Proud of our school year

Hi you all!

Today, last day of June, I have received two important labels. Very proud of working with European schools: one from Czech Republic and the others from Italy&Poland.
Here you have.

Activities for young children

Although this quiz is for children, adults may take it also. 

It deals with a lot of things. 

Please click on the pic and have fun. 

Good luck to you all ;D

A great surprise!

Following a blog shows readers and the authors that you are a fan. 
So, I'm very grateful for the last followers.
By the way, if you think of becoming one of them and you don't know how to do, here you have the steps you have to chase: go to the right and tap on "Join this site" button under the "Followers" widget (as the picture below shows). After that, you have to choose "google" and write down your mail and password. For ending, you have to tap on "follow this blog"

Thank you very much,
That makes me feel very happy!

Reading worthy magazines

This interactive magazine for young learners engages students like never before. 

Everyone will find amazing photos and excellent audios.

Click on the picture and then on "read scout"

and remember...
"Students who read in English,
increase speaking, reading, fluency, vocabulary, confidence and much more!"

Summertime!

Hi you all!

Today we celebrate St. Joan's Day! Yesterday, there were fireworks everywhere and the night was long. So, to celebrate summertime, click on the image below and you will open the lyrics training page. There, you have a song about that topic. 
Remember to choose the beginner level.
If you think that this is too easy for you, try a harder one.
You can repeat the missing word by clicking on the BACK BUTTON. If you don't understand the word, just jump the word with the TAB BUTTON and the web page will write the missing word for you.

Encourage students to boost confidence!

When faced with a big challenge where potential failure seems to lurk at every corner, you’ve probably heard the advice, “Be more confident!” But where does confidence come from, and how can you get more of it? 

Here you have an excellent TED video. It gives three easy tips to boost students' confidence and also yours, as teachers or parents.

Making things better

The end of the school year is a good time for everyone, but also it's amazing when you give a special award to students. Here you have mine ;D

Tackk

Hi everyone!

Although the school year has already finished for children, I go on improving my task of teaching.

As some of you know,  I'm following an on line trainer course about PBL (Project Based Learning) and I have to write down a Learning Diary.

Here you have the beginning. If you want to know more about it, click on the image and have a look.

Welcome Summer!

Hi you all!
Today is an important day!
Summer is here and it's also the end of the school year.
Here you have some Summer time vocabulary

Do your best!

Two beautiful comments this week from families, 

it's sooo nice to hear their appreciation!

Project Based Learning

Hi everyone! 

Most of you know that one year ago I decided to move from my old school to a new one which works through projects along the school year. This methodology is applied not only in kindergarten but also in primary.

So after working in a new methodology I want to reflect what have been my feelings about Project Based Learning.

Adopting the PBL approach has produced a change in my way of teaching. I had to improve the presence of different levels of learning and special needs, the competences and social skills. It made that students had to work in their own way to solve problems, to think and to access to information, processing and learning. 

Personally I think that this way of working has enrich me as a teacher because I had the challenge of improving my lessons every day through individual work but most of the times through cooperative teams.

So, the strategies I used have been very different from using a book and follow the units because there have been a connection to the real world.

Asking questions and doing research as well, made the students decided for themselves. They had the chance to improve their problem-solving abilities. Finally, they shared what they had learned. Now that we can say that the school year is ending, I am proud of having done this new challenge.

Lego Avatar Creator

Hi everyone!

I have just find out an amazing web where you can design your own picture in plastic or a lego avatar;D

Here you have mine.

If you want to design yours, click on the link.

Find the stress ;D

Hi everyone, 

here you have a funny activity for working on phonetics, pronunciation and stress. 

Use the ARROW keys to move the sumbarine and the SPACE BAR to identify the stress on the word.

Cheers!

Ending the school year

Hi everybody. 
The end of the school year is coming and 6th graders are near to close their classrooms because most of them, they will go to their special camp for ending their walk in the school!

I don't want to feel sad for that farewell. For that reason, I am ready to finish my English lessons with this cool song:

"Happy" by Pharrell Williams. 

I love this one because it makes me feel very, very happy and move my skeleton ;D

Enjoy your weekend!

Teaching 21st century skills

I think that the short video below summarizes how today's students feel when they are still addressed to as if they were "pitchers to be filled up with facts, facts, facts"!(Charles Dickens' Hard Times)

The first thing that comes to my mind is that we urgently need to innovate and adapt our schools to the actual needs and expectations of our students. In few words, they are living a digital age and we have some tools that facilitate "learning by doing" and project-based learning. I think that a strong point to persuade skeptical parents and colleagues would be to explain that those tools empower the users. Whiteboards and tablets among others as laptops will do that our learners become more independent and personalize their learnings. However, we have young students. We teach in Primary schools and that means that children need adults' guide. At schools will be teachers,and at home will be families.

In this point I want to share a project I have finished with 6th graders. As I told you some days ago, I introduced an oral activity where students had to ask in pairs some questions about their routines with devices and homework. After talking and taking notes, I collected survey answers and did a research about how much time they spend on those activities. The data is meaningful. Just think about it.

Simple past resources

PAST TENSE, REGULAR VERBS

***************************************

PAST TENSE, IRREGULAR VERBS

Exercise on line

Videos for you to learn past simple

Listening and writing activity

Songs are a great way to learn English and Lyrics Training is a good way to learn through songs! 

You can choose from three levels and fill in the gaps as you listen to or just use it for karaoke - it's up to you! 
Click on the picture below and listen to Bobby McFerrin.

 

Click on BEGINNER. You can press the BACKSPACE button to listen to the last sentence again and type it correctly !

Otherwise, If you want to jump the gap, just press the Tab button and the web will write the correct word.

Rhyme and repetition make learning fun!
The song below teaches actions, animal sounds and exotic settings around different landscapes.

A funny Nursery Rhyme for young learners

With the post today I would like to appreciate Super Simple Songs team. 
My students really love to watch their animated songs. This last week I have been working that famous and persistent spider: Eensy Weensy Spider.
After singing the song and doing the fingers dance, my students and me made a minibook. I'm so sorry because I haven't got the template but I can share with you this free resource from DLTK's-teach team for your classroom. 

An easy riddle for young students

What begins with T, ends with T and has T in it?