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Las aventuras de Sammy

March 31, 2011

DAY ONE Objective: Students will discuss adventure as it relates to their lives and the lives of others. Campanada: Students write their responses to these questions using complete sentences in Spanish upon entry.

  1. ¿Quién tiene mucha aventura en su vida? Escribe una lista de personas. - Who has a lot of adventure in their lives? Write a list of people.
  2. ¿Hay aventura en tu vida? Descríbela. - Is there adventure in your life? Describe it.
  3. ¿Vivir en Alaska es una aventura? ¿Por qué? - Is living in Alaska an adventure? Why?
  • Key vocabulary is written on the side board. “Vivir” can be tricky, because they usually recognize it as “to live”, and not “living”. This is a great pop-up grammar point. “Living” can be a noun (concept/idea) or a verb (gerund).
  • Discuss answers as a class

Choose a Cantaninja Intro Song: La tortuga manuelita: *Sigh* This song is so sweet.

  • First, before listening to the song, read the lyrics (attached to post) with your students. Simplify them and gesture so that students understand.
  • Listen to the song once and encourage students to watch the video as they listen. Gesture the lyrics as the video plays so that you are still in their line of vision.
  • Listen to the song again, and ask students to draw a picture describing the action in each segment in the box next to it on the lyrics sheet.
  • Listen to the song a third time as students finish their drawings.

Discussion: ¿Manuelita tiene aventura en su vida? - Does Manuelita have adventure in her life? DAY TWO Objective: Students make predictions about traveling and adventures from a movie trailer. Campanada: Students write their responses to these questions using complete sentences in Spanish upon entry.

  1. ¿Te gusta viajar? - Do you like to travel?
  2. ¿Viajas con tu familia? - Do you travel with your family?
  3. ¿A dónde viajas y cuándo? - Where do you travel and when?
  4. ¿Es bueno viajar? - Is it good to travel?
  • Discuss answers as a class

Choose a Cantaninja Movie trailer

  • Explain to students that you are going to watch an awesome video. It is the trailer for a Spanish movie called “Las aventuras de Sammy” - “The Adventures of Sammy.” Sammy is a baby turtle that has many adventures in the ocean with his friends.  (The movie was originally in German, actually...also, you can download this movie in about a million places on the Internet. It seems like that should be illegal, but it is so available that I’m confused. If anyone can figure this out, please let me know.)
  • Let the students watch the trailer the first time without any direction. As always, I recommend downloading the movie using Firefox's YouTube downloader add-on. You won't tax your school's bandwidth or have to wait for it to load.
  • Now, post these questions on the board, and watch the video two or three more times while students try to answer them. I let them write things down in English if they don’t know how to say them in Spanish yet.

1. ¿Qué animales hay en el video? - What animals are in the video? 2. ¿Qué problemas o posibles peligros hay? - What problems or possible dangers are there? 3. ¿Qué palabras o frases oyes? - What words or phrases do you hear? 4. ¿Qué emociones siente Sammy? - What emotions does Sammy feel?

  • Discuss answers as a class.
  • If it's helpful or in case you want to do a different activity with the trailer, here is the script for the voiceover: "Hasta ayer, Sammy no era más que un bebé tortuga solo en el océano. Pero de repente, empezaron los problemas...y todo el mundo saltó por los aires. Porque cuando haces nuevos amigos, todo es posible. Y cada momento es una nueva oportunidad de disfrutar. Ahora, Sammy y sus amigos van a emprender el viaje de su vida. En esta gran aventura, tendrán que cruzar todos los océanos para volver a encontrarse."

Writing: Student-Generated Script

  • This part was inspired by Laurie Clarcq’s fantastic strategies on developing student-generated embedded readings. She is a genius!
  • Ask students to write what they think the movie is about. Encourage them to be creative and add LOTS of descriptive details. Try to save ten minutes at the end of class for this part so that they have lots of time to develop their ideas.
  • Encourage the students to use their observations about the trailer from the class discussion.
  • Now, you have some work to do! During your planning time (ha, ha) you will arrange each class’s writing from shortest to longest. Beginning with the shortest, pull out one creative detail or beautiful sentence. Keep adding new details and information from the other students’ pieces until you have a cohesive, collaborative story of about 100 words--as Laurie states, a reading that even the lowest reader in your class can understand. Follow Laurie's directions until you have used sentences or information from every student's writing, and you have three readings (approx. 100, 150, 200 words).

