Using Technology

     This website, maintained by RosettaStone, offers free language exchange for language learners, putting them in contact with native speakers and learners alike.  The site is easy and secure and once you have created a profile, you can choose from various language exchange options from e-mail and chat exchanges to video chat. I like that the site is monitored so that the users are really only allowed to share ideas in the target language, as opposed to using the site for help with homework or using it as a personal dating site. 

     Although most of these resources are best used by students individually, for classroom use, a teacher could assign the students to document one or two hours of chatting per week or even have them present to the class about some topics they discussed in chatting with native speakers and other learners.

     Students could also keep audio journals that document their progress. This website  offers good advice on recording your voice to make podcasts. They provide a list of free software that can be easily downloaded to record your voice on your computer. Using voice recordings could really be fun in the classroom, as students could make blogs  to keep up with over the course of the semester or year in which they can express what they have learned and present their podcasts to share with others. Voice recordings could also be used to involve students more in the classroom. The teacher could have the students create their own listening activities in groups for the rest of the class. If doing this, it’s probably a good idea to work with the students individually during office hours to make sure what they have chosen is appropriate and presented coherently. The possibilities of incorporating this sort of technology in the classroom are limitless.

Presentations and Commercials

This is the website of an Oberlin College Spanish teacher familiar with levels 1, 2 and 3 (beginner, intermediate, advanced) and it has some good suggestions as to how to go about organizing oral presentations in the classroom. I agree with the author that for lower levels, such activities like describing how to make something or telling the class about a trip are best. This gives the student the opportunity to practice speaking about something that is meaningful to him or her and is a great way to incorporate new vocabulary as well as practice new grammar and  verb tenses in a fluid discourse.

Although it might not be practical for community college learners, high school Spanish students could definitely benefit from some of the games suggested on this website. I especially like the Pictionary game and the “Who am I?” game to get students speaking in Spanish in fun ways.

Another good site that could be used to get students talking is a Dutch site for foreigners learning Spanish called Ver-taal. This video would be good for showing the students the imperative tense. This particular video is from Chile and communicates how people can prevent forest fires. The teacher could show this video in class and then have the students get into groups of three or four and create their own commercial. The assignment could be structured so that it either incorporates vocabulary the students have already learned or new vocabulary the teacher can provide, depending on the topic chosen for the commercials.

Youtube is also a good resource for short videos on various topics in Spanish that could serve as examples for presentations in the classroom. This in-flight movie provides an introduction to the city of Caracas, using simplified Spanish and vocabulary the students will likely be learning in the classroom. One activity the teacher could do with this is have the students work alone or in groups to create a video about their hometown or anywhere they have been. They could use this video as a model of some topics to include in their own presentations, as well as to get an idea of what kind of language is used when describing people and places.