…And then my baby vomited on me

The past two days, my child has spit up on both outfits that I was wearing.  This has required a quick costume change before work.  However, I decided that my misfortune could be turned into a listening activity.  I described my morning, and then I had my students recap in English.  I could have also

Not enough copies!

As I have stated before, I love information gap activities.  They are short, and students can practice their speaking abilities.  Today, I realized that while I had made enough copies of my other materials, I had only made enough copies for one class of my information gap activity.  (Why?!  Who knows…)  I didn’t have time

Rescheduled field trip= Plan B

Yesterday we couldn’t go on our field trip because we had a two hour delay. Boo!  Not only that, but the students were not planning on having class.  We couldn’t exactly go on as usual.  The morning of the field trip, I had to come up with Plan B.  One of my favorite resources to

No Prep Required: Anagram warm-up

I love anagrams!  They make a great warm-up especially after a long break.  You can write a phrase in the target language (like Feliz Año Nuevo) and have students make up as many words as they can.  They should not use the three words given; however, they can use as few or as many letters

Give one-get one review strategy

Cooperative learning is great especially for middle school students.  The give one-get one could easily be used as a review strategy for students.  The basic premise is that students create two columns on their sheet.  On one column, they write give one, and on the other column, they write get one.  They start by brainstorming

Vocabulary Practice

When I was doing my student teaching, we got this idea from an English teacher.  Students would have to pick 8 vocabulary words that they did not know.  For each word, they would write the word in the target language, the word in English, draw a picture of the word, use the word in a

Warm-Up Activity: Shopping List

I saw this idea on Farley’s blog a little late for Halloween.  However, it could be used for different units.  She wrote a “Target shopping list” for a vampire, witch, mummy, and werewolf family.  This would be great for a food unit or a clothes unit.  Students could complete this for a warm-up activity.  You

Assessment Idea for Speaking/Writing: Photo Journalism

This website has some amazing ideas!  One that I recently read could be applied to an assessment that the students would enjoy.  It is called Photo Journalism.  The night before, students could take five pictures.  You could have them take random pictures, or they could be sequential.  You could also give them a topic like

No Prep Required: Questions/Guessing Warm-Up

I saw this idea here, but I thought it could easily be adapted as a warm-up or end of class activity.  It reminds me of the Creative Language Class blog’s activity, but it is a bit simpler and quicker- and doesn’t require any prep by the teacher!  You can either read or write questions in

No Prep Required: Video for Family Unit

    I know that I have seen this website many times, but I finally had time to evaluate it this summer.  When the topic of family is brought up, many teachers suggest describing the Spanish Royal Family.  This is great because it introduces culture, and it allows teachers to remain in the target language