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Music as authentic text | passion4theprofession

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Music as authentic text | passion4theprofession

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Music is a universal language. Using authentic musical selections with language learners can be very motivating to students and a friendly way for students to hone their listening skills. Songs lyrics can be presented in written format, as an audio clip or as a music video (sometimes with subtitles). And, at times, students may be familiar with the artists.
Why use music as authentic text in the language classroom?

Includes repetition

Reinforces pronunciation

Shows language structures in context

Connects to culture, history, current events

Can be used as a classroom management strategy

Improves listening skills

Motivates students' interest in the target language

Reinforces grammar and syntax

Encourages creative thought in the target language

Konig, Patricia. "Language Can Be Music to Students Ears." The Language Educator, 2011.

Strategies using music as authentic text

Here are some examples of lesson activities you might use as processes for interpreting songs:

Alternate Title: Invent a new title for the song.

Alternate Verses: Given every other verse of the song, imagine the missing verses.

Before and After: Imagine what happened before and after action(s) in song.

Category Lists: Place words heard in specified categories. Variation: Given lyrics, read and place words in categories.

Chronological Order: Given a list of actions in song, decide probable order of occurrence. Listen to verify correctness.

Cover Design: Draw a CD cover to represent theme in song. Variation: Given a CD title, imagine the cover. Cover Speculation: Make conjectures based on CD cover.

Dialogue Adaptation: Adapt song to a dialogue.

Figures of Speech: Locate similes and metaphors in lyrics; discuss.

Four Corners: (1) After hearing song, go to designated corner of room ("love," "like," "don't like," "hate") and discuss impressions. (2) Line up to show degree of like/dislike for song; discuss. (3) Rotate partners in inside-outside circles to share opinions about song.

Grammar Recognition: Raise hand/card or stand when you hear a selected grammatical feature in song (specific tense, gender, subjunctive, etc.).

Guess the Title: Listen to song and try to guess title. Imitate the Songwriter: Write a new song on the same topic or change original lyrics.

Incorrect Lyrics: Correct lyrics as you listen to song (listen for extraneous words or substitutions).

Key Words: Take word card or picture and stand when/if you hear your word in song. Variation: Given a list of possible words, check off if you hear a word in song.

Letters: Write a letter to the singer.

Lyrics Modification: Substitute other logical words for underlined words in song.

Motivation: Speculate about reasons for writing song.

Name That Word: When music stops before end of song, tell last word sung. Variation: Predict next word.

Predictions: Before hearing song, predict which words might logically fit in lyric blanks or which words would rhyme.

Ratings: Listen to snippets of songs to rate/compare.

Stories: Narrate or write out story from song. Variations: (1) Retell from another person's point of view. (2) Write as a newspaper article.

Title Associations: Given song title, brainstorm list of words you might expect to hear in song; check off list as you listen.

Video Speculation: Imagine video of song.

Word Search: Given list of words, listen for synonyms/antonyms in lyrics.
Examples of tasks using music in multiple communicative modes
Songs not only provide practice in the interpretive mode for students, but can also serve as a springboard to interpersonal and presentational tasks.

I invite you to visit my website where on the page entitled " Authentic Resources," you will find multiple links for songs in the target language, often aligned to vocabulary and grammar points:

Many of our language colleagues have aligned popular songs in the target language to grammatical structures that they demonstrate in context and have generously shared those lists/databases with the rest of us.

French:
Clarisse Les chanteurs français et leurs chansons (crowd-sourced database)
German:
Ten Songs with Hidden German Grammar Lessons
Spanish:

El mundo de Birch Spanish amazing music database!!!

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Music is a universal language. Using authentic musical selections with language learners can be very motivating to students and a friendly way for students to hone their listening skills. Songs lyrics can be presented in written format, as an audio clip or as a music video (sometimes with subtitles).

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Teaching listening and viewing skills using authentic resources | passion4theprofession

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Teaching listening and viewing skills using authentic resources | passion4theprofession

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Authentic resources are created by and for the target language users either for information or entertainment. They are texts that students can read, listen to, or view in the target language. Much attention is paid to written authentic text.

For this post, let's turn our attention to building students' interpretive skills with authentic text for listening and viewing.

