myra5

To: Johnson, Myra J.
Subject: Spanish scavenger hunt
Myra,

First, I want to tell you what a great idea that was. The students who came to my room really seemed excited about the activity.

Also, I wanted you to know that because of your activity I learned a little Spanish. The students in my first period told me that when the students came to ask me for apples I should respond, "Sí Puedes." I was so excited!!!!

Thank you for including me!
Melanie

Pre-requisites: commands, ordinal numbers, prepositions of location, places in a city

This is a great application after you have introduced the above themes. At this point they have heard classroom commands all year from you, the teacher, and have now practiced writing sentences with commands. They have written the ordinal numbers and the prepositions of location on their vocabulary lists. A few exercises with the prepositions of locations would be good as well.

Examples of pre-activities:
*Give the students pictures where they have to describe where objects are in relation to other objects. Do this aloud and in written form. Ask them questions such as, “Where is the computer?” You can use pictures or describe your physical classroom.
*For Spanish use the following website with your projector to practice prepositions together as a class: http://www.colby.edu/~bknelson/exercises/index.html.
*Draw a map of a city on the board. Prepare in advance some pictures of places in the city and a picture of a car. It is best to print these on cardstock as they will be more durable. (You can use them later in the scavenger hunt, too.) Using Scotch tape, place these on your map. Begin by giving the car directions and driving your car around your city. (It is not necessary that you have taught the places in the city in advance, although it may be helpful. The students will learn them incidentally as they see the words on the board and hear you say them, and especially when they begin giving directions themselves.) You might want to list some verbs on the side of the board such as “turn”, “go down”, “go up”, and “follow”. After modeling this couple of times, have some student volunteers come to the board and give them directions while they move the car. (Did I mention it is helpful to have a magnet on the back of the car?) Then, have another student give directions to a fellow student. It’s great fun with a smaller class or as a model for the next activity.
*Give each student a copied city map that you have either drawn yourself or that you have enlarged from an actual map from a target language city. Have students follow with their fingers while you give the directions. Next put students in pairs and have them give directions to their partners.

Now you are ready for the big day!