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March 12, 2016
A year passing between two versions of the same presentation changes things. That’s even more true when your teaching situation changes. Last year I presented at Central States a session about helping students face a world of incomprehensible input and turn it into the comprehensible input they need for acquisition by teaching circumlocution early and often. […]
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December 10, 2015
I just looked at the calendar and realized it’s December. How did that happen? And how did I forget the best-of-year posts and the book club and my December BLOGCATION? Ah. Anyway. The great best-of posts by Laura and Allison have finally sunk in to remind me what I do in December and here it begins. […]
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March 6, 2015
Poll: what conference proposals?
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Proposals are now open for two of my favorite conferences, my home conference, Kentucky World Language Association, and the 2016 Central States Conference on the Teaching of Foreign Languages. Conference presentations are only as good as they can relate to the content teachers actually need, so as usual, I’d like to know what you’d like […]
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November 24, 2014
Can you believe 2014 is almost over? So, what’s next for Musicuentos? Expect one last informative November post this week about what I learned at ACTFL (hint- no one has all the answers). Then, as I did last year, I’ll be taking the month of December off from blogging. But that doesn’t mean you won’t […]
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September 10, 2014
Thank you, reflective teachers
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I thought about trying to tweet this but I couldn’t do it in 140 characters. Many of you are in the middle of the 30-day #reflectiveteacher challenge. You’re blogging and reflecting on what makes you a teacher, what you’ve accomplished and where you can improve. By subscribing to your blogs, I’ve been able to follow […]
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July 24, 2014
Oso de Mantequilla: A tribute
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I grew up in a fundamental Christian church in the South, where everyone referred to the men as “Brother” and their first or last name. My best friend as a toddler could not pronounce my father’s last name – “Brother Blair” – and it came out “Butter Bear.” And so my mother’s favorite nickname was […]
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December 15, 2013
2013’s sixth most popular post is about how brain research can help us plan our lessons more effectively. What if the way we’ve been doing lesson plans for years and years makes no sense at all, given the research on memory and brain function? For the way I currently approach lesson planning I have to […]
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December 6, 2013
2013’s ninth most popular post is about how assessment should affect future content. Assessment has a lot of purposes, the least important of which is to give students a number on a report card. Some that come to mind are: educating students and parents on proficiency helping students identify areas that need improvemen keeping parents informed […]
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December 3, 2013
2013’s tenth most popular post is about quickly assessing students’ paired and group conversations. In order to learn how to converse with someone, students need to hear conversations, plan conversations, and participate in conversations. So, if we’re giving students a lot of opportunities for interpersonal communication in class, which we should, how do we grade […]
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December 1, 2013
Happy December!
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What a year! Even as my family welcomed our third child in five years, 2013 has seen more blog posts (97!) and more activity and more projects for Musicuentos than in any other year since I started blogging in 2008. In December I”ll be taking a break from writing new blog posts -with the notable […]
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November 22, 2013
Broken record: I’m not at ACTFL right now, but I wish I were. Regardless of whether you’re there or not, would you take a minute and let me know what you’d like to see as a Musicuentos presentation at ACTFL 2014 in San Antonio? Bethanie Carlson Drew, Laura Sexton, Kara Jacobs, and I are proposing […]
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November 14, 2013
Are you headed to ACTFL this year? I’m not (and still, sadly, have never been, but this year I’m on “maternity leave” from travel), but if you are, you’ll want to see this exciting, helpful document from the TELL (Teacher Effectiveness in Language Learning) project. In their words, “the mission of the TELL Project is […]
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