¡Bienvenidos!

¡Bienvenidos familia, amigas, y amigos de los Catbirds! Welcome Catbird families and friends! For this school year, 2014-15, I will be teaching Español (Spanish) to our AFS Lower School community and I could not be more excited. In fact, our journey has already begun.

Los Catbirds (the Catbirds) will be having Español class at 8:30am on Tuesdays during our Week A schedule and on Mondays during our Week B and they are super excited! This past week I paid them a visit and began by introducing myself and the program as a refresher to old friends and to familiarize our new ones.

Language acquisition happens naturally and subconsciously when we are surrounded by the target language. My goal is to spend the first few minutes of each class speaking in English to the children as I explain the day’s activity. As the children gain comprehension of the Spanish language, communication in the target language will increase.

I explained to los Catbirds that there are twenty-one countries where Spanish is the official language and I was born in one of them, which is where I learned to speak Spanish. I showed them a map of all the Spanish speaking countries and explained that at the beginning of each class, someone will pick where we will visit for that day.

Once we determine our destination, we will “pretend” to fly to that country. I showed los Catbirdss my red sequin vest and explained that when I put this vest on, it indicates that I am sort of the guía de viaje (travel guide) that speaks very little English therefore we will all try to do our best to speak in Spanish once we land. 

And, at the end of our visit we will have a special friend see us off back to the United States. Ask your child who this special friend is. Here’s a hint; es un animal.

Vocabulary introduced:

Buenos días- Good morning

Gracias– thank you

de nada– you’re welcome

¡Adiós! -Good-bye!

I look forward to our many, many travels ahead. Until my next noticias (news) ....

Paz,

Alicia