Spanish III Summer Work
Spanish III
Required Summer Assignments Packet
Spanish III
Required SummerAssignments
Rationale for Summer Assignments
Although we are just completing one school year, it is the time to look forward and prepare for the next. As an advanced student you will be part of a select and motivated group of students who use our language to help our community, who strive to become better communicators and who enjoy a real challenge.
As a Spanish III student you will have the opportunity to enroll as a dual credit student with WesternKentuckyUniversity in two different classes SP 102 and SP 201 with a combined total of 6 hours of college credit. This is a tremendous opportunity both educationally and financially. You may also become eligible for membership in the Sociedad Honoraria Hispanica (the National Spanish Honor Society).
Although you are receiving additional opportunities because you are an advanced student, you also have additional responsibilities. Those come in the form of summer work. These assignments are not offered as a punishment but as a way to maintain language skills when you are not getting regular class practice. Like riding a bike, playing a sport or an instrument, language is a skill and must be maintained. As my band director said many years ago, “Use it or lose it!”. He was right about my clarinet and I don’t want him to be right about your ability to use your language. These activities are not meant to be overly time consuming, but much of that will depend upon your current level of language skill. In any skill, some people are just naturally more adept while others must invest more time and effort to arrive at the same skill level.However, without practice both groups will lose ability. Summer work is a well-established fact in the AP and Pre-AP community. I blend ideas from the AP and Pre-AP Spanish Teachers Electronic Message Board as well as a good mixing of my own. In particular I wish to acknowledge Robert Oliver a nationally recognized leader in the language field. So…Let’s get started!
Dual Credit Info
There has been a large increase in the demand for Spanish III here at BCHS because the students now have the option to enroll in the WKU Dual Credit classes SP 102 in the fall and SP201 in the spring. These courses come at a greatly reduced tuition rate. Although this is a wonderful opportunity, students and parents need to be aware of some basic information.
1) It is not necessary to enroll in the dual credit program to complete the Spanish III course for BCHS.
2) For students who do register for dual credit, the course grade will become a part of their permanent college transcript, good grades or bad. A student may be very qualified to handle the intellectual difficulty of the work, but may be less focused in their approach to independent learning. Those students may be better served to only enroll in BCHS Spanish III without endangering their permanent university GPA. College courses demand a certain amount of maturity and not all students are ready to handle the demands of a college class at the same age. Some students are better served to adjust to the work load without a permanent record of their growth process. If you/ your child have doubts, then the best choice could be to take CLEP and placement exams as a college freshman in order to skip the course work that they will become proficient with in Spanish III. This process was the norm until the 2010-2011 school year when the dual credit option became possible. Students and parents should discuss their individual situation before making a final decision in the fall.
3) For those students who have always had a 4.0 GPA, it will be stressful to learn that the majority of students who go to the university do not maintain a 4.0 at the post-secondary level. B’s are not looked down upon by the college recruiters; they are more impressed with the course load difficulty. SP 102 and SP 201 are usually the 2nd and 3rd courses offered in a basic 4 course language sequence at any university, thus they are considered rigorous curriculum and a B will not decrease the student’s value to the university.
4) In university courses, there is a general assumption by all professors that the majority of learning happens during personal interaction with the material. Thus, classroom time is to guide, direct and clarify the individual student’s efforts. The on-campus liaison professor indicates on her syllabus for these same 2 classes, that students should plan to spend a minimum of 1hour outside of class preparing for each hour spent in class. I do not, in general assign that much daily homework to the whole class. That allotted time is for individual preparation spent to interact with the vocabulary, the grammar, and the culture necessary to complete the assigned task (projects, readings, verb builders etc.) Some students will be able to successfully complete work more quickly than others depending up natural language skill and focus during preparation time (Facebook,texting and other multi-tasking activities are deadly to your language focus.)
5) The tuition will be due at the time of registration with WKU (normally in August.
6.) This class straddles the two worlds of high school and university, which puts us in some strange positions. At the university, professors are not allowed to discuss student grades with anyone except the student himself due to privacy laws. In the high school level, we do still work with parents closely. In the fall, you will receive a procedure list of how we will try to bridge the two worlds by making the students accountable for discussing issues with the teacher first and then bringing in parent interaction secondly. In this way the student becomes self-aware and self-motivated while there is still a back up support system in place.
