lesson planning

I think i will do my lesson plan on Spanish vocabulary related to favorite hobbies and activities. I will have to find a broad SOL for this topic, but if I remember correctly it is usually a part of the Spanish 2 curriculum.
Here's a possibility:

SII.1 The student will exchange spoken and written information and ideas in Spanish.
1. Ask questions and provide responses based on self, others, and the immediate environment, such as exchanges concerning people and things, plans and events, feelings and emotions,and direction and location.

I think the backwards design is a good way to make lesson plans because it helps the teachers keep the end objective in mind and not lose sight of their primary job--teaching.

If I only have access to a personal computer I could present a powerpoint, non-linear or linear, to help students learn the vocabulary. I could also create a non-linear powerpoint that functions as a practice quiz. This will work if I have access to a computer lab so every student can have a computer. I'm sure I can come up with more creative ways to use technology, but that's all I can think of right now.

Reflecting

I've taken an awful long time to reflect on the assessment experience and I think it was pretty helpful for this assignment. People were at different stages of a rough draft so it was hard to give feedback for the more incomplete drafts (my self-included), but nonetheless it was helpful to share ideas and get feedback on our topics. I also learned a little bit about problems that may arise with the movie maker/imovie and how to combat those issues. I think both giving and getting feedback is beneficial and I learned things through my peers' insight as well my own reflections.

In the future I would definitely use peer evaluation in the classroom. Especially when students write drafts I think peer evaluation is a good way to make sure everyone is on track. I find that there is usually wide range of competency levels in the Spanish classroom, so I think using a rubric to evaluate each other's work would be the best peer evaluation strategy. This could also be combined with the layer cake technique to make sure students are getting positive feedback and constructive criticism.

Topic, specifically

So here's the plan:

1. Digital movie
2. Using iMovie
3. The topic is generally my girlfriends, but more specifically how different boys have come and gone but my friends have always been a consistent factor in my life. It's not going to be a "boys suck" rant, but I just wanted to make a small tribute to my friends through imovie using the thousands of pictures I've taken our my teen/young adult years.

Digital Media Project

Whenever a teacher offers these sorts of open-ended creative projects it kind of freaks me out. Don't get me wrong, freedom of choice is an amazing thing, but I always wonder if the topic I choose will be too boring or too ridiculous. I probably should just get over worrying about what other people will think, but I mean we all care to a certain extent right? Or else why bother to dress decently, or dress at all? I'm getting off topic. At first I thought about doing something related to food (because I love it) and then I thought I might do something like "a day in the life of Laura Adams" because she's my roommate and pretty interesting. Then I remembered how much I love taking pictures (I have almost 3000 posted and waiting to incriminate me on facebook) and I decided I want to make a movie using these pictures. I haven't exactly narrowed a theme, but I think I want to show how from first year to the present many people have come and gone, but there are those that have remained constant. It sounds a little cheesy right now, but my friends and the memories we make are so important to me that I think I can do a good job working with them in my project.

matrix topics

I think I will work with these Spanish topics for my midterm project:

---Basic conjugation of the verb (present tense)

---Preterit versus imperfect (when to use the different tenses)

---Commands

---Ser versus estar

---Important festivals/holidays in one or more Hispanic-speaking countries (possibly The Day of the Dead)

---Vocabulary related to outdoor activities, hobbies, and favorite pastimes in general

TOPIC

My topic will be the subjunctive tense in Spanish. (what this verb tense is, when to use it, and how to form it.)

SIII.9 The student will strengthen his/her knowledge of the English language through the study and analysis of increasingly complex elements of the Spanish language.
1. Demonstrate understanding that language and meaning do not transfer directly from one language to another.
2. Demonstrate understanding that vocabulary, linguistic structures, and tense usage in English differ from those of the Spanish language.

Webquests

I decided to spend more time searching through the webquest archives and I found a lot of very interesting webquests related to teaching Spanish. There were ones geared to various levels of ability, which is nice because many times high school teachers have to teach classes at different ability levels. Many of the webquests were designed to teach students about the Hispanic culture. For instance, one webquest was designed to teach students about the famous Hispanic poet, Federico García Lorca. Another webquest I found really great was one designed as a group project for students. Students had to work together to plan a trip to South America on a limited budget. At the end all the groups would share their virtual trip to their specific country to the entire class. Part of learning Spanish is learning about the Hispanic culture as well and I really like these approaches to doing that.

In the future I could use webquests to create group projects similar to the ones I saw. The webquests can be varied to adapt the Spanish class. For the more advanced classes I would write the webquest only in Spanish, but for the lower level classes the webquest would be in English and would serve as an introduction to Hispanic culture rather than practice of the language.