28 de oct., La Isla y los verbos, 7+

Hola estudiantes y padres,

While I chased down my 4 yr. old, class was opened today by Chester Davis,  who taught the students how to say the names of the food they had eaten for lunch. Thanks Chester!

Then we had an impromptu geography/history/colonization lesson and your kids were geography whizzes! They had a hard time figuring out what language was spoken in Brazil, but I think they could tell you now.  We also talked about the language origins of the U.S.state names! Students, can you tell your parents the MEANING in English of these Spanish state names? (We only talked about the first 3)

Colorado
Montana
Florida
California
Nevada


We read parts of a beautiful book called "La Isla" by Arthur Dorros.  I found it at Barnes and Noble, and you can find another of his books, "Abuela" at the public library.  It has great art and we spend some time comparing what we saw in the pictures to life as we know it.  We also talked about what a generalization is and that it can be useful in making comparisons. We noted the colorful houses, the tropical animals, clothing, tropical foods, etc.  We tried dried coconut, papaya, banana and pineapple.

We spent the last half of class working on living sentences and verb wheels.  We will finish them next week and will be able to create all kinds of simple sentences.  Yay!

The following is a popular cartoon in Spain and Mexico, although it is originally made in France! It features a grandmother who solves mysteries with a bunch of kids.  In this episode, her cat becomes phosphorus and they are trying to find out how this happened and also a cure. It does have one short part that could be possibly scary to younger children or sensitive ones like my Charlotte, but I think she would be okay with it since in resolves quickly and the tone of the cartoon is fairly light. If you like the cartoon, there are many more episodes. Students: listen for the words "verde", "abuela" y
gato".

28 de oct. , Chu Chu wa, niños 4-6

Dear Parents and Kids,

Today we learned a silly song and the kids seemed to have a lot of fun with it.  I have written the lyrics down in case you want to sing it at home, although it would be a lot easier to just let the cartoon characters and little boy sin and dance it for you. We also played Simon says using the words on the following list:

Brazo- arm

Puño -fist

Dedo- finger

Hombros- shoulders

Cabeza- head

Pies - feet

Pingüino- penguin

Cola- tail

Lengua- tongue

Chuchuwa, wa, wa
Compañía, brazo extendido
Chuchuwa, wa, wa
Compañía, brazo extendido, puño cerrado
Chuchuwa, wa, wa
Compañía, brazo extendido, puño cerrado, dedo hacia arriba
Chuchuwa, wa, wa
Compañía, brazo extendido, puño cerrado, dedo hacia arriba, hombros en alto
Chuchuwa, wa, wa
Compañía, brazo extendido, puño cerrado, dedo hacia arriba, hombros en alto, cabeza hacia atrás
Chuchuwa, wa, wa
Compañía, brazo extendido, puño cerrado, dedo hacia arriba, hombros en alto, cabeza hacia atrás, cola hacia atrás
Chuchuwa, wa, wa
Compañía, brazo extendido, puño cerrado, dedo hacia arriba, hombros en alto, cabeza hacia atrás, culete hacia atrás, pies de pingüino
Chuchuwa, wa, wa
Compañía, brazo extendido, puño cerrado, dedo hacia arriba, hombros en alto, cabeza hacia atrás, cola hacia atrás, pies de pingüino, lengua fuera
Chuchuwa, wa, wa

Pocoyo is a great little guy with Spanish origin.  He also attempts to dance the Chu CHu wa.

"Pocoyo doesn´t mean exactly “little me” in Spanish (but it´s mean is quite similar). The real translation of it would be more like “not much me” o “a little bit me” but in actual fact it is a word or a construction that exists neither in Spanish nor in English (I´m almost positive!). The real story behind the name is much more enchanting (especially for me…).

When we started the series my daughter Vega was 2 years old. Every night before bed she used to say a little prayer that goes “baby Jesus light of my life, you are a child like me” (In Spanish, Jesusito de mi vida, tú eres niño como yo). Because she still couldn´t talk properly, instead of saying “como yo” at the end of the prayer, she used to say “poco yo”!

