Mrs. Homeschool

We have tried several different curriculae for teaching Spanish– not been happy or successful with any one of them. What has worked the best for us has been to use flashcards and simple, Spanish language picture books, and games and songs. This is for kids who are third through 7th grade. I speak Spanish at a beginning level, and know how to pronounce it. So it isn’t necessary to use CD’s or computer program just to know how to say the words. One thing I’ve found is that what works can depend a lot on a child’s learning style– if they’re auditory, listening programs may work well, but if visual they will probably retain close to zero from a program based mainly on listening. I’m teaching two kids; one is strong in auditory and kinesthetic learning, one is strong in visual learning. My auditory/kinesthetic child hated flashcards and couldn’t remember hardly any words when taught that way. My visual child did well with flashcards, and knew almost all of the words, so she would say them all while the other child would say almost nothing. So after the first year of attempting to teach them at the same time, I learned that this was counterproductive; I needed to tutor them separately, teaching with methods that fit well for each of them. But both kids really liked doing games. We have found that memory match games are a really good way to practice vocabulary– you say the word whenever you turn over a card. Also we do some 100 board number games, saying the numbers in Spanish. And we have a couple other games. Also, the kids have enjoyed learning some songs in Spanish. We started with a Spanish version of “Eentsy Weentsy Spider,” and also some songs for numbers and colors, and are gradually learning more. Last year we did songs just two days a week. On those days, we played a game together, also. On the other days I would tutor the kids separately; they usually also did a game with me as part of the tutoring.