Happy Spring!

Spring is a busy time of year!  As we are heading into the last few weeks of school, the students are still working hard.  Our 8th graders took a Spanish Placement Exam for a local high school with an outstanding Spanish program this week.  Several did very well on the Spanish III exam, and most of them performed excellently on the Spanish II test.  It is always interesting to see how students do on tests outside of our own program, because the approach and material can be quite different.  I hope that the 8th graders are very proud of their achievements, and I am confident that they will continue to succeed in Spanish at any school they attend.

For a final project, the 8th grade students are designing Spanish videos to help out the 5th grade students as they strive to master verb conjugation and Spanish vocabulary.  I am so excited about seeing these videos.  To make it even better, many of the 8th graders have younger siblings in the 5th grade class!  I know that they will enjoying seeing what their older brothers and sisters pass on to their class.

During the NCEA conference that I attended, one of my favorite workshops featured learning games, and I have had so much fun adapting them for my classes here.  We have taken advantage of the gorgeous weather to take "Frederico" (the students' name for the beach ball--not sure where they got that) outside and practice.

Depending on the class, we have several variations.  For some, the color that their right thumb lands on when they catch the ball determines the type of word.  Other simply practice verb conjugations by using one in a sentence and sharing what it means.  Some use it for vocabulary practice.  The one constant is that we stay focused on Spanish while having a lot of fun!