lesson plans
May 9, 2023
Remember that car that was parked two spaces down from you, at that store you went to, for that thing you wanted to buy? Of course you don’t. Every day, thousands of events pass through our experience, and they do not stay with us. For most of us, these experiences go in, they’re briefly acknowledged […]
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January 29, 2019
By now we’re all back into the language class swing, right? I love my breaks and I love teaching and I confess I have a love-hate relationship with that first day back after a break. I almost always have at least one dream sometime in the few days beforehand with one of the following scenarios: I can’t […]
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March 13, 2018
Do you remember Mad Libs? As I was planning my semester around our novel Robo en la noche and our unit’s Driving Question: What can we create and share to show an interesting itinerary for a five-day trip in Costa Rica? it occurred to me that Mad Libs would be a fun way to explore a […]
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March 30, 2016
My friend Amy Lenord and I are tired of drawing out our primacy/recency map on paper to keep us focused on planning the right stuff at the right time. So, a couple of weeks ago Amy emailed me the template she had whipped up to print out and fill in. It was super simple and […]
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March 11, 2016
The Best Laid Plans (CSCTFL ’16)
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Isn’t lesson planning the easiest part of our job? I have to be honest: I find lesson creation and planning fun. But I don’t always find that what I produce is effective. What’s the difference between effective planning and randomly hoping it all comes together and accomplishing something? That’s the topic Thomas Sauer, Amy Lenord, […]
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February 24, 2016
In eleven years of lesson planning, I’ve learned to have a healthy fear of one particular word in that process: and. Picture this: Recently I’m working on a lesson plan, and because I’m “behind” and trying to catch up on the syllabus (which I wrote, and can really change anytime I want), here’s what I end […]
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October 27, 2015
You know that glassed-over look that your students get about halfway (a quarter of the way?) through your lesson? The same one you get about 15 minutes into the faculty meeting? Here’s how to fight it. First, realize it’s not your students’ fault. Their brains are designed to filter and process information and the brain […]
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September 28, 2015
The Best Laid Plans (KWLA ’15)
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Given how long Thomas Sauer and I have been colleagues and friends, I can’t believe we haven’t presented together before. Well, we fixed that on Saturday and presented a 3-hour workshop on effective lesson planning. Two things: 1. Three hours was not enough. 2. I learned at least as much from Thomas as anyone there learned […]
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July 10, 2015
What if every task students did in class had a real-world application? I asked that question during last night’s #langbook chat. This summer we started what we hope will be an annual summer-break chat to encourage language teachers to read quality professional books. For the inaugural #langbook chat, we polled and participants chose the book […]
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May 5, 2015
If you know me you know I love a good research book, particularly one that tells us in lay language what it’s going to take to help kids succeed in a world we can’t even imagine, one that’s vastly different from the one we grew up in. The other day, Zoe asked me, Mami, what’s […]
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April 15, 2015
A few weeks ago the topic for #langchat was about timing and transitioning activities in a class. Then, shortly after, I was teaching a novice-high class of sixth-graders as part of an interview to perhaps go back to teaching next year (MAYBE). (Lesson plan coming soon.) Anyway, it made me think more about this issue […]
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February 18, 2015
Are you ready for the most intense, profitable workshop on curriculum planning this summer? I’ve been planning for the 2015 Camp Musicuentos workshops since the inaugural workshop ended last June, and I’m so excited to announce that registration for the events (a 2-day workshop in Louisville, Kentucky, and a one-day workshop in Warwick, RI) is […]
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