7) At the university level, the term AcademicIntegrity becomes a very serious issue. Here at the high school we call violations “cheating”. In recent years, it has become more and more common for students to resort to the “any means for an A” mentality. At the university, this will lead to aStudent Code of Conduct Judicial Sanctions Process.
Please understand that this is not a kid’s game, nor harmless at this level, there are important and lasting repercussions for any individual in violation. While not the only option,Western has indicated that the use of electronic translators of any form fit into this definition of a violation. Be careful! No student wants to begin his or her college career with this kind of item posted on their permanent record.
8) The nature of university work is geared toward each student learning the material individually doing as many activities and getting as much teacher/ tutor assistance as necessaryto arrive at the stated ability levels. Thus there will be many fewer homework, classwork and bonus grades than in the lower level language classes. Students who do not keep up with their work will quickly find themselves falling behind the class. At this level, the curriculum is pre-set and students must keep up, even when out for “excused” reasons.
9.) The teacher’s office hours for assistance are 7:30-8:00 AM and 3:00- 3:30 PM daily for students. Other times may be available upon request. All personal questions and requests should be handled during that time.
General Directions for Summer Work
**First you must join our class message board at Edmodo.comand enroll for messages on Remind 101.
Remind 101:
To receive messages via text, text@profmatti to (270) 261-4266. Youcan opt-out of messages at anytimeby replying, 'unsubscribe@profmatti'.
Or to receive messages via email, sendan email . To
unsubscribe, reply with 'unsubscribe' inthe subject line.
Edmodo.com. You may already be registered with another class, if not, your membership is free, just sign up. You will need the course code s3qjsy to enroll in the Spanish III class and begin posting your work. Your first task is to go to the post Introducirte a tus compañerosand add your personal post. This should be done immediately, I need to know that you are able to access the site. Please comment (en español) on other student’s post as well as posting your own work. This will make the work more interesting, you will get to see what others have done, and we will begin to get to know each other. Our Spanish III classes will combine students from different Spanish II classes.
Each of the following assignments has a 2 week window for completion. You are required to complete the summer assignments during the assigned time period. While you certainly may work ahead, please post your work during the designated time, absolutely no assignment will be accepted late. The assignments integrate the use of technology while maintaining the integrity of language acquisition through real-life experiences. Because technology is involved, make sure that you allow time to complete each activity and work with any glitches that occur, (they will always occur so prepare for them). Midnight is the cut off time for each assignment, no matter what good reason you have, so plan ahead, and get the work done early to save yourself frustration. I will use the date and time indicated on the post to determine if it is late. You also need to allow time to post response comments on other student’s messages.
The summer assignments have been selected to continue the development of more advanced communication skills in listening, speaking, reading, and writing. These areas are tested on the University Placement Exams, the CLEP Test and theAP Spanish Language Exam all of which offer additional college credit. Read the assignment descriptions carefully and complete all parts of the assignment. You may use dictionaries, grammar books, etc but never an online translator.You should write your post in Spanish that can be understood by your classmates, the ones who will post responses to you. If you use a translator, it will use advanced Spanish that neither you nor your friends can understand. Simple Spanish is all you have right now, that is ok. I need to know what you can do, not what your computer can do. When I have a false understanding of your skill level, I cannot accurately assist you.
Required Summer Assignments
Assignment 1June 1-14
For your first assignment Iwent back to the voices of experience (the AP classes who have completed summer work in past summers, and know what the AP exam requires).
Here is what they came up with.
--Watch a DVD of your choice with the language set to Spanish (of course). You may use the Spanish subtitles.
- As you listen, make a list of 50 words that you do not know and look up their meanings.
--After you watch the movie, write up your reactions and thoughts in 8-10 sentences minimum. You can discuss this in any way, but you might start with answering the following questions:What did you watch?Why?Was it easy or hard?Which parts?What would you do differently if you did it again?Etc.You should come up with 75 + words in your response. Do I even need to say that it has to be in Spanish? Make sure you check your word count.I will not give partial credit for partial work.This is all or nothing for doing the work.The quality of your Spanish is not a part of the grade at all, simply understanding and completing the work.