We all love the funny little things our children say at this age, but I thought this one would make a great name for the series, and I managed to convince everyone! I love thinking that the title of a series and a character that is alive in many people´s minds, that is being watched in many countries, that is the star of books and toys and is almost a brand name, is a word invented by a child, a mixup of words …. My daughter´s words! (:-D)"

David Cantolla

http://www.pocoyo.com/blog-en/why_pocoyo/

21 de oct. Ricitos de oro (Goldilocks), Niños 4-6 y 7+

Dear parents and students,

Classes today were fun!

7+
We acted out the following list of verbs.  Then I played the story on CD of "Ricitos de oro" and asked the students to let me know when they realized which story it was.  About half of the students got it.  We talked about ways to try and figure out what is going on, even though we can't understand everything.  In this case, they had the word "Oso" (bear) that they had already learned.  Some students pointed out the "Papá, mamá, bebé¨gave it away.  For others it was combination of voices or the structure.  I was very proud of their thinking skills!

We also acted out the story 3 times and if you are up to it, you can practice it again at home.  A narrator can read the script below and others can act it out.

Finally we played a game called ¨Little Bear¨ using the phrases ¨¿Quién tiene miedo del osito?¨ and ¨yo no¨.  Students, can you tell your parents what these phrases mean?

Niños 4-6
We made popsicle stick puppets to play with at home, but we also acted out the story with stuffed animals. One sweet girl in our class could not believe that Goldilocks had changed her name to Ricitos de oro!

duerme - sleep

camina – walk

ve-see

come-eat

siéntese – sit down

sube-climb

tiene-have

levántese-get up

Ricitos de oro y los tres osos   (Goldilocks and the Three Bears)

Hay tres osos. (There are three bears.)

El papá oso es grande. (Papa bear is big)

La mamá osa es mediana. (Mama bear is medium size.)

El bebé oso es pequeño. (Baby bear is little.)

Un día los osos caminan por el bosque. (One day the bears walk through the forest.)

La chica Ricitos de Oro camina por el bosque. (The girl Goldilocks walks through the

forest.)

Ella ve una casa en el bosque. (She sees a house in the forest.)

La casa es de los osos. (The house is the three bears.)

Ella entra en la casa. (She enters the house.)

Ella ve tres platos hondos de sopa. (She sees three bowls of soup.)

Ella come toda la sopa del oso pequeño. (She eats all of the soup of the little bear.)

Ella ve tres sillas. (She sees three chairs.)

Ella se sienta en la silla del oso pequeño y la silla se rompe. (She sits in the chair of the

little bear, and the chair breaks.)

Ella sube las escaleras. (She climbs the stairs.)

Ricitos de Oro sube en la cama y ella se duerme. (Goldilocks climbs into the bed, and

she falls asleep.)

Los osos regresan a su casa. (The three bears return home.)

Ellos ven los platos hondos y el oso pequeño no tiene sopa. (They see the bowls and the

little bear doesn’t have any soup.)

Ellos ven las sillas y el oso pequeño no tiene una silla. (They see the chairs and the little

bear doesn’t have a chair.

Ellos ven la cama y ven Ricitos de Oro en la cama. (They see the bed and they see

Goldilocks in the bed.

Ricitos de Oro se levanta de la cama y sale por la ventana. (Goldilocks gets up from the

bed and leaves through the window.

Listen to this storybook:

This version is somewhat animated:

14 de octubre, La oruga muy hambrienta, niños 4-6 y 7+

La oruga muy hambrienta  (The Very Hungry Caterpillar)

Hola familias,

Today was a busy day! My daughter kept begging for a craft so we put together a storyboard for practicing the story.  Not everyone had the chance to tell me the story (our abbreviated version) , but I suggested they try and tell it to 3 different people this week.  It will go something like this:

La oruga comió y comió y comió una manzana.
Comió, comió, comió dos peras.
Comió, comió, comió tres ciruelas.
Comió, comió, comió cuatro fresas.
Comió, comió, comió cinco naranjas.
Comió, comió, comió un helado.
Comió, comió, comió una hoja.
Se construyó una casita.
Se convirtió a una mariposa.

