The Digital Polyglot

A publication of the Inland Empire World Language Association since 1985

April, 2017

Editor - Bethany Thompson
Asst. Editor - Trini Rios

In this issue:

• CLTA/CWLP Summer Seminar at UC Santa Barbara
• CLTA Conference 2018, Ontario
• Tried and True - White boards
• Activities, activities, activities
• STARTALK Workshops at UCLA
• Jobs Openings in the Inland Empire
• Languages in the News
• Tech Corner - Snapchat
• YouTube Clip of the Month
• Spanish Corner - Webquest
• French Corner - TV5 Monde
• German Corner - Move Beyond "Gut" and "Schlect"

CLTA/CWLP Summer Seminar at
UC Santa Barbara

Summer Seminar 2017 in Santa Barbara is just around the corner, July 14-19!  For more information visit the Summer Seminar Webpage.

Summer Seminar Offerings - Choose One

A: Designing French Instructional Units that Engage and Transform Learners’ Performance
B: Common Core-Aligned Reading and Writing Strategies that Build Multilingual Literacies
C: Leading through Practice: High-Leverage Practices that Advance Student Learning and Professional Growth
D: Multimedia Tools that Enhance Core Practices, Advance Learning and Global Competence
E: STARTALK Leadership Development for Teachers of Critical Languages and Cultures
F: Strengthening Core Practices in the Spanish World Language and Heritage Learners Classroom
G: Using Core Practices to Build Global Competence in Japanese
H: What Can They Do? Performance Assessment that Support Globally Competent World Language Students

For more information and registration visit the Summer Seminar Webpage.

Looking to give back to IEFLA? CLTA Conference 2018 in Ontario

In March of 2017 IEFLA will be hosting the CLTA state conference in Ontario, and we are looking for some Inland Empire teachers who want to show of their IE pride!  We need help with hospitality (show off your favorite IE restaurants and entertainment), technology (audio/visual support), advertising and more!  If you’d like to help make the Ontario conference one to remember, contact Lewie Johnson at lewiejohnson@gmail.com.

Tried and True

Individual White Boards

White boards have become very popular with teachers and students alike. They can be very easily made by slipping a sheet of tag board (heavy duty paper) into a slick plastic sheet protector.

Using the white boards the teacher can stay in the target language, the students are actively engaged, and the teacher gets valuable informal assess seeing the responses of the students. After the students show their answers, be sure to give confirmation by either saying the answer or showing the answer.

Be careful: You don’t need to check every answer every time. This can slow the pace down too much. Keep the pace lively. Take a quick look around the class to see about how many answers are correct and that all students are participating.

Verb forms: The teacher prepares a stack of about 10 – 5” x 8” index cards. Write subject pronouns on them. And then prepares about 12 more cards with infinitives. Show one subject and one verb. Students write the correct form.

Verbal relay races: The teacher announces the infinitive. The first person in row has the white board and writes the first person singular of a particular verb, then passes the board to the next person, who must write down the second person singular of the verb, etc.

Numbers: The teacher says the number and the students show the number.

TPR: The teacher gestures the word. The students write the word.

Pictures: The teacher shows the picture. The students write the word.

Numbered heads together: Each group of four has one board. One person writes the word/answer. The board passes to a different person for the next question.

Reading: After reading a selection, students can write answers to comprehension questions and higher order thinking questions.

Erasers: I have the students donate used, clean socks to the class collection to use for erasers. They work well. I take them home a few times a year to launder them.

Activities, Activities, Activities

Two low prep activities for writing: students get into pairs, then one silently reads a sentence on the board and writes it in the air for a second student, who cannot see the board and must correctly write the sentence down. In the second version, one student writes on the other students' palm with his/her finger. See a fuller explanation at http://palmyraspanish1.blogspot.com/2017/03/air-writing-palm-writing-fun-friday.html (via CASLS)

Look for #authres on the Internet?  Here are some helpful tips from Secondary Spanish Space.

7 Speaking Activities for any video from Spanish Playground.  (Examples in Spanish, but applicable to all languages.)

Follow IEFLA on Pinterest @iefla  Twitter: @iefla_tweets

Check out CLTA on Twitter @cltatweets

STARTALK Workshops at UCLA

The National Heritage Language Resource Center will be holding a STARTALK workshop for teachers of Arabic, Chinese, Hindi, Korean, Persian, Portuguese, Russian, Swahili, Turkish, and Urdu, with additional spaces available for other less commonly taught languages.

