On Monday we read the story El Toro Ferdinando and yesterday we watched the dubbed Disney short Ferdinand. We followed the video with chapter 1 of the novel Bianca Nieves y los 7 Toritos in which we meet her bull Ferdinando! We made some predictions about the novel based on what we saw when we watched the 2011 movie Blancanieves and from reading the story Snow White… What are some key elements of a fairy tale? What elements make a fairy tale more like Disney and which make it more like Grimm! As level 2 students they can make great connections!
Mine have decided that the novel is going to be more like Grimm! We shall see! They have also started a “Burn” chart where they are keeping track of Bianca and Salomé’s spats. I think they’ll be surprised how infrequently Bianca gets the upper hand!
Today we read Chapter 2 which talked about the ranch property size and the budding relationship between dad and Salomé (not-so-lovingly nicknamed Salami). We followed with an activity from the teacher’s guide called “Picasso of Plates”!
I love the idea of using novels to bring more of everything cool about learning a language into the classroom, and over the years I’ve used a couple of them with varying success. This past August, I’d submitted a grant request to be able to purchase class sets of some of the newer novels, but it was denied. I wondered if you had your students purchase their own copies or if you used the audio cd, or a doc cam projecting it for them to read as a class? I’m toying with the idea of having my students purchase personal copies of a couple of novels- putting it on my syllabus as a required material- this would be for my Spanish 3s- who are taking the class above the requirement for graduation. Do you have any thoughts or advice on this?
Hi!!! I have slowly built up my class sets! One novel per year! I started with novels that would be great for all levels! Easy enough for novices to read and then added challenge in the intermediate discussions!! I HAVE had kids buy their own! And the added perk is that they often donate them back at the end of the year! Which adds to my novel collection! ❤️
Both the audio CD and doc cam are totally legal since you aren’t reproducing the materials so they’d be a GREAT stand in while you decide your best move!
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