From story-telling to story-asking

I am reading TPRS with Chinese characteristics: making students fluent and literate through comprehensible input by Terry Waltz and I am learning a great deal! I definitely recommend this book if, like me, you want your learners to truly develop fluency and proficiency in another language and on the other hand you do not consider yourself advanced in TPRS and comprehensible input,

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Let's celebrate success!

https://goo.gl/photos/ZvJ23xgZM28AiXo58

Today as we enter the month of September and we slowly start to wave goodbye to summer, let the sun shine and let me share a success story using TPRS and comprehensible input online!

Back in April an ex Spanish student of mine contacted me because he wanted to learn French.

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How to use a mini story in a Spanish beginner class

I have become a fan of TPRS because I do believe it is the most efficient way so far to help students develop both fluency and accuracy in Spanish. However, I am new to the techniques and although I read the Big Green Book: Fluency through TPR Storytelling,

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Civilization project to use the past tense in Spanish

I have covered the past tense in Spanish with my grade 8 students (13-14 years old) this term and I want them to be able to describe past events confidently and accurately. Over my teaching experience I have found out that doing the traditional grammar exercises such as filling in the gaps with the correct verb forms does not really work with students.

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Spanish story script number 4: Lo siento.

Here is another story script which follows the last story about little Pedro losing his notebook. This story has lots of repetitions to focus on "lo siento" and "no sé qué hacer". I am telling those stories using wooden ice cream sticks which the students love.

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Story script in Spanish

I am huge fan of the Michel Thomas method. The only thing that is bothering me is that it hugely relies on translation. I was trained to use the target language as much as possible in the classroom and my mentor taught me a few tricks to get the students to understand me in the target language like using lots of cognates.

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Goal 11: Feel The Weight of Your Impact #30GoalsEdu

 

I posted this picture a few years ago and instantly remembered it when pondering on goal 11 of the 30 goals challenge for educators 2012.

Goal 11 is about impacting our students. As Shelly Terrell mentions in her blog:" Educators don’t realize that every time they walk into a classroom they plant seeds that may grow into weeds and stunt their students’ learning journeys...

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