October, November, and December with Nancy

Hello there! I know this is long overdue, but let me introduce myself. My name is Nancy and I am the English Language Assistant (ELA) this school year at ​​CEIP Antonio Rodríguez Almodóvar. I am from California, USA and this is my fifth year working as an ELA. 

The first few weeks were spent introducing myself and getting to know how things worked around the school. For the month of October, we focused on food and nutrients. Students learned about carbohydrates, proteins, vitamins, minerals, and healthy fats and why they are important for us. To finish off this unit, each student had to write a recipe and explain what ingredients were nutritious.

At the end of October I shared with the students different ways in which Halloween is celebrated in the States. I didn’t expect such enthusiasm for this holiday and was pleasantly surprised at the awesome decorations all over the school! 

In the next unit we learned about the Earth. We started off with the layers of the atmosphere. I explained the five layers of the atmosphere and what can be found in each one. After, we moved on to the three climate zones and parts of the Earth. The class learned about the five imaginary lines that go across the Earth and represent the equator, the Tropics of Capricorn and Cancer, and the Arctic and Antarctic Circles.  

Next on the agenda is winter holidays! I will definitely talk about Christmas and how my family and I celebrate this special holiday, but there are also other holidays the students may not be familiar with. I am looking forward to sharing these new (to them) holidays this week. 

Time has flown by and I am enjoying every minute of it. I will try to do a better job with this blog to keep you up to date on everything going on with the 4th graders and all the material they are learning in their science classes. I hope you all have a great winter break with your loved ones!

P.S. To view any of the presentations linked to this blog post, just click on the underlined word and once the tab opens click on Presentación (top right) to begin the slideshow!

October -Interaction and Body Systems

The year 4 classes are great because they are getting older so very mature but also full of energy too! In November, we looked at interaction and body systems. First, we looked at how the eye works and takes in light. I showed them how the pupil gets smaller if there is lots of light and bigger if it is dark by turning the classroom lights off and on again. They looked at each others' eyes and were astonished! We learned about how different parts of the body react to stimuli and how the brain sends messages to the different body parts. 

When we looked at muscles we all tensed our bicep contracts and the tricep relaxes and visa versa. It was great to use our bodies to learn.

We also played a game where the students had to work in teams and come up to the board one at a time to review what they'd learned about different body parts. The team that had the most words written down won!

For some more complex material, on the brain, for example, we looked at videos to help us.

This is the vocabulary they learned:

-    Brain, brain stem, cerebellum, interaction, musculoskeletal system, nerve and sense organs.
-    Gustatory nerve, inner ear, iris, lens, middle ear, mucous membrane, and nerve endings, olfactory nerve, optic nerve, pupil retina and taste buds.
-    Bone, joint, muscle and tendon.

Circulation

To learn about circulation, I put the students in groups of 5 and had each student play a different part of the circulatory system. One student was the artery, a vein, the heart etc and they had to present in front of the class (holding blue or red depending on if blood was oxygenated or deoxygenated) the circulatory system. They worked well using their English to explain the system! 

October with new English Language Assistant, Daniella

A whole month working as an English Language Assistant at CEIP Antonio Rodríguez Almodóvar has flown by. My name is Daniella and I am 23, from the United Kingdom and currently teaching English at CEIP. I am in science classes teaching science in English, which I love because the students get to practice their English through their science learning. I think I am the first British language assistant that the school has had, so I am looking forward to bringing some British culture into the classroom. This brings me to one of the most exciting days so far at school… Halloween! 

Halloween at CEIP
It was so amazing to see Halloween celebrated at CEIP by all the teachers and students. I was blown away by the costumes. Halloween originated in Scotland and Ireland so it was a great festivity to intertwine with some British cultural history! I told class 4A and 4B about the history of Halloween and how people wore costumes to scare away the evil spirits. They seemed interested and learned some new vocabulary as well as the geography of the UK and Ireland. I asked the students questions about Halloween in Spain to find out how it is similar or different to the UK, where Halloween is a big deal. They were surprised that everyone puts a pumpkin outside their door in the UK, and that we eat the insides of the pumpkin sometimes too. It was great to see the students trying to explain what they do on Halloween and what they dress up as without realising they were improving their English by practising and learning new vocabulary.

Spooky Word Search and Bingo
We did a spooky word search and bingo. I taught them some new vocabulary like ‘broom’ and ‘cauldron’ by drawing pictures and writing the words on the board. They had to understand the new vocabulary for bingo because I would call out a word and they needed to know it to find it on their sheet (and as with all games, they all wanted to win so worked hard to remember the vocabulary).

First Impressions of English & Intentions

I have been so impressed by the high level of English across the year groups! The first step to learning a new language is motivation and to be motivated the children need to be excited and confident. I hope I can make the students have fun with their English learning and not worry about making mistakes (as that is how we learn after all).

Catching up...

