CREA

This is the word that resulted as an acronym for the way I rephrased my classroom rules this year. It stands for

Colabora – Collaborate

Respeta – Respect

Esfuérzate – Make an effort

Arriésgate – Take risks

My goal was to find words that represented the CI class rules and that gave students room to come up with the way these rules would look and sound like as for our Responsive Classroom approach (philosophy?).

Last week, I saw some of my classes. I teach Pre-K to fifth grade Spanish and I see most of my students twice a week for forty minutes except for Kindergarten (30 minute-classes). I only see Pre-K and Jr.-K once a week for thirty minutes. Although I saw both Kindergarten classes, I did not mention those rules yet. We worked on our introductions and our line and rug routines.

With first grade was different. After our introductions and practicing the steps to sit on the rug, I chose my first hire of the year: Our Silencio helper. This person would count from five to zero when s/he notices some students have not seen our hands are up and we are quietly waiting for instructions. My back up plans are our call-and-responses, and a bell I have on top of my desk to add variety. All of these are ideas I have been getting from the Responsive Classroom books we are reading and from seeing them applied by many CI teachers in their videos.

First of all, it is important to know that In my experience, I use English the first class to ease the transition for new students and to let them know that they are not expected to understand everything. During the new students orientation, I welcomed our excited new students into my classroom using only Spanish and two ended up crying, including the child who blurted out her very well rehearsed greetings to me right away. Lesson learned!

In my first class, I restrict the total use of the target language to modeling the routines as I name them in Spanish (Una sola fila, levántate, siéntate, mete/voltea la silla). When I refer to the rules, I point to them and I ask my students to tell me what they think they mean. Crea, Colabora, and Respeta are cognates that encourage my reading kids to confidently say their meaning. Esfuérzate and Arriésgate are not that simple to infer but after I read them, children recognize “Effort” and I explain that “Arriésgate” is just what they are doing saying all their guesses no matter if they are right or wrong.

For each word/rule, we come up with examples of what they would look like in Spanish class. These are just some my students came up with:

Colabora:

-When someone does not know what page/materials/activity we are working on/with, we can tell/show them.

-We can point to things or act out words so that people can understand.

-We can translate words in English if we are asked for.

I usually lead them to “Support the flow of the class”.

Respeta: I ask students to tell me what our eyes, mouth, and whole body would look and sound like to show respect.

-We listen to the person that is speaking.

-Our mouths are close when someone is talking.

-We don’t make noises.

Esfuérzate: I tell them not to give up when they find themselves not understanding.

⁃ Look at the teacher’s actions.

⁃ Look for words that sound familiar.

⁃ Use the posters on the walls.

⁃ Use your materials.

⁃ Ask questions.

– Use Spanish as much as you can.

Arriésgate: My goal is for students not to be afraid of making mistakes and learning from them.

⁃ Participate.

⁃ Say what you think it is.

⁃ Guess the spelling / meaning/ pronunciation a word

– Use your Spanish as much as you can.

We accompany each word with an action to make it comprehensible, fun, and active, TPR -style.

Colabora: arms around each other in a circle.

Respeta: Left hand behind our back, right hand making small circles down as our head bows. ( Easier doing it than writing it)

Esfuérzate: We pretend we are lifting a big and heavy weigh and end up showing our muscles.

Arriésgate: We lift our right hand up as when we win a tournament.

Once we learn the actions and how to move safely and respectfully into the center of the classroom, I choose my second hire: our CREA helper. I was inspired by Annabelle Allen and her Cantaninja for this. Whenever I feel we need an energizer/brain-break, I would put my hand under my chin making a “C”. My Crea helper would get up from the chair and say CREA. This would give the class a signal to be ready to move when my helper says “Colabora” and then goes all the way up to “Arriésgate”. I told my students it should be done quickly and then we would go back to what we were doing quietly.

I will keep adding my observations as how this works with my other classes. This is an attempt to be more reflective on my teaching while sharing my experiences. I hope this can be useful for you somehow.