Title: Bienvenidos

Topic: Family

Level: Middle School - High School

Timeframe: One 45-minute class

Materials Needed: Bienvendios CD-ROM

Description of Task: Review is often a less-than-interesting task for both teacher and student. With this CD a student can review family vocabulary and relations with interesting activities using both discrete exercises as well as those which put the student in meaningful situations. The student can interact with this technology to practice communication skills, make comparisons between the target language and her/his own and learn and practice cultural differences and perspectives. An opportunity is also afforded the teacher to evaluate and assess student progress.

This learning activity uses the CD with Chapters 5-7 from the Bienvenidos series. Since family is a theme from nearly every entry level Spanish course, it is not necessary that Bienvenidos be the textbook series used. Students will watch, listen to, assume active roles in, answer questions to, and composed letters about family situations. They will be asked eventually to take cultural differences and apply them to their own situations.

Activity instruction:
Preparation:

• Students should already have studied the basic family situations for both the immediate family and the extended family. The important relation of the padrino and madrino should also have been introduced.
• The normal settings for the family in the various rooms of the house or apartment (as well as the idea of the prevalence of apartments) are natural extensions connected to the family members and are helpful for the student to go beyond discrete exercises to meaningful situations.
• Introduce the students to the symbols of the CD and how to use them. They should also be shown where help can be found. This theme of the family is found in the Chapter 6 section of the CD.

Procedure:

1. Have students select Chapter 6, then Content tab (on right), then vocabulary 1 for a quick review of the family members, and sentences using these terms. They then click on any member whose relation needs review and repeat after the native speaker to practice usage. When review is complete, students return to the main menu and pick Conversation to listen to a family situation. After the conversation has ended they can pick a favorite role read that part when prompted when the conversation is repeated by the CD.
2. After listening to the conversation with themselves in one of the roles, the students continue to Jaime's questions which are posed orally. Students answer by clicking on the microphone at the top of the screen when it is flashing and talking into the (real) microphone. Instruct students to answer only 4 questions, then raise their hands when they have done this. Teacher then approaches and instructs each student to finish answering the questions. After the last question is answered the CD will replay the questions with the student answers. At this time the teacher can evaluate how well the student has mastered both the understanding of the situation presented as well as her/his ability to express what has happened verbally.
3. Students return to Contents (right tab), Chapter 6, pick "Lecturas y Cultura". Clicking on the headphones at the top will enable the students to listen while reading "La familia hispana". After listening, they pick the "E" at the top, then "Palabras afines" to identify the cognates from the reading passage. On a separate paper, they write the Spanish work with its English derivative next to it. Return to "E" at top and pick part B to answer questions to "Quién es". Any time when answering questions that the student cannot remember what went on in the story or reading she/he can click on the "¿?" button to have the story be presented again on the screen. After finishing, go to the double arrow at the bottom to answer the next series. After finishing this, students can check their answers by hitting the return key for each number. Any differences between the student answers and the CD's can be noted by the student on the separate paper also.
4. Return to Content (tab on right), Chapter 6, then pick "Culminación", then "Escrita A". Students type their own quick family tree (just the immediate family if time is short), using the Hispanic way of writing surnames (Follow the instructions).
5. Click on "On line" at bottom and use the URL's provided to find familiar information on the internet (e.g., the family tree of the kings of Spain since Ferdinand and Isabel). Print this information and compare it to won family tree.

Richard Giantisco
Delaware Valley Regional HS
19 Senator Stout Road
Frenchtown, NJ 08825
richard.gianticso@dvrhs.k12.nj.