriate (or dangerous), give them freedom to be creative.  If we teachers can resist the temptation to micromanage, the results can be spectacular.

Hasta pronto,

--AnneK

Bésame Mucho

¡Feliz Día de San Valentín!

I love Valentine's Day - not because it's a day about sweethearts, but because it doesn't have to be about that only.  Years ago, I decided to expand the idea of Valentine's Day to include all the people in my life that I love - my family, my friends, and my students.

My husband is included in that list too, of course.  He and I have a reservation at a Mexican restaurant for Saturday and, as is our custom, we will exchange video games and high end electronics.  No joke!  I always remind him not to be swayed by the guilt trip diamond and chocolate commercials out there.  (And there is one teddy bear company out there with an offensive commercial that I don't think they showed to any women before they aired it.  I certainly don't want anything from them!)

Anyway . . . back to Spanish - that is what the blog is about, after all.  I put together a Bésame Mucho activity to add to Friday's lesson.  While I was working on it, I did a little research and discovered some fun facts that you might want to share with your students. 

• It is the most recorded Spanish song of all time. 
• It was written by Consuelo Velazquez when she was so young that she had never actually been kissed.
• The topics of loss and distance in the song touched a strong chord with people during World War II when boyfriends and husbands were being shipped away to Japan and Germany - though Miss Velazquez didn't have that in mind when she wrote it.

Interesting, isn't it?  

Here is the activity sheet with a cloze practice, a link to the original song online, and a few discussion questions.  You might need to help your students with the history of the song.  I put a few present perfect sentences in there that might be stumbling blocks for beginners.

And here is a shout-out to my adult student David W who sang this song to his wife on their golden wedding anniversary.  Both he and his wife are students of mine in a continuing education class at our local community college.  Bien hecho, David.  ¡Muy romántico!

Hasta pronto,

--AnneK

Fabuloso

There might be no end to my oso posts, amigos.  A reader here, imsotired, left me a comment yesterday about these being "fabuloso" and I knew that I had to make a fabuloso too - if I could find the right image to start.

Needless to say, this is the perfect image for a fabulOSO.

Easy enough for Spanish I students to get the joke! 

Hasta pronto, amigos.

--AnneK

Subjunctive Notes

My Spanish III students have a big subjunctive test coming up on Friday and they wanted to have all their notes in one document to make it easier for them to study.

Unlike the the Subjunctive Tri-fold which I posted a long time ago, this differs a little.  These notes just focus on how to form the subjunctive - not when to use it.  Stem-changers (curse them!) are included.  There is also no mention of command forms.  This is just subjunctive conjugation.

Once students have studied all the various ways to use subjunctive and are also familiar with command forms, that is when you will want to bring out the tri-fold.

Click here or on the image below to download the blank notes for your students to fill in.  Provide scaffolding, amigos.  They will need help to make sure their notes are correct.  You don't want them studying the wrong thing!

Click here or on the image below to download the answer key for the notes.  You can give this to absent students or post it on the wall for students to check their work when they are done.

And, in case you want to edit the document, here is a DOC version of it.  Please don't edit out my Creative Commons statement.

¡Ojalá que sea útil!

Hasta pronto,

--AnneK

Perezoso y Cariñoso

My students loved the furiOSO so I couldn't resist and I had to add a perezOSO and a cariñOSO to the list.

And, since it is almost Valentine's Day, the cariñOSO is especially timely!

Murió En Un Accidente

What was going on with the Super Bowl commercials last Sunday?  Most of them were heavy, tragic, heart-wrenching, or just plain bad.  I'm not a sports person at all, but I decided to mix it up last Sunday by actually putting on the game (in the background) so I would be able to participate in conversation the following day.  But wow . . .

I think the commercial that was the worst aguafiestas of all was the Nationwide "I died from an accident" commercial.  It started off kind of cute then took a radical turn for heartbreaking.  If you want to watch it, here is the link.  Get your tissue box ready.