As indicated by the infographic below, listening has many benefits which include increasing literacy, fluency and motivation.
https://ebookfriendly.com/improve-reading-skills-infographics/how-audio-increases-literacy-infographic/
When considering having students listen or view authentic text, we must first anchor ourselves in the NCSSFL-ACTFL Can-Do Statements that describe what students can do in the Interpretive Mode at the various proficiency levels.

Novices can: identify words and phrases, some isolated facts, and the topic or gist of an authentic text that is composed of simple sentences that is listened to or viewed.

Students at the intermediate level can: identify the main idea and some details from short straightforward authentic text and conversations.

Here are some examples of novice-level listening/viewing activities:

Spanish- During a unit on the theme of school, students listen to and watch a 30 second commercial about back to school sales at Arrocha, a store in Panama:

During their listening/viewing, students are asked to:

circle all of the words/phrases they hear in the commercial based on a word cloud of words created on Wordle or Tagxedo

circle each vocabulary word/phrase they hear and draw a line to the backpack

complete a cloze activity with the commercial transcript.

2. French- During a unit on the theme of describing people and things, students listen to and watch a Coca Cola commercial called "Du bonheur pour tous."

While they listen to and view the commercial, in addition to bullets one and three listed above (circling key words in a word cloud and doing a cloze activity using the transcript) an alternative activity might be:

Students are given two columns of adjectives/descriptors. As they listen to/watch the commercial they connect the opposites.

For links to authentic commercials in the target language, go to:

Or, go to my Pinterest boards that have target language commercials sorted by language:

French:

German:

Spanish:

Types of authentic text that might be listened to or viewed include:

commercials

podcasts

songs/music videos

video clips

movie trailers

news clip

live or recorded interviews

live or recorded performances

animated short films

fine art

photographs

The approach for teaching students how to listen to or view an authentic text (with audio) is very similar to that of teaching students how to read an authentic text. Students listen/view for words they know, words that sound like words they know (cognates), and figure out meaning of words based on context.

Students' comprehension can be bolstered before listening or viewing (with audio) by using typical before reading strategies:

Students make predictions about the authentic text

Students brainstorm connections with and ideas and questions about the topic of the authentic text

Students list what they already know about the topic of the authentic resource

Similarly, students can use during reading strategies for listening and viewing (with audio) as well.

Students take notes about authentic text as they listen/view

Students record new vocabulary gained from the authentic text

Students use a graphic organizer to record ideas while listening/viewing

What makes listening and viewing very different from reading as an interpretive skill, is that the text (unless the transcript is provided or there are subtitles) is not visible to the student. To overcome this challenge (of not being able to see the words), students can be taught skills for capturing ideas they listen to through the use of a variety of strategies.

Supports and Scaffolds for Students During Listening and Viewing Tasks
Cloze activities
Cloze activities are those that use the script for a text with words or phrases omitted. The task of the student is to listen to the text and fill in the missing words and phrases. A great source for cloze activities for Spanish based on music is Zachary Jones' website called Zambombazo. He calls the activities " Clozeline."

Here's an example:

Here's a cloze activity example in French for the song by Gerald DePalmas called "Mon Coeur Ne Bat Plus.":
Graphic Organizers
Graphic organizers assist students in capturing what they have heard/viewed and classify those ideas into topics/themes. A great example is a 5W's (who, what, when, where, why) and 1H (how) graphic organizer. Here are some examples in Spanish below:

And here's an example in French:

Or, the organizer might be where students record events from the text in sequence. Here is an example in French:

and one for Spanish:
Visual Notetaking or "Sketchnoting"
For more examples of graphic organizers, click here

Visual notetaking or Sketchnoting is a strategy whereby students draw symbols and pictures to indicate their understanding of a text. The result is a visual version of the text that was listened to or viewed.

Here's an example in Spanish:

For more on how to teach listening skills, explore the slideshow below:

Viewing authentic resources without audio

Included in the examples of authentic text are visuals like photographs and fine art.

How do we teach students to interpret text like pictures?

Some strategies students can use when "reading a picture" are:

describe what they see (what is going on, who is doing what)

make connections with the visual

describe how the picture makes them feel

express an opinion

A great scaffold/support for students to practice how to interpret a picture is a "Picture Description Frame." Here's an example below for Italian. Students lay the "frame"(with the center cut out) over the picture and use the expressions around the perimeter of the frame to help them describe the visual either through speaking or writing.

Here's an example for French:

During a unit on leisure activities, students view the painting called "A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte" by Georges Seurat.

