Holiday Celebrations!

It's the last week before our holiday break, so we have been talking about holiday traditions here in Sevilla, as well as my Christmas traditions in America! We have had fun learning and discussing our favorite foods, decorations and celebrations while practicing English! I have gathered some photos and videos that have information about Christmas and New Years traditions in America, so I will share them here, I hope you enjoy and have a wonderful holiday with your family and friends! I look forward to seeing you all again next year! ;)

My town, Knoxville, Tennessee, during Christmas! We can see Christmas lights, a star, a tree, a wreath, and people by the street:

Typical American Christmas Dinner:

In America, some people love to decorate their houses with Christmas lights:

New York is very famous for its Christmas decorations:

Christmas Vocabulary Video:

The Night Before Christmas, a children's version of a traditional American Christmas Story:

Santa Claus is Coming to Town!:

Christmas Traditions Video:

Jingle Bells Song!:

And finally, in America our New Years tradition is to watch the "ball drop" in New York when the clock strikes midnight on New Years Eve. If you are not in New York, you just watch it with family and friends on TV to celebrate the New Year!

Fun and Games with English!

Since arriving this year, it has been a blast figuring out how much English each group of students already knows, and their favorite ways to engage with the language. We have some impressive students at our school! In Social Science 1A and 1B, we have spent some time learning about fruits and vegetables to help build basic vocabulary. We have had lots of fun talking about the healthy foods we like to eat, and what we have for breakfast, lunch, and dinner! To review our food vocabulary, we played a Fruits and Vegetables Bingo game. We had so much fun and we definitely know our fruits and veggies now!

I get to work with Physical Education classes 4A and 4B as well as 6A, 6B, and 6C. Typically I will introduce each game that we play in English to see if students can figure out the rules from my descriptions. Sometimes they have questions, but usually they can understand my instructions very well! Each week I try to incorporate at least one game from the United States, especially games that I played as a child to incorporate aspects of my culture into the class. Games that require the students to speak English challenge them physically as well as engaging them with new English vocabulary while having fun! Recently, two favorites have been "Castle Ball" and the "Infinite Hoop Game."

In Castle Ball, there are two teams, each with their own castle. They have to protect their castle while throwing balls to try and destroy the other team's castle. Whoever knocks down the other team's castle first, wins!

The Infinite Hoop Game requires that students stand in a circle holding hands. The goal is to get a hoop all the way around the circle without letting go of their friends' hands, using teamwork skills to help get each student through the hoop successfully. Once they have mastered one hoop, you can always add more!