Monday, November 18, 2024

Authentic resources for your school unit!

The transition to middle school has not been easy but I'm back with some great authentic resources that would work for any novice learner from 3rd grade on up. 


First up is the chain of private schools in Chile. Each school has a virtual tour and a fantastic Información Práctica page that includes school supply lists, schedules, lunch menus, and uniforms. I actually had my 7th graders look at these and then create their own Información Práctica page for our school in Spanish as their final project for this unit. 

These tours were great for learning places in school


These schedules were great for practicing subjects, time, and comparing & contrasting

This Instagram page for a school in Colombia has some great posts - there are students talking about their favorite subject and one that would be great for adjectives. 






This reel is a great opener or review of school supplies. 


This one from Tang Venezuela is kinda weird but fun - it tells you what flavor tang goes with your favorite subject. 


Same idea but with sneakers. I think next year I will have students come up with their own versions of these posts. 




That's all for now - If you have authentic resources related to school share in the comments below!












Thursday, June 27, 2024

New school - new look

 Every winter for the last 12 years there have been discussions about ending the district support for our elementary World Language programs and for 11 of those years they decided to keep us around. Mostly because it was usually too late in the year to start thinking of how to restructure things to make it more fair (not every elementary school had a district funded World Language teacher.) 

Every year until this year. This year they finally decided that it would make more fiscal sense to allocate our positions to the middle schools. 

From a district standpoint I 100% understand the decision. It hasn't been fair to over half the schools that don't have a World Language program and this will allow them to get more "bang for their buck." 

From a personal standpoint it has been incredibly hard. I have loved working at my school and the little kids. I'm more than a little nervous about moving up to middle school. 

The good news is I'm going to an IB school where World Language is highly valued! I won't be a lone ranger anymore - I'll be part of a departement of 6! I already have friends who work there! 

If you have followed me for elementary lessons and ideas - thank you! I hope you continue to read along as I adjust to middle school. I suspect (hope really) that many of my elementary ideas will also work with older students. And if you teach middle school - please send me good thoughts and any advice you might have!