DAY THREE Objective: Students will understand a story about Sammy the Turtle. Campanada: Students write their responses to these questions using complete sentences in Spanish upon entry.

  1. ¿Tú disfrutas de la clase de español? ¿Por qué? - Do you enjoy Spanish class? Why?
  2. ¿Tú disfrutas de la tarea? ¿Por qué? - Do you enjoy homework? Why?
  3. ¿Tú disfrutas de un programa de televisión? ¿Cuál? ¿Por qué? Do you enjoy a TV program? Which one? Why?
  4. ¿De qué disfrutan tus amigos?
  • Discuss answers as a class. Make sure that "disfrutas de" is posted on the board somewhere.

Choose a Cantaninja Embedded Reading, Level One

  • Distribute copies of the first level embedded reading that you created last night.
  • Read it aloud to the class, then give students time to read it on their own.
  • Ask several reading comprehension questions, and have students write their answers on a post-it note or other small paper. Label it "BEFORE". This is a formative reading assessment.

Acting out the story

  • Choose actors and have them act out the story. Circle important structures and check for comprehension.
  • Ask the students the same reading comprehension questions and have them write their answers on the other side of the paper. Label it "AFTER".
  • Now, you can compare how well students understood the reading before the representation with how well they understand it afterward (reading vs. listening/visual comprehension). Students do not receive a grade for these assessments.

DAY FOUR Objective: Students will assess the validity of several statements based on a reading. Campanada: Students write their responses to these questions using complete sentences in Spanish upon entry.

  • Ask three to four questions about yesterday's story to remind them of what has happened.
  • Review answers as a class

Embedded Reading, Level II

  • Distribute copies of the second level embedded reading (150 words)
  • Read it aloud to the class, and ask them to underline three phrases or sentences that stand out to them.
  • Read it aloud again, but ask students to say anything that they underlined with you as you say it (their voices join in with yours).
  • Draw up several (5-6) quick sketches of things that do or do not happen in the story (2-3 that do, 2-3 that don't). Show a picture (and make sure students know in English what is going on in the sketch), then have them put their heads down and give a thumbs up if it happens or a thumbs down if it doesn't. Put an "X" next to a student's name on your class roster if they answer incorrectly. Repeat for each question. This will count as a reading comprehension assessment in the gradebook. I think that the thumbs up/down is more difficult to see, so I don't think cheating is as much a factor with this one as the up/down assessment. Just make sure their heads are tucked away!

Peer Teaching

  • Divide the class into pairs, then split the reading into as many portions as you have pairs of students (if you don't have many students, they should work individually).
  • Assign one portion of the text to each pair of students, and tell them that it will be their job to make sure the class understands that part of the story. They should illustrate it, circle it, and gesture it so that their classmates understand.
  • Have each group present in order.

DAY FIVE Objective: Students will compare and contrast the adventures of two characters. Campanada: Students write their responses to these questions using complete sentences in Spanish upon entry.

  • Ask three to four questions about yesterday's story to remind them of what has happened.
  • Review answers as a class

Speaking Re-tell

  • Show the pictures that each group drew yesterday on the doc cam and have students describe what is going on in each picture to their shoulder partner.

Embedded Reading, Level III

  • Distribute copies of the level III reading to students.
  • Students will read it aloud with their shoulder partners: one person reads all of the old content, and the other partner reads the content that was added into Level III.
  • Act it out one more time as a class, circling the new information and checking for comprehension.

Writing assessment: Character comparison

  • Watch the "La tortuga Manuelita" video again, gesturing the lyrics as students follow along.
  • Draw a big Venn Diagram on the board.
  • Divide students into three groups: "Manuelita", "Sammy", and "Manuelita y Sammy".
  • Each group is responsible for creating a list of characteristics and actions that fit into their portion of the Venn Diagram.
  • After 5-7 minutes, stop the groups and have a representative present to the class. You can fill in the information on the diagram on the board.
  • Now, ask students to compare and contrast the stories of the two characters, or the characters themselves. Let them write for 10 minutes.

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