Life Skills...communicate in another language

What do you want to be when you grow up?

Speak with your students about why they are studying language- show the ACTFL oral proficiency levels in the workplace

World language skills are LIFE SKILLS! Click on life skills to read the link.  Learning languages connects to interpersonal, learning, presentational and writing skills.

Please remember if you have any creative or interesting writing pieces...submit them to Phoebus.      Just email phoebuslitmag@gmail.com

Remember, writing will look different in the novice and intermediate stages.  For more ideas, prompts and ACTFL guidelines...look back at the SLIDESHOW from our last meeting.

Library News:  Thanks to Kari Dalane for purchasing some new Spanish and French resources for the US library.  They are audio magazines with mp3 audios that can be put into dropbox.

Punto y Coma Spanish Audio Magazine

• Puntoycoma nace, sobre todo, del amor al aprendizaje de una segunda lengua y del interés por una cultura diferente a la nativa. 

• Puntoycoma se dirige a estudiantes que tienen un nivel medio-alto (niveles avanzado y superior del Instituto Cervantes y B2, C1 y C2 del Marco de Referencia Europeo) 

• Puntoycoma es una revista de actualidad escrita por periodistas y expertos en los distintos temas.

• En puntoycoma todos los artículos se presentan con un glosario de traducciones y en muchos de ellos hay ejercicios con sus correspondientes soluciones.

• Esencialmente, puntoycoma es una revista de audio con su CD en el que podemos escuchar una gran variedad de acentos del español.

Bien-dire French Audio Magazine - From France for learners of French

• Articles variés sur la culture francophone spécifiquement écrits par des spécialistes de l'apprentissage de FLE
• Lexique de mots traduits en contexte et expressions idiomatiques
• Niveau de CECR précisé à chaque article
• Nombreuses illustrations qui facilitent la compréhension
• Points de grammaire
• Articles lus par des natifs francophones
• Exercices interactifs basés sur des articles des magazines

Diversity in Depth-

David Grant has published a website with various aspects of our Potomac Diversity.  Click to see what some WL teachers have submitted about CULTURAL COMPETENCE in their classrooms. Please submit more to David Grant to update his site (include pictures)!

LS/MS Buddy update:  All languages represented!

How exciting that all of our languages will be heard in the LS and MS hallways in the next months. You all have been great about bringing in your students for a meeting time and exchange.   Some groups have already met, some are being scheduled and others are still getting ready to debut in 2016!  If you have expressed interest I will be contacting you directly and serving as your matchmaker with a younger class.  We will compare schedules and look for a suitable meeting time.

* Thanks to those that have begun to submit your syllabus/course description and final exams for your courses- please don't forget to include a placement exam for your language.  I will accept the submissions both online and in paper format (just leave in my mailbox or on my desk in the language office.)

Interested in ideas like these?  
Creativity in the Classroom: Fostering Student Learning Through Creative Language Experiences

Teaching Language Through the Lens of Social Justice

Teaching Heritage Languages and Learners

Take a look at CARLA- Center for Advanced Resarch on Language Adquisition and it's summer insitutes for language teachers
SUMMER institutes and more

AP course refresher and new courses

Interested in AP?  

check out dates

Tech news in US

• Aileen is compiling information on how we use various platforms, Haiku, Google Classroom, etc. in hopes of  streamlining our student communication, let her know your thoughts 
• US Library scanner: Lots that can be accomplished with the scanner, even the ability to make digital books of our texts 
• Some US teaches have begun to record their classes with ipads to document their curriculum and share lectures with students
• US Hubs use for creative projects (Could we make movies/news programs in languages?)
• Dec 1 teachers share tech at 3:15 in room U231

Core Values: In the Languages  Some teachers already have our school values in the languages in their classrooms! HERE is a link for English/Spanish...change it to your language and use

December 9 meeting agenda

Location : OFF CAMPUS! Carpool if you like, we will meet at Greenberry's Coffee House

Address: 6839 Redmond Dr, McLean, VA 22101
Phone:(703) 821-9500
please try to get there as close to 3:30 as possible

• Core values in our mission statement, department philosophy and classes
• Spanish teachers: you will have Descubre rep meet you at Greenberry's for a question and answer time
• Holiday cheer!  Happy December!

Be bilingual!

Download and share this fun poster with your students and colleagues to show how learning a second (or third) language can make you smarter.
Classroom posters: 5 ways Being Bilingual makes you smarter


November 11th Meeting- location: Michele Maxson's room Middle School off of the square
Agenda

• Brigitte- share
• Atlas in the real world (skills)
• Wrting exemplars- examples of student writing (BRING FOR EACH COURSE) What does writing look like at different stages of the language aquisition continuum?
• List of US candidates for Governor's School (bring names for Spanish, Latin, French): Criterion

* Thanks to those that have begun to submit your syllabus/course description and final exams for your courses- please don't forget to include a placement exam for your language.  I will accept the submissions both online and in paper format (just leave in my mailbox or on my desk in the language office.)

Projects 2015

I am beginning to compile a list of your projects (just new ideas you are working on)  for this year and am excited to see so many wonderful ideas. Please submit your idea to me either by Google Drive in the shared format or through email.  I will begin to set up appointments with you to see you and your projects at work in the classroom. 

I am happy to see that many teachers want to participate reaching out to a Lower or Middle School class.  I would love to see all languages represented! The activity need not be labor intensive, it can be as simple as reading a story, playing multiplication bingo, sharing a snack.  Look at a few ideas on these wikis below:

Helena Curtain

Wendy Brownell

Global Learning with Food

Building Bridges

Multi-lingual Magazine

Phoebus, Potomac's literary magazine, is officially accepting submissions. The magazine is going to be run online, so we will be taking submissions from a wide range of art styles; feel free to submit short stories, essays, visual art, photography, audio clippings, videos, or anything else you can think of. Just email phoebuslitmag@gmail.com with any submissions or questions.

We are hope to make Phoebus more interactive with the student body this year, and hope to be able to collaborate and discuss with other students on their writing and artwork. We also aim to have various get-togethers and activities with other interested students, so look out for more updates!

Upper School cell phone policy:

Please remember, Students are allowed to use cell phones during common free breaks and during lunch. They should not have them out in class unless the teachers ask them to take them out.

Changing Course Level – Grading Implications 

Becca clarifies some questions we may be having with this process... if you wonder, check out the link here

International Education Week: November 16-20, 2015

The 16th annual International Education Week (IEW) is November 16–20, 2015. This year's theme is "International Education: Advancing Access for All." Many activities—both virtual and in-person—are being planned around the country and the world.    Iniciatives

*Thanks to Ingrid and Sarah for updating us in their teaching from Middlebury interactive.  Could we see using this platform in other ways?   Have you taken a look at the demo?  Comment pros and cons.

Susan Lafky  
Susan Lafky, Middlebury Interactive’s lead German teacher, has been teaching world languages for parts of four decades, mostly in the Fairfax County Public Schools in Virginia. At Fairfax, she also served as the Chair of the Foreign Language Department. Susan joined Middlebury Interactive full-time three years ago after health reasons made it impossible for her to continue at her classroom position. In our blog, she shares her thoughts on digital education, her students and the differences between teaching in the digital and brick-and-mortar classrooms.
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