Nationwide Commercial

So now that I've contextualized this, you can understand the humor in this chiste gráfico.  I'm not a terrible person - I promise.  I was just poking fun at the commercial.  Share it with your students and I guarantee you'll get laughs and lots of discussion.  Mine fell out of their chairs yesterday when I showed it.

Ha ha!  Take that, Nationwide!  You are now a meme.

Obviously be careful about this one.  Don't show it to immature classes or to folks who have had a recent tragedy.  That would go over terribly.

And, because I was asked, here is a version in English too:

I hope you have a great week that is filled with homework and completely bereft  of accidents, amigos.

Hasta pronto,

--AnneK

Furioso

No, I'm not furiosa, despite the title of this post.  I'm working myself about half to death and I find little time to spend blogging, unfortunately.  Still, I have a backlog of great things I would like to polish up and prepare to post here. 

And I had this silly little idea for a cartoon today - the sort of thing that is perfect for a person who is just learning the language.  It's the kind of joke that gets rolled eyes from native speakers (except for six-year-olds), but language students will take a minute to decode it and will feel a tremendous sense of accomplishment.

FuriOSO . . .

I'm thinking of making a curioso, delicioso, amoroso, and peligroso too.  But we shall see if I ever find a little free time to make it happen.

Hasta la próxima,

--AnneK

Villancicos de Navidad

Thanksgiving 2014 has passed so it is now officially Christmas season!  One of the best things about Christmas, if you ask me, is the music.  I have bought quite a few Spanish Christmas songs over at iTunes so that I can play them in class during the last two weeks of the quarter. 

José Feliciano's Feliz Navidad continues to regale us year after year, and I suspect that the simplicity of the lyrics is partially responsible for its success.  Most everyone can belt out "feliz Navidad" over and over again, even if they get lost on the "prospero año" part of the song and try to fake their way through it.  I do make sure that all of my students know the line so they can seem knowledgeable when friends come at them with, "Hey, you take Spanish.  What are they saying in this song?"

 I put together some lyric sheets for the three Spanish Christmas Carols that I find are the easiest for my students to sing - Cascabel, Mi Burrito Sabanero, and Los Peces en el Río.  (I'm not sure the Christmas meaning of that last one, but it seems to be a Christmas carol by all accounts - even though I'm not seeing the connection.  There is a mention of the Virgin Mary washing diapers, so I guess that is vaguely related to Christmas . . . .)

If you would like to download a copy of the lyrics for these Christmas carols in Spanish, with festive decorations, please click here or on the image below.

And you might be asking yourself why I did not include the ever-present Feliz Navidad in the set, and the answer to that would be one word: copyright.  José Feliciano and his record label are not feeling especially friendly about sharing so, despite the fact that this blog is not widely read and is non-commercial, I'm going to play by the rules and respect the copyright.  If you wish to share the lyrics with your students in a strictly educational way, you can find them online with little effort.

Happy start to the Christmas season, amigos.  Away we go toward merriment and joy!

Hasta pronto,

--AnneK

Teaching and Learning with iPad Conference

What an interesting couple of days it has been at the Teaching and Learning with iPad Conference!  And, if I am to be frank, it's been exhausting too.  Normally when one goes to a conference, it is out of town and you get to have a little bit of a vacation experience by staying in the hotel and eating out at restaurants - well, at least that's the way I do it.  But this particular conference is held right here in my hometown.  In fact, it is co-sponsored by my school so it is populated by my coworkers, my administrators, and even quite a few of my students.  Meanwhile, I'm running around and doing all my usual stuff like taking my kids into school on Friday and picking them up in the carpool, grabbing things from the supermarket on the way home, and all that sort of thing.  It's an odd and somewhat disconcerting mix of home life and conference experience that just leaves me feeling wiped out.

The organizers of the event did a great job, I think.  Everything was well laid out and well planned.  There were drinks, tasty snacks, and friendly helpful folks all around.  There was a social hour with cocktails and in which our school's jazz band was the entertainment.   (Though I think more conferences could benefit from cocktails and jazz - this is not a good mix in front of your students.  I had to decline the temptation because I could think of so many ways - so many ways - that could go wrong.)  We had folks from all over the state here, as you might suspect, but we also had folks from other states and a whole bunch of folks from Canada too.  I heard talk that there were other foreign nationals in attendance too, but I didn't meet any of them personally.

