A first year middle school teacher, Hailey, wrote about her Spanish One class,
“I really try every day to maintain the 90+ target language . . . and I feel like I’m depriving my kids of content because it takes me so much time to just get them to set up an activity. Do you guys have any time saving/management tips?”
Yes! You need to work smarter on making your communication comprehensible more quickly. It’s not just that it is 90% target language but that it is 100% comprehensible.
I also teach 7th and 8th and ninth grade Spanish One and I use VCI – visual comprehensible input to speed up the class.
You can, too! I have learned that rather than explain how to line up in two rows facing their partners, I just show a transition video created by a native speaker. Poof! 30 seconds later they know what to do!
Rather than explain to take out their vocabulary lists, they watch the transition video. 30 seconds later we are doing the activity.
Above is a 5 minute video to show you what I mean. The transition videos are towards the end of the video. There is a 1 minute condensed version below.
Look up in the black ribbon at Transition Videos categories for more information.
But first check out the great poster below!