This two-part workshop will help language teachers face the challenge of teaching heritage language (HL) students. The three-week online component opens on June 1, 2017, followed by a five-day face-to-face component (June 26-30, 2017 at UCLA). The online assignments focus on identifying and addressing the linguistic gaps in HL students’ language, differentiated teaching, and teaching mixed classes. The face-to-face session will focus on how to use project-based learning as a useful tool in HL instruction. Accepted participants will be required to complete both online assignments and the face-to-face session. There is no charge for the workshop. A limited number of stipends will cover travel and accommodations for out-of-state participants.

The workshop's goals are for participants to:
1.   Understand the needs of HL learners.
2.   Identify criteria and strategies for developing PBL curricula.
3.   Develop instructional materials that answer the needs of HL learners.
4.   Design projects and select materials that build on HL students’ initial proficiencies and meet both their linguistic and affective needs.
5.   Understand how to structure and pace a project-based unit.
6.   Understand how to select and use authentic materials, and develop real-life activities to accompany them.
7.   Become familiar with the principles of differentiated and macro -based teaching.

For more information about the teacher workshop, please visit http://nhlrc.ucla.edu/nhlrc/events/startalkworkshop/2017/home

Job Openings in the Inland Empire

Spanish and ASL Opening in Apple Valley Unified.  See http://www.edjoin.org to apply.

French/Spanish temporary position at Citrus Valley High School in Redlands.  See http://www.edjoin.org/ to apply.

Need a teacher? Need a job? Go to http://www.la-stars.net/jobs/

Languages in the News

ACTFL is looking for volunteers They have established a new volunteer portal on the ACTFL Community. Log in and use the "Volunteer" dropdown menu feature, which allows you to check out volunteer opportunities and update your preferences.

Language Teacher v. Acquisition Facilitator in Language Magazine.

A Map of Lexical Differences Between European Languages

IEFLA’s now on Twitter!  Follow us @iefla_tweets!!

Tech Corner

This month:  Snapchat (Yes, Snapchat.)  Snapchat is a mobile app that allows you to easily communicate with friends and teachers are using this tool with their students. How one school is using Snapchat to teach life long lessons.

Why and how to create #booksnaps with your studentsUse #booksnaps to have students talk about something they read.

Language specific ideas for Snapchat from Discovering CI.

YouTube Clip of the Month

Two low prep activities for writing: students get into pairs, then one silently reads a sentence on the board and writes it in the air for a second student, who cannot see the board and must correctly write the sentence down. In the second version, one student writes on the other students' palm with his/her finger. See a fuller explanation at http://palmyraspanish1.blogspot.com/2017/03/air-writing-palm-writing-fun-friday.html (via CASLS)

Look for #authres on the Internet?  Here are some helpful tips from Secondary Spanish Space.

7 Speaking Activities for any video from Spanish Playground.  (Examples in Spanish, but applicable to all languages.)

Spanish Corner

Here is a webquest from Maris Hawkins for shopping for furniture.

Spanish songs for the classroom- some recommended songs in Spanish that are especially well-suited for learners, either because they are fairly easy to understand or are culturally interesting: http://learn-spanish-with-bilingual-stories.weebly.com/the-best-spanish-language-songs-for-learning-spanish-top-ten-audio-list--spotify-playlist.html (via CASLS)

Five new movies for the Spanish Classroom from Mis Clases Locas.

A podcast for Spanish learners about punctuality in Spain!

French Corner       

TV5 Monde Channels are now available on SlingTV. 

An incredibly thoughtful and thorough French unit on food and culture from Catherine Ousselin. 

Looking to explore the French presidential elections?  Madame Shepard has a proficiency based mini-unit ready for you!

Using the “Humans of Paris” to spark conversation from the French Corner Blog.  Mais oui!

German Corner

Move beyond “gut” and “schlect” with a wider variety of descriptive adjectives. For commonly-used adjective, there are suggestions for more specific words: http://blogs.transparent.com/german/express-yourself-in-german-with-these-adjectives/ (via CASLS)

Job Openings

Looking for a job? Go to http://www.la-stars.net/jobs/

Follow IEFLA on Pinterest @iefla  Twitter: @iefla_tweets

Check out CLTA on Twitter @cltatweets