Yo me llamo...

A few weeks ago my family met a native Spanish speaker. I chatted with the man for a bit and mentioned that my kids are learning Spanish. The man turned to my daughter, Lauren Clay, and asked her what her name was (in Spanish.) Eventually she sang him the Buenos Días song or something, but we went home and talked about how to ask and answer about names so that she can engage in a little bit more conversation next time we meet a Spanish speaker.

This year I have really worked on receptive language, focusing productive language to the children singing along with the songs we do each week. Most of your children can respond to the language they have learned this year. They can show me big and small when they hear "grande" and "pequeño." They can point to most animals and the older children can point to colors when they hear them. Lately I have made some of our songs more conversational so the children recognize them as dialogue if they have an opportunity to talk with someone in Spanish (especially the "Buenos dias, ¿Cómo estás?" song.) I have also been encouraging the children to find opportunities in their day to use certain phrases that they have learned (like saying, "¡me gusta!" when they like something.)

I do hope your children finish this year with a few useful phrases ready so they can have a very basic exchange with a Spanish speaker. So over the next few months, we will be working on some simple one-liners such as:

yo me llamo (yoe meh YAH-moe)= my name is...
por favor (pour fah-VOUR)= please
gracias (GDAH-see-us)= thank you

We have done some "please" and "thank you" already, but this week the kids heard "me llamo" for the first time. We did a little chant:

"Yo me llamo Shannon. ¿Cómo te llamas tú?"

I chanted along with each child (in most cases, I chanted for the children) and we went around the room to ask each child his/her name. We did the same with the animals we have been using in class. (You may have seen the paper that the children colored with each of the animal names on it.) We will continue to play with this chant so that the phrase is easy to remember.

You might use the animal paper to see which ones your child can point to when hearing the name:

el avestruz (ehl ah-veh-STROOS): ostrich
el elefante (ehl eh-lay-FAHN-tay): elefant
la jirafa (lah hee-DAH-fah): giraffe
el loro (ehl LOE-doe): parrot
el mono (ehl MOE-noe): monkey
la zebra (lah SAY-brah): zebra

We sang the elefante song, a favorite among most of the children. Click here for a sample of that song.