I have one major issue, and that was the fault of the hotel - not the conference organizers, the wi-fi was terribly slow and unreliable.  In the case of a technology conference, this is simply not okay.  If you agree to host a "Teaching and Learning with the iPad" conference, then you have to expect that a few hundred people are going to all want to use thier iPads at the same time.  And there is an expectation on the part of presenters and attendees that there will be a way to get online and have access to everything we are showcasing and learning about.  When I gave my presentation on Friday, there was almost no bandwidth and much of what I wanted to show my attendees had to be skipped.  It was a shame, but the enthusiasm and the supportive energy I got from everyone made the presentation a success regardless, so I can't really complain.

In addition to presenting two sessions, I attended presentations in all available slots.  I learned about engaging active learners, gamification, flipped instruction, and blended learning.  I even got a digital badge for my participation in the gamification session.

This is the first conference that I have attended that was not focused on foreign language instruction, and that made it a bit unusual for me.  I wasn't able to hook up with as many people to share instructional ideas as I do at other conferences and I didn't get a friendly vibe off of everyone.  Maybe foreign language teachers are all just great people?  I don't know the answer to that, but it might be fun to research it - if I weren't already a bit biased.  Still, I met two folks that I like quite a bit and I tweeted to both of them today.  Maybe we will stay in touch and maybe not, but I feel like I have to make the attempt because connecting with other professionals is very important to me.

Hasta pronto,

--AnneK

Amapolas Para La Conmemoración

Veterans' Day is a week past now, and I am finally finding a free moment to share an idea with you.  The idea was not mine though, it was the inspiration of one of my colleagues who teaches French.

In Europe, and elsewhere to a lesser extent, it has become traditional to honor veterans of war with poppies.  The tradition began in France around the end of World War I and has grown in momentum over the years.  So, to acknowledge Veterans' Day, my colleague spoke to all of us in the foreign language department and the arts department about having our students make paper poppies. 

The idea was to have a field of poppies that would be a beautiful memorial to our veterans - and I think it turned out great.

 

Some folks are not naturally crafty so I decided to put together a set of instructions for those who might want to do this project themselves for a future Veterans' Day celebration.  It has written instructions, visual instructions, a template to follow, and reference photos (for those people who like to be precise).  Click here to download a PDF of the instructions or click on the image below.

 If you make poppies with your students, I would love to hear from you!  Send pictures or leave comments.  It's great to stay in touch, amigos.

Hasta pronto,

--AnneK

 

¿Cómo Cambiarías el Mundo?

How would you change the world?  It is a question I asked my Spanish IV students as we were beginning a chapter on ecology.  With so many ecological issues very present in our everyday consciousness, we hear a lot about cleaning up the air we breathe and the water we drink.  There is a lot of talk about getting trash up off the roads and recycling - both in our textbook and everywhere around us.  I thought my students would all be drawn to conversations about climate change and the environment, and many of them were. 

But many others chose to focus on things that were issues of personal importance to them instead - hunger, religious freedom, equality of education.  I was surprised by how honest they were and how they resisted the path that had been laid out for them by the textbook.

The project consisted of choosing a topic of personal importance, stating a desire to improve the world using the present subjunctive, and presenting it in an attractive way on a 10" x 10" square.  I provided class time in which we wrote our statements in the subjunctive, peer edited them, and I helped with grammar and phrasing.  (There are still errors in some of them.  It is student Spanish, after all.)

The creativity part was done, by in large, outside of class.  I did provide materials and artistic suggestions, but the students were given full creative privilege to do what they chose.  We discussed symbolism and how to represent our ideas using pictures, and I suggested that students might want to use three-dimensional elements in their design.  (The one above has actual sand on it.)  When I displayed them all together, wow . . . the results were beautiful and the message was so positive.

Hasta pronto, amigos.

--AnneK