I know non-targeted input is all the rage, but frankly, I’m hung up on high-frequency vocab repetition. And the more I can get key words, phrases, and structures stuck in kids’ heads, the more Spanish they can take with them when the class is over. So these are the tunes Read more…
I’m struggling for real, you guys. I sincerely, sincerely believe that authentic opportunities for engaging with other speakers of the language for an authentic purpose is the most effective and important way to motivate language learners. But man, oh man, if I could just get a word in edgewise to make that POSSIBLE some Read more…
I was so frustrated with all of my failure this year. I honestly felt like I peaked two years ago, and it was all going to be downhill from there. There were no more competition trophies to put in the display case, no more FLANC awards to be won. I Read more…
I had a choice. In theory my students have been working on one self-improvement goal since the snow days in January. In practice not so much. The cool thing is that they can totally express to me in Spanish “No he cambiado” perfectly clearly and explain how they need their goal, Read more…
it would have been magical having any student who sat through my classes decide that what I did was something worth doing for them too. Several students have at least “been thinking about minoring in Spanish,” but never before had they planned to teach it. Having inspired any student that way would have made a mama bear proud. But that it was this student?
I started bawling instantly.
Dear FLENJ, I’m not a girl who needs to be wined and dined to feel loved–elegant sushi certainly doesn’t hurt, of course. Plush hotel toilets accommodations aren’t what bring me back either. It is the sheer quality of people you let me be around for a weekend. Now don’t get Read more…
8 friends requesting Since our district’s policy strongly discourages friending current students, graduation is a time of adding teachers–strangely only 1 that I taught this year. 7 grades surprisingOf course there’s the one who needed a good project and to make up time. One needed an A to pass his Read more…
There are about 10 (current) students that have–and have used–my cell phone number. I have been glad of this fact seven times this week. One time, it was just handy to be able to text a mysteriously absent student that I didn’t have her mysteriously missing assignment that was due Read more…
So I have not stopped posting at http://huerter0.xanga.com. I’ll be remarrying in November, so I guess I can be Huerter0 until then. The account reverting is due more directly to the fact that, despite my resignation to abandon my English roots, I am once again a Spanglish teacher. That’s right: Read more…