Señora Reardon’s Spanish Web Page
Students in Grades 1 thru 5 check out your homework by clicking here
¡Bienvenidos! Welcome to Saint Michael School’s Spanish Web Page! Whether you are veterans or newcomers, I hope that this site will provide you at least a basic understanding of the Spanish language program here at Saint Michael School.
We are very fortunate to be able to offer Spanish classes to grades 1-8. Students in grades 1-5 attend Spanish classes once a week for half of the academic year. Grades 1-3 Spanish classes introduce basic thematic vocabulary (greetings, feelings, colors, numbers, alphabet, days of the week, months, family members, animals, food, places, clothing, community workers, etc.) with the emphasis on making Spanish fun and enjoyable. We use songs, props, and lots of gesturing and memory tricks to get the children started.
In grades 4-5 we will more fully expand our vocabulary base by focusing on easily “demonstrable” and most frequently-used Spanish words. (This beginning phase of TPRS is called TPR. For more information, read the description of TPRS that I have included on this site or you can click on related links below). The students will have fun gesturing and combining their new vocabulary into funny commands that their classmates in turn will act out. The fast pace, high energy and the fact that students get to create their own funny commands (and watch their friends act silly) combine to produce high motivation and participation.
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The philosophy of this powerful method is to teach students a foreign language in such a way that they acquire it very similarly to the way they did their first language: immersion. As babies, we learn language by hearing words and phrases repeated many times, and these words are often associated with objects, gestures, facial expressions, and are almost always in context (comprehensible input). After several months of this comprehensible input, babies begin trying to produce the words on their own and with each passing month, their language begins to blossom!
As an introduction to TPRS we begin by building a Spanish vocabulary base that combines new words with gestures. We practice our new vocabulary in fun and creative ways (and by doing so, we sneak a lot of repetitions in! This is important for long-term memorization.) We then incorporate our newly-learned vocabulary into stories. The students are involved in helping to create, personalize, and act out these stories using props and their own imaginations. The stories help make the lessons fun and, most importantly, they provide context for our Spanish words. I will ask the students many questions during the storytelling both for repetition of vocabulary and to test their understanding. We will follow up the stories with extended readings. (Reading has been proven to be one of the best ways to naturally acquire a new language!) While the focus of TPRS is on comprehensible input, we will also do writings, translations, and utilize the “Spanish is Fun” textbook for grammar reinforcement.
Spanish Links to check out:
Want more information:
About the Curriculum
