‘P’ is for Project in World Language Classes

Posted on by Vicky Masson

“’P’ is for Project” is one of the frameworks that I usually use to help students complete a project successfully in my Spanish language classes. This framework uses words in Spanish that begin with ‘P’, guiding students to identify and follow the different steps of the process while gaining independence. In Spanish, the 7 Ps of a project include: Preguntar / Preguntarse, Planear, Preparar, Practicar. Presentar, Personalizar, Pensar.

‘P’ is for Project

In English, most of the names for the steps use the word ‘P’ except for the very first one, which stands for ask yourself or questions. The framework includes: ask myself/questions, plan, prepare, practise, present, personalize (give feedback) and ponder (think and reflect).

Needless to say, there are other frameworks that guide students when they do projects, such as Challenge-Based Learning, Project-Based Learning, Project-Based Language Learning, Global Competence, etc. I have used these frameworks apart from the 7 Ps for Project with good results as well.

Having a consistent path when doing projects helps students know where they are and what comes next, which lowers their affective filter. It also focuses them on the task at hand and helps them stay in the language! 

In my classes the best learning has happened when students follow all the steps. I am going to show you the path my students – in elementary and early middle school – follow when doing a project in my Spanish classes. You can adapt these steps to use in Early Elementary or in High School. 

‘P’ in Preguntar / Preguntarse

We usually start our projects with questions. Questions usually bring more questions. The word for questions in Spanish is ‘preguntas’ and ‘preguntarse’ is the action of wondering.  It is the perfect way to start our ‘P is for Project’ framework.

I read the following “If we’re willing to ask the questions, we can begin changing things.” (Turning to One Another: Simple Conversations to Restore Hope to the Future, page 71). Though not all projects in my Spanish class lead to substantial change, students might change their way of seeing the world, their understanding of themselves, and their knowledge of other cultures. 

‘P’ in Planear

What may ‘Planear’ include?  It may include making a drawing, creating a simple outline, chunking what we need to do into daily doables, getting the materials needed, choosing what technology to use, investigating a topic, etc. Before we jump in, it is better to step back and think about what resources you need and what you need to do to achieve your goal. 

‘P’ is for Project: Preparar

‘Preparar’ may include creating a graphic organizer, writing the first draft, preparing a PowerPoint or using another presentation edtech tool. My students have realized that usually this step is the one that takes the longest and after doing a couple of projects, they take their time to complete this step thoughtfully. 

‘P’ in Practicar

‘Practicar’ is a key part of any project. Usually, in the first project of the year, my students skip this step. Students immediately get to understand that they should have practiced more before presenting in Spanish. When it is a presentational writing, they realize that they should have gone over, edited, and proofread their writing before turning in their final draft. Some students benefit from doing this step consciously as they realize that practicing compensates their effort. 

‘P’ is for Project: Presentar

Once students complete Preguntar/Preguntarse, Planear, Preparar, and Practicar, ‘Presentar’ becomes an easy part of their projects. They are proud and ready! They feel accomplished and it often helps develop their self-esteem. 

At the beginning of my career, I would have stopped after their presentation, either speaking or writing, was complete. Now I include two more steps: give feedback and reflect on their work. Why do I do this? 

‘P’ in Personalizar

‘Personalizar’ has become my students’ favorite part of any project. It is the time in which they give feedback and celebrate their accomplishments and their friends’. If students created a Flip as a presentational speaking assignment, for example, they give personal compliments on each other’s successes. If students created a ‘gallery walk,’ they proudly give their feedback on other students’ work by posting stickers or post-it notes. 

‘P’ is for Project: Pensar

‘Pensar’ has become my favorite part of any project. I get to hear students’ reflections on the process and as well as the product. I get to know how they feel and what they think. Interestingly enough, I also get to know how the project has opened their eyes to new products, practices, and perspectives, how it has transformed the way they see the world, and what personal connections they have made. It also gives me a chance to make changes to the project to help the following group of students. I usually use a form to capture their pondering on the project but other times, I prepare a set of questions and discuss them as a class.

So, to me, the ‘P’ is for Project because in my Spanish classes, following these steps -’Preguntar/Preguntarse (to ask questions), Planear (to plan), Preparar (to prepare), Practicar (to practice), Presentar (to present, in writing and / or speaking), Personalizar (to personalize and give feedback), and Pensar (to ponder, think, and reflect on their learning)’- help students engage in their learning by giving them a choice on what they want to learn about, investigate, communicate, and many times act upon. 

Books by Margaret J. Wheatley

‘Mi día típico’ By Amy Lenord: A One Page Jewel

Posted on by Vicky Masson

You know you have found ‘a jewel’ for a unit when you discover ‘Mi día típico’ by Amy Lenord through Twitter: https://twitter.com/alenord/status/1479988461264416777 

It is only one page but it lets you dive into so many topics while personalizing it for each of your students. 

Many ways to use ‘Mi día típico’ by Amy Lenord

This one page can be used to review many topics already studied, such as clothing, food, time, sports, meals and food, school, chores and other activities, and grammar structures, such as prepositional phrases, adverbs of quantity, sequencing words, besides the conjugation of verbs in the 1st person singular of regular, stem-changing, and reflexive verbs.

It also gives the perfect context to review the verbs ‘desayunar, almorzar, merendar & cenar’ for the specific meals of the day, as opposed to repeating ‘comer’. This is something quite confusing to language learners as these verbs are used differently in English and in Spanish.

Another application of this great resource is to make comparisons and explore new topics.

How I used ‘Mi día típico’

Reading for understanding

Initially, students read the page, it was easy for them to understand the meaning of the statements by looking at the images Amy Lenord included as a clue, plus my acting out, and drawing when necessary. 

Later, I used this page for Interpersonal Speaking, Presentational Writing, and Presentational Speaking. 

Interpersonal Speaking 

After my fifth grade students read the page multiple times and were familiar with the meaning of each statement, I moved to having them ask and answer questions about themselves. They quickly realized that they needed to change the endings of all the verbs and the pronouns from ‘me’ (about me) to ‘te’ (about you) when asking their partner. There were some giggles when they made the questions without making this change, e.g.: ‘Do you brush ‘my’ teeth in the morning?’ instead of asking ‘Do you brush ‘your’ teeth in the morning?’ 

Scaffolding in Preparation to Present ‘Mi día típico’

Using the resource for presentational writing and presentational speaking needed some scaffolding. The following are some activities and tasks that my students did prior to presenting. 

  • Draw the activities

I had students use this ‘jewel’ to also think about their typical days. I handed a booklet with three pages with the days of the week on each page. The first page read ‘Por la mañana’ (In the morning). The second read ‘Por la tarde’ (in the afternoon) and the third one had ‘Por la noche’ (at night), Students drew what they do during each part of the day on the specific days of the week. This booklet, along with the page ‘Mi día típico’, were our anchor for the rest of the tasks and activities. Students used both as guides all along.

  • Self-checking competition 

I asked students to study the ‘Mi día típico’ verbs and the next day we played a competition. Each student would say a verb and everybody had to write it down. Students numbered the verbs and wrote them down until they thought they had named them all. Then they self-checked their writing against the ‘Mi día típico’ page for spelling and completion of all verbs. To my surprise, not only had they included all the verbs, but they had also added a few more!

  • Level up the phrases

Then, students chose one of the drawings from their booklet and wrote a sentence in their notebook that later read aloud to share it with their peers. I have to say that they came up with excellent phrases! To push them a little bit more, I asked them to ‘level up’ the phrases, so we discussed ideas on how to do it. Finally, students practiced ‘leveling up’ their phrases into emerging sentences by writing two more sentences and adding some details. They were very proud to share them in class.

  • Topic and conclusion sentences 

The next class, We discussed which could be a good topic and a conclusion sentence for a presentational writing assignment and we jotted down several possible sentences. We used OneNote so everybody knew where to find the topic and conclusion sentences to study.

  • “We are in RLA,” they said

For reference, RLA is Reading Language Arts. I asked students if they had written paragraphs in Language Arts and they all said ‘Yes’, and we talked about what makes a good paragraph. I asked them to look at their drawings and circle those which they thought could be good illustrations to write about in Spanish. They could choose up to six pictures from any part of their booklet. While they were planning what to write, I told them they should answer: What can I write that will make an impact on Sra.? That way,I would see complete and original thoughts when I read their paragraphs. In other words, their writing had to catch my attention as a reader. 

I also told them that we would be writing a presentation in class only using the booklet with the drawings and it would be an assessment. They practiced with different partners until they had a better idea of what they could write about and how they would write it.

Presentational Writing Assessment

It is imperative that I know what students are able to do. It helps me understand what I need to do to move students along the proficiency levels. Using their drawings as the only resource, most of my students included at least a Novice High sentence, evidence that they have already started creating original thoughts in Spanish. As a teacher, I felt accomplished! 

Presentational Speaking & Reflection

For the Presentational Speaking they would be recording ‘Mi día típico’ in Flipgrid the following class. In preparation, they chose what to say, they practiced with friends, asked me questions, and shared strategies on how to do it. Then, they completed a reflection about the following: 

  • What went well for you?
  • What was challenging?
  • What did you learn about yourself? 
  • What would you do differently next time?

For the most part, students’ responses showed that the presentational writing was better than the presentational speaking because when writing, you can proofread your text, but when speaking, you have to come up with what to say on the spot. For the most part, they said that they could write and speak in Spanish much better than they could have ever imagined. I was proud of their work, effort, and growth. 

I find that ‘Mi día típico’ by Amy Lenord is a resource that helps my students accomplish communication. Thank you, Amy!

Intercultural Conversations in Middle School Spanish Class

Posted on by Vicky Masson

What do intercultural conversations look like in your language class?

Depending on the age of the students, intercultural conversations can take many different shapes and forms. For the purpose of this blog, I’ll talk about the experience of bringing a native Spanish speaker to my middle school class. This person was from Spain. Why from Spain? We were getting ready to read “Agentes secretos y el mural de Picasso” by Mira Canion and I wanted to introduce them to Spain in a different way. My first impression was that (in general), my students knew little about Spain and had misconceptions about this country. Off to an interesting start!

How might you prepare students to have intercultural conversations?

I am sure that there are many ways to have students get ready for intercultural conversations but I decided to go with questions, facts, and maps.

Asking Questions:

I asked my students what they wanted to know about Spain and wrote each one of their questions. I could see how their minds fed from each other’s ideas, and I was impressed with the array of questions they had. We created a long list of questions. 

Categorizing questions:

Next class, I asked them to work in groups of three. They had to read the questions generated in our previous class, find connections among them and group them in categories. They also had to come up with the names for the categories. When they finished, I asked one group to tell me a category and read the questions that were in it. If others disagreed, they would have to explain why and what they would do differently. When all the questions were classified and everybody was in agreement, we paused for a second and re-read all the questions in each category.

Delving Meaning:

Now, it was time to think deeper and discuss how the visitor would feel or react to the questions. We wanted to avoid questions that sounded too direct or even unintentionally offensive, i.e. ‘Why did you come to America?’ We rearranged the questions and tweaked some of them so that they would provoke a positive response in our speaker. When we finished, we re-read the questions once more and … finally, we all liked how they sounded! 

This step of the process proved to be a fundamental part of the experience, it sparked empathy and kindness. Students could see that the way we ask questions is as important as what we ask. 

Finding Facts:

Now that the questions were ready, students had to investigate and find three to five facts about Spain.The next day, they came excited about their findings. “Quite interesting facts, Sra!” they said. “Did you know that the Spanish anthem does not have lyrics? Did you know that Spain has many World Heritage Sites?” 

Reading Maps:

We found Spain and its islands on a world map and also read a couple of simple articles that explained Spain’s location and regions. Students were surprised to find out that Spain is similar to Texas in size. Now, I felt students were ready to meet our guest speaker.

Time to meet our guest speaker

Finally, the day to meet our guest speaker had come! I had sent her the questions in advance so she could prepare for our meeting. She had made a short presentation with images based on the questions my students had asked. As I had anticipated, students were intrigued by all she had to show them about Spain but she did not stop there. She also asked students personal questions such as, favorites, sports, and traveling, to compare their experiences with hers and so that they could relate to what she was talking about. They gave her a round of applause when she finished.

Time to reflect on the learning of intercultural conversations

As my guest speaker spoke practically all in Spanish (really! the 90% suggested by ACTFL) I was curious to know how much my students had understood. I decided to have them do a short reflection using the PZ Thinking Routine: I used to think … But now I think / I know. I added “I learned” and “I liked” for those that needed to express more concrete thinking. I was amazed at how much students had understood and learned through this experience. 


In sum, I was happy to see the growth in my students’ thinking and learning. Moreover, I felt very accomplished to have facilitated a successful intercultural conversation.

Engaging Language Learners with Global Views

Posted on by Vicky Masson
global views

Presenting global views connects language students to the experiences of others. It engages their minds, hearts, and hands. There are wonderful resources that help language students broaden their perspective of the world, not necessarily limited to the people in the countries that speak the language they are learning. Why wait until they are at an intermediate level? You may start with novice learners. It all depends on what you show them and what you do with it, i.e. how you use the resource, as well as why you are using that specific resource. 

Why global views?

I part with the idea that we live in one world and the more that we learn from each other, the better. As a Spanish teacher myself, I moved from showing only things related to the Spanish-speaking world to showing my students the whole world. Of course, a big part of what we do in class is related to the Spanish world, but I intersect resources that go beyond that.  Learning about others helps break down stereotypes, expands our worldviews, and helps us become aware of our interconnectedness and common humanity. In sum, it is about helping my students become globally competent. 

How do we use photographs as global views ?

To successfully reach the minds, hearts, and hands of language learners, it is necessary to think through how we introduce, develop, and conclude each lesson. It is also important to think about what background knowledge students need in order to understand the topic and what prior knowledge they bring to class. Using resources thoughtfully is key. 

Many times I choose to use photographs to do this type of work because they are potent visuals. They tell stories and we can all relate to stories. Photographers have a unique eye as their lens captures a precious moment in time. It is up to us to show these global views and choose how to do it.

The following are some ways in which I have presented global views to my students. 

When I taught elementary school, my students particularly enjoyed when I showed them photographs of classrooms around the world and they had to compare and contrast those with their own classroom. As an added benefit, I learned about students’ prior experiences and their families’ history. 

My students love when they can choose. When presenting them with several photographs, I let them choose one that talks to them and ask them to do different activities, from simply describing the photograph to creating a story to only asking and answering questions. Other times, I present them with two photographs and we compare them to find similarities and differences. These types of activities propel great conversations.  

The National Portrait Gallery has many classroom resources to use when describing portraiture, and some of them can be applied to analyzing photographs successfully. I especially enjoy:

–Unveiling Stories

–Seeds for Storytelling

–Jump in!

–Compare and Contrast: Top Hat

There is no doubt that using the Project Zero Thinking Routines makes perfect sense when analyzing photographs. For this type of work, I would go with the Global Thinking Routines ones.

The Library of Congress has a special tool when it comes to analyze photographs that differs from the tools used to analyze other media. It is a wonderful way to start a conversation about photographs. Check it out!

Source: Library of Congress

The LOC also has an online analysis tool for students to download and work directly there. 

You may also want to read our blog “Authentic Resources with the Smithsonian Learning Lab,” where we give examples of integrating art into the curriculum.

There are so many ways to go when it comes to introducing global views to students. Of course, the images per se are key in making it a powerful experience.

What resources can we use to engage learners with global views ?

The following are some resources based on photographs. Some of these photographs include the topics of school, food, identity, and landscapes and I have used some of them with my novice students. What is important is to choose what to show and how to present it to students. 

As an Amazon Associate LTL earns from qualified purchases.

Food

-In her kitchen

–Menzel’s photographs

–Article on Menzel’s work in Spanish

–What I Eat (Menzel)

–Hospital Food

–School Lunches

Galimberti’s work on what children play with

-An article in Spanish

–Photographs

Esther Honig’s photos on beauty

–Article on Honig’s photos in Spanish

-Article on Honig’s photos in Spanish

–Webpage

School

–Schools around the world – The Guardian

–Schools around the world – Boston

House

–Menzel’s photographs

Landscapes, Ecology, Social issues

–Overdevelopment, Overpopulation, Overshoot (OVER)

Each time I present global views to students, their engagement is palpable as global views engage language learners’ minds, hearts, and hands. If you haven’t already, give it a try and let me know how it goes in your classes.

VideoAsk: Get Almost Face-to-Face Interpersonal Speaking with Video

Posted on by Vicky Masson

by Vicky Masson

“EdTech” is a column of Language Teaching Lab where we highlight the use of educational technology in the world language class

What is VideoAsk?

VideoAsk allows you to build stronger relationships with students by getting a personal almost face-to-face response from them. A wonderful way of capturing all your students’ thoughts and ideas at once, in video! Start video asking with your students right away. 

Why is it essential for language teaching and learning?

The VideoAsk widget lets you get a personal almost face-to-face response from students on day one and keep on building it. With VideoAsk you welcome students every day, every week, or every semester. It allows you to start an authentic dialogue with each student and add a more personal touch to any assignment. It engages your students with its welcoming and easy to use interface. Students get to know YOU better as well. 

Best of all, students do not need an account to answer your questions or give you feedback. In one click, they respond to your video and you get their answers by video, audio, or in writing. You decide. As an added value, you can organize the answers in different folders, name the folder and the video response and much more.

VideoAsk

How could VideoAsk be used in a language class?

There are many ways that you can use VideoAsk in a language class. The following are some ideas to get you started.

  • Respond to questions and ask questions, building connections from day one, even before your course starts
  • Use interactive video to communicate with your students in a personalized way. It’s almost like you’re face-to-face
  • Record your questions and share them with students so that they receive them on their own devices.
  • Evaluate students’ responses and track their progress.
  • Customize to only accept video, audio or text as an answer to your questions. You can also add a multiple choice option
  • Embed your VideoAsk on any web page and bring more life to your assignments
  • Connect VideoAsk to many apps you are already using 
  • Use VideoAsk in your own language with Multi-language support
  • Download your students’ videos and have them include them in their portfolios
  • Choose which steps go to which student. VideoAsk allows branching
  • Show students different follow-up videos based on their answers
  • Reply to your students from the VideoAsk inbox
  • Personalize instruction! Convert into text all video/audio recordings to find key points

If you want to have an almost face-to-face interpersonal speaking with your students, try VideoAsk. Connect, build relationships and trust!

‘Cognates’ and ‘Circumlocution’ Power in World Language Classes

Posted on by Vicky Masson

By Vicky Masson

‘Why do we teach…?‘ is a column of Language Teaching Lab. It might help us think deeper on why we teach a certain topic. In addition, it might show a new perspective on how to teach it.

Learning about ‘cognates’ and ‘circumlocution’ helped students feel successful during an assessment. When my students finish their assessments most of the time I ask for feedback. I want to know what my students are thinking and feeling. After the last presentational writing, I asked my students what helped them while they were writing.

In a group of ten students, two said that they thought of cognates to help them write or figure out words to use in their writing. A third student told me that he thought of the game we play where “you say words about something without mentioning the word”. He said that it helped him come up with words to use in his writing.

Why I teach the word ‘cognate’ the first day of class

Many years ago, as summer reading, my students read Cuba 15 by Nancy Osa. As far as I remember, very early in the novel, we learn about the power of ‘cognates.’ That was one of the first words the Spanish teacher taught her class. I teach my students the word ‘cognate’ the very first day we meet as a class. 

Learning about cognates makes a huge difference in the quantity of vocabulary a novice proficiency level language student might acquire. I invite students to act like detectives, trying to find clues in words by comparing them to their native language.

How I use ‘cognates‘

Once students feel comfortable being language ‘detectives,’ I purposefully ask them to find cognates in interpretive reading taks and listen for cognates in interpretive listening tasks first of all. 

Students immediately realize that by looking for cognates, they already understand many words in the text or audio, even before starting to analyze it. 

While having class discussions or group conversations they tend to ask ‘how do you say…?’ I immediately tell them that the word is a cognate and ask them if they can figure out what it can be, which they do 90% of the time. Some of my students even create their own list of cognates and refer to it during practice assessments or assignments. 

Where I find resources

Co-creating a list of cognates or presenting students with lists of cognates are ways of increasing the variety of vocabulary they can use. My go to lists are Colorin Colorado and Mondly.

Why I teach ‘circumlocution‘

Teaching circumlocution increases communication in world language classes. I learned about circumlocution during an OWL (Organic World Language) professional development training many years ago. According to dictionary.com, circumlocution is “a roundabout or indirect way of speaking; the use of more words than necessary to express an idea.” In general, we are taught to use the best words to express our thoughts so it seems that circumlocution is contradictory. When it comes to languages, it is not. 

Why do I think that teaching ‘circumlocution’ is one of the best gifts I can give my students? Simply put, it helps students stay in the language using words that they know and figuring out how to express their thoughts with the content they own.  

How I teach ‘circumlocution‘

Circumlocution expands students’ vocabulary and at the same time, It helps learners categorize. Categories help students be able to express themselves in the language they are learning by making associations among words that share the same or similar carachteristics. Learning circumlocution is a game changer! 

I usually use games to help students use circumlocution, like the one my student mentioned after the assesment. I call that ‘Adivina’ which basically means ‘guess.’ It is a low prep game where you show a picture to students. One of them describes one of the objects in the picture and the others (usually in groups) have to guess what it refers to. The one who guesses chooses the next word. A similar game is the famous ‘20 questions’ in which students have 20 questions to find out the chosen word. Both games are favorites in my classes.

What are some structures to use 

A simple search in Quizlet or Kahoot will give you ready-to-use activities to practice circumlocution. If you search Teachers Pay Teachers or Pinterest you will also find lots of useful resources.

‘Cognates’ and ‘circumlocution‘

My premise is that I teach a language with the purpose of having my students think and communicate (locally or globally) what they want to say and how, in another language. When I provide tools like cognates and circumlocution, students take ownership of their learning and feel successful in class. I want students to stay in the language and also to take risks, so cognates and circumlocution give students superpowers. 

Resources mentioned

–Cuba 15 by Nancy Osa  – As an Amazon Associate LTL earns from qualifying purchases

–Colorin Colorado 

–Mondly

–Quizlet

–Kahoot!

–Teachers Pay Teachers

–Pinterest

–Organic World Language

Some Classroom Tested Resources for Winter and December Holidays

Posted on by Vicky Masson

by Marcela Velikovsky, Gabriela Barbieri & Vicky Masson

Interdisciplinary Connections is a column of Language Teaching Lab to show specific examples of connections between world language teaching and other subjects at school

Back by popular demand! After publishing our blog “How do you celebrate El Dia de los Muertos / Day of the Dead?” in October, readers’ interest grew on having other lists of classroom tested resources. Marcela, Gaby, and I decided to start gathering what we use for Winter and December Holidays. Though not exhaustive, this list reflects some of our go-to resources. Enjoy! 

Art

El invierno: un viaje a través de la pintura y el arte

Articles

¿Cómo se celebra Navidad en América Latina?

