SAMPLE CHILDREN CLASSES

SPANISH FOR CHILDREN

Spanish Program for Children - Age 3 - 6

Course Objective:

                   As this course is intended for younger students, the learning experience in this course will be enjoyable and entertaining with the purpose of achieving and maintaining a high level of interest. A great variety of visual and audio aids will be used as well as games to ensure the active participation of the students and to enable them to establish a vivid connection with Spanish.

Unit I:       Greetings: Dolls will be used. The students will practice greeting each other. The students will translate the greetings from English into Spanish. The Greeting song will be heard and sung by the students. The students will receive written material of the “greeting song” with pictures to color. The numbers: The students will learn the numbers (1-5). They will count different objects and will color pictures. The students will write down the numbers mentioned by the teacher. The students will hear and sing the song “Let’s count”.

Unit II:      What is this? The students will practice the question. Visual aids will be used showing new vocabulary. The colors: The teacher will show objects of different colors. The students will color a bouquet of flowers, each of them with a specific color called by the teacher in Spanish. The teacher will call colors and the students will find them in the classroom. The students will hear and sing the song “The colors”.

Unit III :   The family. The students will color a family tree and draw the picture of each member of the family in the corresponding blank circle of the tree. Each student will mention a family relationship in Spanish and the other student will say the name of his family member. The children will hear and sing the song “Papa chant”. Who is this? The children will practice this question asking the names of their own classmates. They will also use this question to ask the names of the relatives on the family tree.                                                                                                

Unit IV:     The classroom. The students will learn the names of the most common objects in the classroom. The teacher will guide a blindfolded student who must identify the objects in Spanish. The students will draw a picture of the classroom with all the objects they learnt. The students will show the picture and will name the objects in Spanish. The question What is this? will be practiced as students ask each other about the objects in their pictures.

Unit V:      The body. The students will identify the parts of the body on the picture of a girl and a boy. A student will whisper the name of a part of the body in Spanish to another student who will point it to the class. The students will color the picture of the parts of the body and will hear and sing the song “The Body”. Introduction to Where is? The student will practice this question in reference to the location of different objects in the classroom. The students will close their eyes and one student will hide an object. He will ask where is…? And the class will have to guess.

Unit VI:     Where is? (Verb “Estar”) The students will learn the name of some places (restaurants, house, school, and movie theater). They will color the pictures of these places and will draw the animals they learned in each of them. One student will ask where the animal is, and the other student will mention the place. The happy birthday song will be heard and sung.

Unit VII:   The food. The students will color the pictures of different foods. One student will whisper the name of a food and the other will draw it. He will show the picture to the class and the class will say the name. The students will mention their favorite foods and will draw them.

Unit VIII:  The numbers (5 to 10). The students will color the pictures of objects representing the numbers. The teacher will show cards with numbers and the students will say the number in Spanish. The students will say how many friends they have, brothers and sisters, etc. The titles (Mr., Mrs., and Ms.). A poster will be used to let the class identify these titles. The students will use the titles mentioning people they know.

Unit IX:     Verb “Ser”. (First and third persons). A poster will be used to show different people and their attributes. Adjectives that are similar in Spanish and English will be used. The students will practice these adjectives mentioning people they know. They will practice “Soy” and will pick one of the adjectives to describe themselves.

Unit X:      Verb “Ser” and “Estar”. Visual aides will be shown to induce the children to practice the two verbs. The students will say what they are like (verb “Ser”) and where they are (verb “Star”). They will color people and their attributes as well as the places where they are located. Each of the students will describe the pictures.

Unit XI:     The days of the week. The students will hear and sing the song “The days of the week”. The teacher will mention typical activities of each day of the week in English to induce the student to name the corresponding day of the week in Spanish. The children will mention their favorite day of the week. The students will color pictures that show the days of the week. The children will hear and sing the song “The days of the week”.

Unit XII:   The clothes. The students will color picture of clothes. From a pile of clothing, a student has to pick the item requested by the class in Spanish. The students will name their own clothes. The students will use adjectives learned with the clothes.

Unit XIII:  General revision. Greetings. The numbers. The colors. The body. The food. The family. The classroom. The days of the week. The clothes. Grammar: interrogative words, what, who, where, how. Adjectives. Verbs “Ser” and Estar”. The students will hear and sing “The farewell” song.

