Wednesday, November 7, 2012

Late Fall Update

Your children are such a joy to teach! They are engaged and excited and they remember so much of what we have been practicing in Spanish the past few months. Young minds soak up language so easily. In September we focused mostly on getting-to-know-you vocabulary. In October we moved to school vocabulary. The children learned words like lápiz (LAH-piece) for pencil, papel (pah-PEHL) for paper, and mochila (mow-CHEE-lah) for backpack. We sang a familiar song to many of the children who have done Spanish with me in the past, called Mami, ¿Dónde está?, where I put out a picture of a table (mesa), a lamp (lámpara), a table (mesa), and a bed (cama), and then hide a small picture of another object under one of those. In the past we have sung this song as we look for a shoe (zapato) or coat (abrigo). Since we are studying school-related objects, we looked for a backpack (mochila):

Mami, ¿dónde está mi mochila? (sing twice)
¿Debajo de la mesa?
¿Debajo de la lámpara?
¿Debajo de la mesa?
¿Debajo de la cama?

After each question, we pick up the corresponding object and the children sing either "no, no, no" if the mochila is not there or "sí, sí, sí" if it is. See if your child can sing this song. It's a catchy phrase that is easy to learn, especially with the number of times we have sung it lately!

During our school unit some of the children asked if they could learn the Spanish alphabet. I brought in the alphabet and had them find the letters that are different than ours (ch, ll, rr, ñ). We categorized the letters according to their sounds, then we sang a song about a fly (una mosca) sitting on a wall (parada en la pared) to practice the vowel sounds. After the first round, you replace all vowel sounds with just one. (The nice thing about Spanish vowels is that they always sound the same; no short or long sounds. Reading Spanish is much easier than reading English!) Anyway, here is one version of that song: http://musicwithsara.bandcamp.com/track/una-mosca-parada-en-la-pared.

To finish out our school-related work, we will learn some songs about the days of the week.
The children under 3 mostly practice the commands related to each day of the week, like jumping on one foot (salto en un pie), clapping (aplaudo con las manos), and raising our arms (levanto los dos brazos).
Click here to listen to another song that walks through the days of the week. We read this book along with that song:


By mid-November we will begin learning some Christmas songs! There are so many beautiful and meaningful traditional Christmas songs in Spanish speaking countries that I love sharing with the children.