C*E*L*E*B*R*A*T*E

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Learning and Teaching on the Brain

My colleague over at Teacher in Development has a great new post you really should check out entitled, “Engagement: Brain Friendly Classrooms.”The aforementioned blog post led me to make the following connection.As I continue to grow in my practice as an educator, I am beginning to embrace to a greater extent the implications of [...]

It Just Occured to Me…

…that I spend the least amount of time with the people and things I enjoy the most.
This is not to say that I don’t enjoy my students, my colleagues, and my classes.
It is to say, however, that my most productive waking hours are devoted to life outside of the home, away from family and friends, [...]

You Just Can’t Make This Stuff Up #6

Have you ever had a situation where you encountered someone and wondered why? Especially if your contact with said individual was less than uplifing?
SisterGirl had one such experience recently with a co-worker. On this particular day, I noticed my colleague making her way to the photocopy machine, at which point I exclaimed, “Hi!” She [...]

Kinda Having a Brain Freeze…

…so I will share this mad cool story about a young woman who is reportedly the first to accomplish her feat. Read about it here :
There are some amazing young people out there. Still!
Truly inspirational. And brave!

How Do YOU Get It All Accomplished?

Sunday is the day I seem to come alive, and feel motivated to do the things which need doing in my personal life. By the time Friday arrives, I am in a coma. Saturday is spent coming out of the coma. So, on Sunday, I have a montón of things to do.
Here [...]

Perhaps It’s My Age Showing…

…but, I have a fondness for dictations.Current FL pedagogy poo-poos the use of dictations in the language classroom, for it promotes rote learning. I disagree. Dictations promote better listening, skills, which in turn promote better writing, speaking and grammatical skills.I have used dictations - dictados as they are called in Spanish - with my [...]

A Meme: Gotta Get Goals

Kelly over at Educational Discourse tagged me for a meme. Kelly calls them, “Gotta Get” goals. I am being asked to list five to ten goals, and then tag five people. According to Kelly, these are “goals that you gotta get so that you can truly say you have achieved your wildest dreams in [...]

A Balanced Lesson

Here was today’s lesson plan for my Spanish 2 students:~2 listening comprehension activities to review lesson vocabulary. Student volunteers were asked to give the answers, as opposed to me merely reading off the answers, which is what I ususally do in an effort to save time.~”Lotería” (Bingo in Spanish) to review lesson vocabulary~Students selection of [...]

Making the old seem new

I am not a “game girl.” Today, however, I introduced my eighth grade Spanish 1 students to an activity to help them practice verb conjugations. It is called, “Dice Game.” It goes something like this:1. Take two die - one red, one green2. Assign a [...]