Your reaction will be a 100 point grade with the word list counting as an additional 100 point homework grade. In your Edmodo post, include both the reaction and the word list. You will need to make at least 2 comments on other students post (50 points each).
Have fun and pick a movie that you will like whether you have seen it before or not.
Required Summer Assignments
Assignment 2June 15-28
-I want you to pick out a news article from some Spanish news source that you already know, or choose one from my web extravaganza listing in the left margin of my web site.
-Read the article, pick anything that looks interesting to you (in addition to the front page stories, most newspapers have tabs across the top for different sections of news including sports, fashion, leisure, etc) from any of our 21 Spanish speaking countries. Skim the article first and look at headlines and photos with captionsto get an idea of what it is about. Then really read it with care. Are thereabbreviations for political or sports groups? Are there peopletalked about that you don't know? Who are they? Why are they important to the story? If they are famous or political figures can you tell anything about them from the article? What is the action discussed? Is this story of interest globally or is itmore specific to one or two countries? Who is the audience?Did you find it interesting? ETC. If you find that you don’t really understand the topic or are terribly confused, then select a different article to share with the class.
-In your post, you will offer your thoughts on the article (75+ words, Spanish ofcourse). (100 points) Findsomething interesting to you so that you can better enjoy discussing it, and your friends can think of more things to say about it!You will need to make at least 2 comments on other students’ post (100 points).
Required Summer Assignments
Assignment 3June29-July 12
This time I have a different job for you.Let’s take this outside of your computer and make it personal. So, what do you have to do this time?……
1) Talk to a native speaker (friends, neighbors, waiters on break, Latinos in Wal-mart) or someone who has a great deal of experience and can speak fluently in Spanish (a college student who is in 300 or 400 level course in Spanish or someone who lived in a Spanish speaking area for a long period of time) Make sure that it is a good time to ask questions. Don’t ask the waiter in the middle of a lunch rush; try more for a quiet time between meals.
2) In this conversation, make sure that you use Spanish for your interview (surely that part is understood). You need to ask this person at least 8-10 questions about themselves, their lives, homes, families, countries, work, travel, language skills, or any other questions that you can put together. Hopefully things you think you will understand the answer to with the help of a dictionary.
3) Remember to use your courtesy knowledge, please/thank you/ I appreciate your help, as you ask for this persons help.Make sure that they know that you are a BarrenCountyHigh School student and that they would be doing you a great favor and that you appreciate their help. This is especially important if it is someone you don’t already know.You don’t want to come across as a border patrol agent, but a student seeking understanding.
4) Make sure that you have your questions already prepared and that you have paper to write down answers.Practice asking the questions before you get to the real situation so that you are less tongue tied.
You will be less frustrated if you ask questions that have somewhat limited answers i.e. you will have some idea of the answer in advance.For example, if you ask where they are from you will likely recognize the country name when they say it, however if you ask them what is the most difficultpart of living in the USA, you may get some impassioned answers that go to vocabulary you don’t know.
However if you have a great interview going and you want to go on into more difficult areas, you will enjoy the experience more.Just stick to your comfort level.Push yourself a bit but don’t make yourself nuts, this is not supposed to make you crazy.
5) Finally, post a summary of yourefforts (75+ words in Spanish,100 points).How did the experience go? Who did you interview?Did you know them in advance?What did you all use besides words to help you communicate?What did you learn about them?Was any part of the process a surprise?How did you feel after the interview?Etc.
6) You will need to make at least 2 comments on other students post (100 points).
Please try to have some fun even though you will be nervous about your Spanish.Most Latinos are very patient and willing to help you out if you are sincere and courteous.I hope that this will be a favorite, though scariest, effort so far.When you know someone, you can begin to understand them and their culture better.
Required Summer Assignments
Assignment 4July 13-26
1)This time I want you to find a Spanish music video online at At the top right hand section of the page, select Spanish as the language. Many popular Spanish music videos from a variety of countries (look at the flags), various genres and levels of difficulty are available.