Spanish Program for Children - Age 7 - 10

Course Objective:  The main objective of this course is to make the learning of Spanish an

 enjoyable, personalized and rewarding experience. The use of visual and audio aids as well as role-playing and intensive conversational practice give the students the feeling that they can have fun learning Spanish.

Unit I:       Words that are similar in Spanish and in English. Many words that do not need translation will be shown. Greetings: A dialogue will be heard and the students will practice it with each other.  They will fill in the blanks of another dialogue of two people greeting each other.

Unit II:      What is this?: Practice with vocabulary learned in previous unit. The definite article (el, la) will be practiced with new vocabulary. The students will fill in blanks. One student will name a noun and another student will choose the corresponding masculine or feminine article. The family: A visual aid will show the members of a family. The students will mention the names of each member of their own families. The titles: Mr., Mrs. and Ms. Visual aids will be used to induce the students to practice the titles. They will use them naming people they know. Who is this?: The interrogative word who will be practiced in questions about the visual aid.

Unit III :         The indefinite article (un, una): The students will practice the difference between the definite and the indefinite articles. A poster of a simple story will be presented to practice the articles. The students will complete a crossword puzzle to practice the articles and previous vocabulary.                                                       

Unit IV:     Where is?: A poster will be shown to present objects and people in different locations. The students will ask and answer questions to each other. Simple Present Tense, Negative and Interrogative Cases (ar conjugation): Posters will be shown of people doing different activities. The poster of a story of a family will be shown to induce the students to talk about the activities of the family. The students will fill in blanks to practice conjugation.

Unit V:      Simple Present Tense, Negative and Interrogative (er, ir conjugation): Posters will be shown with different activities. On some posters, the students will attached the corresponding conjugated verbs. The students will ask each other questions about their activities. Some students will mimic actions and others will guess the corresponding activities.

Unit VI:     The City: A poster of a story of two children visiting a city will be shown. New vocabulary will be learned and the simple present tense will be practiced. The students will talk about their city.

Unit VII:   Verb “Ser” (first person and third person) and Verb “Estar” ( first person and third person): Visual aids will show different people and their attributes to practice both verb “ser” and several adjectives. The students will talk about their own attributes. Visual aids will show people in different locations. The students will practice verb “estar” and the names of places. The students will describe the posters to practice the two verbs. How? With verb “Ser” and verb “Estar”( first person and third): Visual aids will be used to mark the difference in the meaning between how+ser and how+estar.                 

Unit VIII:  What Time Is It?. The Numbers (0-30): The students will practice the numbers and to tell time with a big clock with movable hands. The students will have pictures of people doing daily activities and will have to establish the corresponding time of the day. The students will listen to a dialogue between two friends about a watch that does not work and later they will do role-playing based on the dialogue. The clothes” The students will dress a man and a women. The teacher will show the paper clothing to induce the students to practice the vocabulary. The students will talk about they are wearing. The students will listen to a dialogue between a girl and her mother about going to a party and about the clothes the girl wants to wear. Role-playing will be used to practice the dialogue.

Unit IX:     What’s the weather like?: A visual aid will be shown of the story of two friends who take a vacation in South America. The seasons will be practiced as well as the months of the year and the days of the week. The Food: The students will learn the names of a variety of foods. They will receive pictures of foods and they will name them. They will talk about their favorite foods.

Unit X:      The Use of The Infinitive: The students will use two verbs together. Visual aids will be presented to practice verb to want + infinitive, verb to need + infinitive. The students will mention the activities they want to do or that they need to do. The students will fill in the blanks on a poster.

Unit XI:     The Home: The students will learn about a typical Spanish house. They will have a plan of the house. They will describe their own homes. At The Restaurant: A story will be presented to practice the new vocabulary and the students will do role-playing.

Unit XII:   Simple Present Tense, Irregular Verbs: The students will practice some of the most common irregular verbs. A poster will be used to practice the irregular verbs. A dialogue between the students will take place to practice the irregular verbs.

Unit XIII:  General Revision: The Family, The City, The Time, The Weather, The Clothes, The Home. Grammar: definite and indefinite articles. What, Who, Where, How. Adjectives. “Ser” and “Estar”. Simple Present Tense, Regular Verbs. Simple Present Tense Irregular Verbs. The Use of the Infinitive.