IT’S BEEN A MINUTE.
Some might even say it’s been a “hot minute” since I last posted. And, of course, they are correct. Like many of you, I was overwhelmed and took time to center myself and gain perspective. This meant giving up several enjoyable activities that would inevitably add stress. I’m so glad I took that time!
I’m as refreshed as possible and ready to start planning again!
With the start of school is just around the corner, I’m reflecting on what was successful this past spring.
Things that worked very well for me:
- Google Classroom. It’s free, simple to set up, and easy to use.
- Google Slides as my daily planner. I made a slide show for each day of class. Everything that I needed to say in class went on a slide so that I didn’t forget to tell any sections important information.
- I did NOT overdo PD. A lot of times, seeing others putting together amazing digital lessons that I just won’t be able or have time to reproduce produces more anxiety.
- Adapt familiar lessons. Rather than reinvent the wheel, I took familiar CI lessons from TPT that already had slide presentations and adapted those to my needs.
- Focus on maintaining. I did not stress about what were “weren’t going to get through.” I chose to reinforce previously acquired targeted structures to make sure students didn’t lose ground. Let’s face it, not a lot of acquisition was going to occur given the circumstances and every student in every school in every corner of the United States was going to be in the same position. Instead of fighting it, I accepted it and focused on maintaining.
- Zoom. I did take the time to learn how to use Zoom. This enabled me to keep up with my dual credit students.
- Flexibility and grace. Last spring was truly an unprecedented time in our history. No one predicted that schools would shut down on a moment’s notice. I decided from day one that I would be as flexible as possible and I would err on the side of grace in every single student encounter. It was more work for me: I offered three different Zoom meeting times each week (morning, afternoon, evening) to accommodate as many students as possible. When a student missed a class or an assignment, I asked how I could help them make up the work rather than get angry and give them a zero. Deciding to show grace helped me to eliminate any negative feelings I might have mis-applied to students.
My favorite go-to activity:
One of the webinars I did attend early on was produced by Fluency Fast and featured Justin Slocum Bailey of Indwelling Language fame. I have met Justin several times at conferences and he is one of the kindest, most genuine people I know. His ideas are outside the box and truly engaging for students. I knew that I would get way more than I paid for out of this webinar – and I was right!
Justin taught us how he takes a picture, zooms in on one part of it and then asks a series of questions.
Level 1: What do you see?
Students have 3 minutes to write down everything they see. Novice learners will list objects and description. More advanced might write sentences.
Level 2: What questions do you have?
Students have 4 minutes to write as many questions as they can about what they are seeing. I provide the question words to help them out. Novice learners will focus on the Who, What, Where questions while more advanced might focus on How and Why questions.
Level 3: Write sentences that all begin with perhaps.
This is an advanced activity that requires the subjunctive in Spanish. So definitely late level 3 or 4.
You can see how I used this slides presentation to adapt Justin’s ideas to my own needs:
If you would like to download and make a copy of this presentation to adapt to your own needs, use this link.
I found this song by chance…
…and I knew immediately that it was perfect. The refrain is calma, calma, no pasa nada. We use the phrase “no pasa nada” a lot in my classes. It’s one of the ways I show grace and model flexibility – no big deal, we can take care of that.
Since the song is about emotions, I started the lesson with asking, “How are you today?” and posted various options for support (it’s nerve wracking to speak in class, but Zoom classes take that nervousness to a whole new level!). We listened to the song, described the cover art and asked our questions. Then we did the cloze activity. We ended in English so we could have an open and honest conversation about our feelings in the very scary beginning stages of this pandemic.
Fostering resiliency.
I really liked how this lesson progressed and opened students to discussing their feelings at the end. Acknowledging someone’s feelings as valid and acceptable is one of the best ways to show them they are important and that you care. Especially in the middle of a pandemic. Affirming students’ feelings as perfectly normal is one thing we can do to help build resiliency.
