To finish the year, Spanish 4 is reading the novel La Calaca Alegre by Carrie Toth.
More Blog posts about using La Calaca Alegre in Spanish class
Chapter 6
- We reviewed chapters 1-5 from the week before using the fun marker partner game from Cynthia Hitz. I read true/false statements from the first 5 chapters & students have goofy rules to show their comprehension.
- Students read chapter 6 and we discussed it as a class.
- We used the videos from the teacher’s guide to do a video tour of the neighborhood of Pilsen in Chicago.
Chapter 7
- We used the phrase “meterse en líos” to talk about students past history of getting in trouble using an activity from the teacher’s guide.
- We read and discussed the chapter.
- We reviewed the conditional tense and students did a guided writing on what their reaction to Carlos would be in they were his aunt and uncle.
Chapter 8
- Students shared their free writes from the day before with their tables, reviewing and discussing once again what they would have done it that situation.
- Per the class request, i read the chapter to them, and we discussed as we went.
- Students then wrote and discussed their prediction of what would happen in the second half of the book.
Chapter 9
- We discussed predictions as a class and then read and discussed chapter 9.
- Students completed a web quest from the teacher’s guide about Jeff Zimmerman murals.
- We went through the Murales de Pilsen slideshow from the teacher’s guide.
Chapter 10
- We started this chapter after a long weekend, so I divided up the 9 chapters we had read so far. My nine students were each given a piece of computer paper and were responsible for drawing and writing what happened in their chapter. These were then posted around the room in a gallery walk style, so students could walk through what had happened so far.
- Before reading we discussed the phrase “meter la pata,” using times we had put our foot in our mouth.We read and discussed the chapter.
- Students completed phrases from the starter “If I were Carlos,” once again focusing on using the conditional.
Hopefully by next week I will be able to post Teaching La Calaca Alegre – Chapters 11-15 once we finish the book!
Allison Wienhold of Mis Clases Locas has a decade of experience as a #deptof1 secondary Spanish teacher in Iowa. She enjoys creating curricula using novels, films, and music. Allison provides professional development to World Language teachers, including being the keynote speaker at MALT and Comprehensible Iowa, and workshop presenter at dozens of state & regional organizations, school districts, AEAs, and virtual conferences.