I've been behind the past few weeks! I've been traveling and trying to keep my creativity alive in the classroom, so blogging has taken a back seat unfortunately but here's what we've been doing in fourth grade:

Sadly enough I haven't been able to do much in class the past few weeks. We have been working on our oral exams and with this being my first time completing it with them I've had to work through some nerves and anxiety. I assured them that I don't bite but it still seemed to be a little nerve wrecking for them. They are doing well and we are taking our time but I'm ready to get back into the classroom this week and have some fun! They are completing an economy project and will be presenting soon so I'll be helping them with presentation skills this week. Time to do some more acting!

Weeks of February 25 - March 1 and March 4 - 8

These past two weeks were slightly off schedule as we celebrated Andalucia Day on February 28 and International Women's Day on March 8. We've also had some teacher's out with various things going on so these past two weeks were definitely a lesson in going with the flow which is very important! All that said, they were very good weeks and the students had a lot of fun with the activities that were related to these two very important holidays.

In fourth grade we covered a bit about grass, bushes and trees, as well as flowering and non-flowering plants. This activity was very straightforward, the students wrote the characteristics in their notebooks and used a flow chart to break down the differences of the flowering and non-flowering plants...not my most fun activity but sometimes things must be done the old fashioned way.
The following week, I taught about ecosystems and introduced the various types of ecosystems we have in Texas. Spain and Texas share some very similar ecosystems with the exception of the wetlands we have in Texas. I went more into depth with this type and used it to add in the food chain and talk about alligators! Another thing we have (few of) in Texas but not in Spain. We covered the definition of an ecosystem with a breakdown of everything we would find in a wetland. This was a pretty fun activity and I did a lot of drawing, which proved to be comical for the kids!

Week of February 18 - 22

This week in fourth grade I took the opportunity to teach them what a Pop Quiz is! They had to complete the names of the life processes using MRS GREN. After this I used another trick to teach them how to memorize the five kingdoms. And finally we spent time using the tricks to name everything we covered.

This class was fun, it was amazing to see how fast they learned a new tool! For the Pop Quiz, they were nervous but they did so well and in reality it was added to their notebooks as a study tool. During the five kingdoms trick they were excited and had a lot of fun with the tricks. For the review at the end they gave me their full energy and I appreciated that as always!

Our first six weeks with Teacher Melanie!

Our first six weeks with Teacher Melanie!

Now that I’m adjusted to my new life here in Spain, let me tell you about these amazing first six weeks…

I am the Auxiliar or Culture and Language Assistant here at CEIP Antonio Rodríguez Almodóvar and my role is to encourage conversation and introduce relevant American culture into the classroom. Let me say…this is THE BEST job I’ve ever had! I am showered with love and appreciation and I get to use fun activities to get students involved in their curriculum. I think the one thing that I have been shocked by is how much I am truly able to teach the students. When I have their full attention I am able to introduce new subject matter and they walk away with knowledge and new confidence in their English. There is no better feeling!

Ooh fourth grade, how dear you are to me! I absolutely do not have favorites but I feel like my fourth graders have pulled out the best in me. Each class is impactful and unique and they met me with an unmatched energy level the minute I stepped into class. They truly gave me my confidence to teach…and for that I’m thankful because it impacts my ability to teach in all of classes. On my first day in our getting to know me conversation, they asked me to sing my favorite song and I haven’t sang in public since I was a 4^th grader myself. That was the moment that changed me! Here are the rest of our highlights:

In the first three weeks we got to know each other and I learned the classroom structure and lots of names! I also taught the Rock Cycle using a diagram and question/answer session and we had a day where they played a Guess Who style game using types of rocks. Thinking back I’m not even sure how we’ve covered so much in such a short amount of time! Our time together is always productive and progressive.

In week four I introduced the activity I was most excited for! I created a Fear Box similar to this one:

This is a tool I intend to use more throughout the year when I can. The idea is to insert an object that they must describe. The item may be unrelated but the words they should use will relate to the subject material. The rest of the class must then guess what’s inside. Unlike the video, the item inside is hidden from the audience. The first time we used it, it went flawlessly and was quite the entertainment. The students loved it and look forward to using it again. It gets them out of the comfort zone of using the same phrases and forces them to try to find words that they know or want to know!

In week five we did a review of landforms using a guessing game. Each student was assigned a landform that they’ve learned and given the opportunity to present it to the class. They used categories (landscape/body of water), direction (NSEWC), and relational clues (near, next to, etc.) to describe their assigned landform. The class was then allowed to guess the correct landform.

This activity was fun, interactive and competitive. I challenged the students to try to be the student who guessed the most landforms. This activity integrated their review, their public speaking, their directions and relational words, which they are learning in other subjects. They enjoyed it and I will use more activities like this to encourage their public speaking!

Last week I transformed into “MRS GREN” in order to teach the life processes of living things. Each letter of the name stands for a different life process and helps them to memorize each type. I lowered my glasses to the tip of my nose and spoke with an odd drag to make the day memorable. They giggled and participated willingly as I asked them to help me spell my name. Before the activity I asked the class if they could name all of the processes and they doubted themselves. By the end of the activity they knew each process and we reviewed an example for each process.

Needless to say, we have FUN in fourth grade!