Hola todos,
¡Cómo vuela el tiempo! Por fin, la primavera toca la puerta. Los días son más largos y los pájaros canta a fuerzas. Los brotes de las plantas muestran sus cabecitas y el sol nos calienta más y más. Los niños felices de correr y jugar, tiran sus chaquetas por todos lados. ¡Así es la primavera!
How time flies! Finally spring is knocking at the door. The days are longer and the birds singing away. The sprouts of plants are showing their heads and the sun warms us more and more. The children happily run and play, tossing their jackets everywhere. Such is spring!
Thanks to all who helped with the Spanish games at the Whittier Fun Fair! It's so awesome that the students are exposed to additional Spanish speakers and I think the families enjoy connecting. The students really enjoy the games and come back to school Monday talking all about them! I look forward to continuing to build our network of Whittier Spanish speakers!
I apologize for not writing more frequently to keep you up on our work. We have been very busy from the start of the new year till now. In the younger grades, we worked on winter words and winter clothing for most of January. In grades 4 & 5, we wrote and performed conversational puppet shows. In February, we celebrated One Hundred Day by creating a list of 100 words (or more!) en español. We continue to build our vocabulary, understanding of the culture, and use of the language through multiple activities, music and movement, and games. In getting ready for ISATs we practiced our math facts en español. What fun!
On March 9, we welcomed special visitors from Nakano Nishi High School in Nagano, Japan. They spent the morning at Whittier, moving from class to class and working in small groups to teach our students a bit about their country, a few words, and doing an origami project with them. Ask your child what he/she did and learned. The trip to Whittier has become an annual tradition when the Japanese students who are with students at OPRF High School for two weeks come for their visit. On both sides, we gain much from sharing our time together.
Last week was especially eventful when I lost my voice from Wednesday to Friday. We had class as usual but I planned activities that the students could lead without my using my voice much. Interesting being a language teacher with no voice!! Sure brings out your creativity as a teacher! The students were very empathetic, checking on me daily to see if I had re-gained my voice. And what a great job they did with the learning! ¡Bravo!
Here's a taste of our learning in March:
K, K-1: Greetings, calendar, numbers, Spring themes
K-2: Greetings, calendar, numbers, Spring themes, Getting reading for Spring Sing
Some of our new vocabulary: flores (flowers), lluvia (rain), sol (sun), luna, (moon),tierra (earth), brisa (breeze), primavera (spring)
2, 2/3: Greetings, numbers, cardinal directions, Getting ready for Spring Sing
Some of our new vocabulary: norte (north), sur (south), este (east), oeste (west), nordeste (northeast), sudeste (southeast), nordoeste (northwest), sudoeste (southwest)
3: Greetings, numbers, cardinal directions, Getting ready for Spring Sing, Spanish alphabet with special emphasis on vowels
Spanish is such a phonetic language that if one masters the vowels, s/he's got 70+ per cent of the pronunciation!
4/5: Vocabulary building: nouns, questions, and other key words
Some of our new vocabulary: nada (nothing), algo (something), nadie (no one, nobody), alguien (someone, somebody), ¿Quíen? (Who?), ¿Qué? (What?), ¿Cuándo? (When?), ¿Dónde? (Where?), ¿Cómo? (How?), ¿Por qué? (Why?), ¿Cuántos? (How many?), ¿Cuánto? (How much?)
Looking ahead a bit:
K-2: Spring themes continued; food
2, 2/3, 3: Telling time; food
4/5: Review of time; work on adjectives and poetry; writing about ourselves
Thanks for all you do to support your child's language learning and exposure to Spanish-speaking and other cultures. The more language, the better! I look forward to hearing all about your experiences and travels -- near and far.
As always do not hesitate to contact me with questions or concerns. Check back soon for more details on what we're up to!
Gracias por todo y hasta pronto,
Sra. Deaton
