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July - August: Some of the writing and listening activities from our latest icebreaker. "Vamos de tapas". You can also preview its video here.
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Teaching basic food vocabulary while having “tapas”
Posted by Alvaro
“Vamos the tapas” is an icebreaker for the first days of a Spanish I/beginner level. The objective of this lesson is to explain the general eating habits in Spain while students review basic grammar such as the –er and –ir verbs and how to tell the time. The vocabulary focuses on the most important food words, including breakfast (tostadas, mantequilla, galletas), lunch and dinner (carne, pescado, verdura, fruta, arroz) and beverages (leche, café, agua, refrescos).
The icebreaker also offers several exercises about the use of “mucho” and “poco”, and two audio activities to practice the key vocabulary. The PDF file included in the package prepares the students to get the gist of the video, with four activities that students should complete while watching it. There is also a reading exercise with additional information about the “tapas”.
If you’re interested in receiving a sample of the activities that accompany the video, you can subscribe to our monthly newsletter, and we’ll send them to your email account. You can also watch the video in low resolution in our icebreaker section.
We have also included in our newsletter a comprehensive guide to all of our materials, which you can also see below this post. We’ll update this file monthly so you can find all of our materials quickly and easily.
Finally, we’d like to wish everybody a great summer and we’ll be glad to get suggestions and ideas from other teachers to add new materials for the coming school year. ¡Feliz verano a todos!
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Learning the subjunctive in “El parque del Retiro”
Posted by Alvaro
“¡Qué llegue la primavera!” is an icebreaker for upper classes (Spanish III, B2 and above) which focuses on the irregular verbs in the subjunctive tense (dar, estar, haber, ir, saber and ser). It also covers vocabulary related to health and outdoor sports.
Thanks to our wonderful reporter, Andrea Savi, we interviewed different people in the most famous park of Madrid about the exercise they practice, and the benefits they get from them. We have prepared different activities, included in the PDF document that accompanies the icebreaker, to make sure your students are ready to understand what random people at the park told us.
The icebreaker, whose video you can already preview in low resolution, also includes three audio activities and a 9-page PDF document with the audio and video scripts.
Finally, on the day we filmed this video we were lucky to meet the Spanish Association of Tai Chi Xin Yi at the park, and they kindly answered our questions. We have decided to add subtitles to their answers, and to offer this video to all of our subscribers. You can also watch it here in a smaller size:
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Using visuals to teach basic grammar
Posted by Alvaro
The first days in a Spanish I class have a great importance. As teachers, we try to explain some of the basic aspects of a new language, and some of them are usually very different to the structures students use in their native language. That might lead to some confusion. To avoid the early appearance of feelings of frustration and disappointment, we should understand the different learning styles present in our classroom, trying to exploit them with different kind of resources.
Visual content –videos and PowerPoint presentations- are a great addition to traditional materials, especially at this stage. “Esta es mi clase”, our third Smart Lesson Plan, will help you explain many essential grammar concepts (i.e. el,la,los,las; un and una; muchos and muchas; cuántos and cuántas; ser and hay; the plural formation; the adjective-noun agreement) from a different perspective, more dynamic and appealing for most students.
The lesson plan includes 12 PowerPoint presentations, audio activities and a 4-minute video (with and without subtitles) to cover all the topics related to the description of a classroom.
Remember that you just need a computer, loudspeakers and a projector or smart board to get the most from this 4-hour lesson plan.
You can preview the video in low resolution and purchase the lesson plan in our Smart Lesson Plan section.
We also filmed a second video with the same actors that collaborated with us in “Esta es mi clase”. We asked them to answer the questions that some students from Chicago had sent us trough their teacher (thanks Mike!). They were free to answer whatever they wanted, so there isn’t a script or any kind of modifications behind this video. Since this video doesn’t include any activities, we have decided to publish it here for free, and also to send it to all of our subscribers.
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Get ready for a delicious Peruvian lunch
Posted by Alvaro
“Mi mejor propina”, our second Smart Lesson Plan, will take your class to a Peruvian restaurant to practice the most common expressions and the key vocabulary to order food in Spanish. Our lesson plans include a variety of activities -PowerPoint presentations, listening and audio exercises, videos and games- to engage your students from the beginning of the unit to its end.
We have published a low resolution version of the “Mi mejor propina” video in our Smart Lesson Plan section and some of the PowerPoint slides in the following presentation:
The “Mi mejor propina” package also includes the possibility to watch the video with subtitles, audio files with their transcripts and a detailed Word document (both in Spanish and English) with clear instructions and information about how to implement each activity. For more information about our Smart Lesson Plans, just click here or contact us.
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