We did something similar in the niños 4-6 class, practicing the names of the food, numbers and reviewing colors mostly.

Vocabulario

Huevecillo – little egg

El Sol- the sun

Una Oruga- a caterpillar

Tenía hambre- she was hungry

Comió- she ate

Manzana- apple

Peras- pears

Ciruelas- plums

Fresas-strawberries

Naranjas- oranges

Dolor de estómago- tummy ache

Casita- Little house

Una mariposa- a butterfly

This is the story:

This video is a Hermie the Worm video in Spanish

A cute cartoon about a caterpillar discovering her gift.

7 de octubre, 7+

Buenas tardes,

The Spanish class played soccer on Tuesday! We had talked a bit about how to play it and some of the terms and then we gave it a go.  Thankfully, most of the kids knew what they were doing and Daniel and Stephan even took turns playing ref.  They did an amazing job!  Most of the boys had played soccer before while most of the girls had not.  The boys won 4-1 (the kids graciously let me sneak in a score a goal for the girls' side...thanks! I loved it!).  The girls were great defenders.  The boys were a great offense with talented goalies.They all passed to each other and were a great teams!

We also talked about the "we" form of verbs and identified the verbs in the book I was able to copy for them.  We analyzed patterns and discovered this rule:

the "we" (nosotros) form of verbs all end in
-amos
-emos
-imos

Can you recall which verbs end in "amos"?  Did you say the verbs that end in -AR? You are right!

Practice saying the we form of these verbs:

pasar-  pasamos
ganar-  ganamos
patear-  pateamos
dar-  damos

correr- corremos

abrir-  abrimos

Here is a video teaching about sports:

We are continuing to learn the lyrics to "Cristo me ama".  Here is another video of that song:

7 de octubre, Cú Cú, niños 4-6

Hola Familias,

We had a great time today singing this song and acting it out.  The kids made a craft they can use to tell you the story.  

Cu cú, cu cú

Cantaba- was singing

Pasó- he/she passed by

Pidió- he/she asked

No le quiso dar- he/she didn´t want to give it to him/her

Llorar- to cry

Rana- frog

Agua-water

Caballero- knight

Capa- cape

Sombrero- hat

Señora- lady

Traje de cola- dress with train, flamenco style

Marinero- sailor

Romero- rosemary

Ramito- little branch

Cu cú, cu cú
Cu cú, cu cú 

Cu cú cantaba la rana
Cu cú debajo del agua.

Cu cú pasó un caballero
Cu cú con capa y sombrero.

Cu cú pasó una señora
Cu cú con traje de cola.

Cu cú pasó un marinero
Cu cú vendiendo romero.

Cu cú le pidió un ramito.
Cu cú no le quiso dar.
Cu cú y se echó a llorar

Cuckoo, cuckoo, sang the frog,
Cuckoo, cuckoo, 
Cuckoo, cuckoo.

Cuckoo, cuckoo, sang the frog,
Cuckoo, under the water.

Cuckoo, cuckoo, a gentleman passed by,
Cuckoo, cuckoo, with a cloak and hat.

Cuckoo, cuckoo, a woman passed by,
Cuckoo, cuckoo, in a dress with a long train.

Cuckoo, cuckoo, a sailor passed by,
Cuckoo, cuckoo, selling rosemary.

Cuckoo, cuckoo, the little frog asked for a sprig,
Cuckoo, cuckoo, but he didn't want to give her any,
Cuckoo, cuckoo, and she began to cry.

Song video:(this has a slight difference near the end, but is the clearest video I could find. )

Story: