Best Day in Education!

I have been teaching Spanish for almost a decade. I have been teaching 6-8th grade middle school for the past few years, and while I like different things about my classes, my 8th graders can always be trusted to make the most out of any activity if they are interested. On this day in particular we had just been learning about money, food, clothes and purchasing things. 

When students walked in they were assigned a partner and told that their mission was to survive the time with enough money and food to live off of. Half of the pairs were designated around the room at storefronts with various things to sell..clothes, plastic fruits, scarves etc. The other half had to walk around the classroom with a set amount of money purchasing and negotiating prices (and using descriptive adjectives.. "No, that shirt is orange. I don't like orange, but I'll take the blue one for $200 pesos etc). The storefront managers had to sell enough so that THEY could survive. I also added one policemen, whose job it was to assign tickets in case of English words, and halfway through the class we reset the supplies and the owners and kids switched.

It is a lot more complicated to describe than to do, and while it required a lot of prep time, I like that the kids were getting hands-on comprehensible input..and then that they started to have fun with it, figuring out how to say things in a "real" life experience. Authentic speaking situations tend to be a bit forced in world language classes, and I was glad that this was engaging for the kids and that they really learned out of it.

(This is Jacqueline G, blogging for EDUO 9107)