Christmas Vocabulary Challenge Assignment: ALL GRADES

Image: Guardian.co.uk

I just read a fascinating article about a guy who learned an entire language (Lingala - spoken in the Congo basin of Africa) in 22 hours. He literally memorized the entire dictionary in 22 hours (spread out over the course of a few months). Here is the article if you're interested in reading.

He used a web application called Memrise.

Memrise uses pictures and funny phrases called "mems" to help you remember the words. The more weird and crazy the mem, the more likely you are to remember it.

Below are three different ways to remember the verb TOCAR. You click on the thumbs up to choose the one that you think will help you the most. If you don't like any of the options, then you can create your own mem.

DON'T CRAM!!!
Memrise is perfect for spending 5 minutes a day (or twice a day). They have done studies that prove that you can learn twice as much vocabulary in half the time if you DON'T CRAM!

TAREA: Create an account on Memrise.com. You can use Facebook or your email. Choose one Spanish courses to work on over the break. Here are a few that look good:

• http://www.memrise.com/course/35/1500-word-spanish-intro/
• http://www.memrise.com/course/737/first-5000-words-of-spanish-3/
• http://www.memrise.com/course/193/intermediate-phrases-exito-de-venta/
• http://www.memrise.com/course/1292/intermediate-phrases-exito-de-venta-2/2/

Grow your Spanish garden (use the website). I will check your profile upon return to classes next semester and award points accordingly.

(A good goal would be to "plant" 5 new words a day and water them 2-3 times a day for five minutes.)

I can check how many mems you have created, how many flowers you have grown, and how many total points you've earned.

Yeah, that's me, #2 in the world for learning Essential Tagalog!!! I have literally learned more words in the last 15 minutes than in the last 3.5 YEARS.

G11 - Exam Review

Exam Review – G11

Content Topics:

q Salud – Gente 1

q Trabajo - Gente 1

q Machuca

q Casa - Gente 1

Grammar Concepts:

Irregular Present Tense – IR, Stem changers, DAR, SALIR, DECIR, etc. (p.27)

He/Has/Ha/Hemos/Habéis/Han + Participle (-ado/-ido and a few irregulars) = have done something or recent past  (p. 60)

Estar +Gerund = Present Progressive (p. 46)

Voy + a + infinitive = immediate future (p.46)

Tipos de texto:

q Carta Formal

q Artículo

q Anuncio

Feliz Navidad por medio de KIVA.ORG

Fuente: http://www.bancodeimagenesgratis.com/

Fuente: http://www.bancodeimagenesgratis.com/

Este año he decidido regalarles a ustedes una oportunidad de ayudarles a las personas menos afortunadas. Voy a donar $25 por clase a KIVA.ORG. Serán $100 en total. Pueden prestar todo el dinero a un emprendedor y pueden dividir el dinero entre dos o tres emprendedores.

Según wikipedia, KIVA es

una organización que permite prestar dinero a pequeñas empresas o emprendedores de países en vías de desarrollo a través de Internet. Es una organización sin ánimo de lucro, establecida en San Francisco y basada en los préstamos que realizan sus usuarios y en acuerdos con empresas e instituciones.

Quiero que ustedes miren la lista de emprendedores y escojan por lo menos dos que les llama la atención.

Click here:
Lista de Emprendedores en Países Hispanohablantes


TAREA: You need to click on "Read their story" and read their story. You do not have to read the part about the micro-lending institution at the bottom.

Choose two entrepreneurs (emprendedores) or groups of entrepreneurs and write a comment on this post explaining why you think they would be a good recipient of the class' loan. You should be able to introduce them (name/nationality/work), and explain what the loan is for in basic terms.

You should also be able to discuss the merits of your selected entrepreneurs in a class discussion.

DO NOT use an online translator. DO NOT use verb/grammatical structures that you do not understand. You may use an online dictionary to look up vocabulary words.

Casa Presentación Assignment

Save several 2D images (jpeg/pdf) of your house to use as a visual aid for your oral presentation.

Content:
Describe the different parts of the house, the rooms, and what is in each room.
Explain what you like about your house, what you use the different rooms for, why you put the different furniture in the different rooms.
Explain what materials are used for the different parts of the house.


Grading:
Pronunciation
Use of vocabulary
Variety of sentence structure
Correct use of grammar
Interesting information
Level of detail
Organization and structure

G10 - Estudiar en el extranjero

Study Abroad Research Homework

The best way to start is by googling the name of the university and "study abroad". When I did that for the University of Michigan, I got this. Then I clicked through a bunch of pages until I found a list of all of the possible study abroad programs. Use your internet-savvy to get the information you need.

1. Go ahead and check out the list of all the possible study abroad programs at the University of Michigan. Click here: https://mcompass.umich.edu/index.cfm?FuseAction=Programs.ListAll
2. Which program seems like the best program for you? Why? (Take notes so you can explain in class.)
3. Go to a few other universities' websites and try to find information about Study Abroad programs. Not every university will offer these, but most universities do.
4. Pick two additional study abroad programs at the universities of your choice and take notes about the type of program they are and what makes them seem interesting to you.
5. Save your link information.
6. You will submit your notes about the different programs you researched.

This was the study abroad program that I did. http://studyabroad.colorado.edu/index.cfm?FuseAction=Programs.ViewProgram&Program_ID=344

And here is a search tool for all of the study abroad programs at the University of Colorado.
http://studyabroad.colorado.edu/index.cfm?FuseAction=Programs.AdvancedSearch

G12 - El baile de los que sobran

En qué parte de Santiago crecieron los miembros del grupo "Los Prisioneros"?

Qué es la Prueba de Aptitud Académica?

Basándote en lo que has visto en la película Machuca y en lo que has aprendido sobre las políticas de Allende y Pinochet en Chile, cómo supones que la situación económica era en los mediados de los ochenta cuando esta canción fue interpretada.

"La canción de "Los prisioneros" vino a recordarles a los chilenos que a pesar del renacimiento de su economía no había un verdadero correlato (correlation) entre el bienestar de los grandes exportadores y las oportunidades de llevar una vida mejor para el hombre común."

Lee el párrafo que empieza con "En la vereda de enfrente quienes tenían una situación económica más estable podían elegir."
Describe cómo los ricos y los pobres tenían opciones diferentes con respecto a los estudios superiores.
(cuota - fee/payment)

G12 - Escoger una película

Los criterios:
La película no puede ser de "R" o "NC-17".
La película tiene que ser de lenguaje español o tiene que tener partes o escenas en español.
Tiene que ser disponible en la red (iTunes o por otra fuente).

Pueden mirar aquí para buscar posibles películas:
http://www.imdb.com/list/X8hPTchu1ho/
http://spanish.about.com/od/spanishlanguagecinema/tp/popular_films.htm 
http://zachary-jones.com/zambombazo/tag/pelipareja/
http://www.amazon.com/Spanish-Language-Movies-Retas-List/lm/RDXPLLZK9VBXD

OJO: Para averiguar si la película es de leguaje español o no (especialmente en Zambombazo), busca los nombres de los actores y los directores.

TAREA: Tiene que escribir una entrada en tu blog que explica por qué quieres mirar la película que escogiste. Debes usar el indicativo (pienso que..., creo que..., me parece que...,) y el subjuntivo (no creo que..., es increíble que..., es extraño que..., es probable que... etc.)
(80 a 100 palabras mínimo)