La Navidad en América Latina

Fiestas de invierno celebradas en todo el mundo

Books

As Amazon Affiliates LTL earns from qualifying purchases

Iguanas en la nieve y otros poemas de invierno by Francisco X. Alarcón

El regalo de Navidad by Francisco Jimenez  

Una muñeca para el Día de Reyes  by Esmeralda Santiago

¡Ya llegan los Reyes Magos! by Georgina Lazaro – Morella Fuenmayor

Carta Virtual a los Reyes Magos by Lucia Margarita Cruz Rivera

Un día de nieve by Ezra Jack Keats

Lesson Plans and Ideas

December Stations 

La Navidad: Resources by Profe de Ele

Activities: La Navidad en España by La clase se Ele 

Rif – Actividades para un día de nieve

Rif – The Snowy Day: Reading Adventure Pack

Songs

Las Navidades by Lulu Delacre

Websites

Spanish Playground: Winter 

Worksheets by iSLCollective

Activities by ELE Internacional

YouTube

La noche mágica de Gaspar

Santa Claus llego a la ciudad

What resources do you use?

What do you do when you learn something new?

Posted on by Vicky Masson

by Vicky Masson

‘What’s in a framework?’ is a column of Language Teaching Lab. A framework informs our teaching and it shows a unique philosophy.  It gives us a shared language and purpose, and it lets us see teaching and learning from diverse perspectives

DKDK – Don’t Know what you Don’t Know

You do not know what you do not know. What counts is what you do when you get to know something, i.e. when you learn something. That is what happened to me when I learned about the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals. The SDGs are a path to action for people, planet, prosperity, peace, and partnerships. The SDGs consider sustainability from the economic, environmental, and social perspectives. As we know them now, the SDGs started in 2015 with a plan to achieve the 17 goals by 2030. I had to do something so I became a Cohort 3 #TeachSDGs Ambassador.

17 Goals

When I saw the image of the seventeen goals and started reading each one, I happily realized that most of the teaching happening in my Spanish classes related directly to them. I committed to introducing the 17 goals to my students, our changemakers. 

There is so much more information about the SDGs now than when I started introducing them in my classes. Fortunately, lots of these materials are in different languages! 

Let’s start by learning about some of these resources. Then, let me share some of the things that I did in my language classes.

SDGs in different languages

Let’s start with some places where you can find materials on the SDGs in different languages:

This is a short list with lots of information. These sites are great starting points for introducing the SDGs in language classes.

How I prepared to teach SDGs

In order to teach about the SDGs, I first informed myself. I took courses, I read books, I created a Wakelet, and I presented together with Gaby and Marcela in language conferences.

Since I became a #TeachSDG ambassador, I have introduced the SDGs to all my students. Learning about the SDGs is engaging and empowering for students, therefore, it boosts proficiency. Students want to learn, read, and talk about the SDGs. Most importantly, they want to take action.

How I teach SDGs in my language classes

I usually show them the Global Goals icons. I ask students their favorite goal or the one that catches their attention and why, how old they will be in 2030 and what they see each other doing differently than they do now. Then, I explain what the SDGs are and their importance, and connect them to what they are studying in class. In no time students realize that the SDGs are an intrical part of their life and of what we do in class.

SDGs = Enduring learning

The most enduring learning happens when students are connected with other students to solve problems. The No.More.Plastic. project was one of these instances. It was a three week project where 4th grade students had to attempt to answer: 

  • What’s the problem?
  • Are there any solutions? Let’s try to fix the problem!
  • Action! The students take action and try to bring change at school and at home.

Students researched about plastic, brainstormed possible solutions for reducing the use of plastic at school, and wrote a chant to share with the rest of the elementary school. They posted the chant in the cafeteria as a reminder of the importance of reducing the use of plastic. All in Spanish!

Students also saw some of the projects done by other schools around the world and felt part of it! 

My students were engaged in the content and empowered to make change happen. They were also proud when they received a certificate of participation.

SDG in language classes

The SDG framework is perfect for language classes. It is a powerful tool to raise awareness of sustainability, to empower students as changemakers, and to have students see that learning a language might have an impact outside the classroom. 

Don’t wait one more minute to introduce the SDGs in your language classes if you haven’t yet done that. Don’t wait to have students ask you: Why has no other teacher taught us about them?