The students overlay their "description frames" onto the image.

Then, the students use the prompts around the frame to assist them with describing the picture either orally or in written format.
https://www.grahnforlang.com/scaffolds-and-supports.html
This tool and ones for other languages can be found at the link below by scrolling down to the bottom of the webpage:

To find out more about viewing comprehension strategies, check out the resource below:

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Teaching listening and viewing skills using authentic resources

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Authentic resources are created by and for the target language users either for information or entertainment. They are texts that students can read, listen to, or view in the target language. Much attention is paid to written authentic text. For this post, let's turn our attention to building students' interpretive skills with authentic text for...

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Spanish Poems for Kids - Spanish Playground

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Spanish Poems for Kids - Spanish Playground

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Poems in Spanish are a wonderful way for children to experience and learn language. Below you will find many Spanish poems for kids with activity suggestions.

Choosing Spanish Poems for Kids Learning Language

Poems for language learners can be hard to find. Not all poems will be enjoyable or help them learn Spanish. The best poems for kids learning Spanish:

are short

have a base of familiar vocabulary to orient readers

have some new language so kids learn new words

rhyme

have patterns kids can use to write their own poems

can be acted out

can be illustrated

One of my favorite resources for Spanish poems for kids is the blog El Jardín de Douglas written by the Argentine poet Douglas Wright. Douglas Wright has generously given me permission to reproduce the full text of his poems on Spanish Playground. Many of the posts mentioned below include his poetry and activities for sharing them with kids.

Poems in Spanish: National Poetry Month Activities - General ideas about ways to share poems with children.

Easy Spanish Poems for Kids

Spanish Color Words: Rhymes to Print and Color - Four-line poems about colors with pictures of familiar vocabulary. They can be printed and colored.

Poems about Body Parts in Spanish - Three easy poems for beginners.

Poem in Your Pocket Spanish Printable - Four-line poems in the form of dialogs.

Spanish Poems for Kids about the Seasons

Short Spanish Poems for Spring - Three short Spanish poems about spring with a printable activity for one of them.

Spanish Poems: Spring - Two Spanish poems for kids, one about rain and one about wind, with suggested activities.

Spanish Poems about Fall by Douglas Wright - Four-line poems about leaves falling from trees.
Spanish Poem about Fall: Dramatic Play and Printable
Short Spanish Poems about Fall - Five poems about fall with imagery of leaves. Each poem is only four lines long.

Spanish Poems about Winter - A collection of short Spanish poems for kids with lots of winter weather and clothing vocabulary.

Simple Spanish Poems for Kids by Douglas Wright

Spanish Poem for Kids - Bien Tomados de la Mano - A pretty poem about friendship and suggestions for using it with kids

Hola, buen día, día - A poem by Douglas Wright - A happy poem to greet the day and ideas for how to use the poem with Spanish learners

Spanish Poem for Children with Color & Nature Words - A poem with basic vocabulary. The post includes ideas for using the poem with children.
Spanish poem for kids - Una casa con un sol
Spanish Poem for Children with Suggested Activities - Mi casa está viva - An excellent poem for talking houses. The post includes a printable activity working with the rhyming words in the poem.

Spanish Poem for Children - ¡Qué grande era todo! - This short poem is a great choice for beginning Spanish learners. It has familiar size and house vocabulary.

Poem by Douglas Wright for children learning Spanish - The poem Apurados, apurados and 10 activities to do with Spanish learners

Walking and Talking in Spanish: Two Rhymes to Combine with Movement - 2 short rhymes about walking
One pretty poem and 15 activities for children learning Spanish - This poem has natural world and 5 senses vocabulary. It works well with beginning learners.
Spanish Poem for Children - Rimando ando - A fun rhyming poem with easy vocabulary. It is about how animals move through different spaces.

Spanish Poems for Summer Nights - Two short, easy poems about night.

More Spanish Poems for Kids

La ardilla - A poem by Amado Nervo with printable activities.

Spanish Poem for Kids: Los pollitos - A poem by Olegario Víctor Andrade with reading comprehension questions.

Poems for Children in Spanish - Edgar Allan Garcia and Sergio Andricaín in Cuatrogatos - 3 wonderful poems from Cuatrogatos, an online magazine dedicated to children's literature in Spanish.

Reciting poetry in Spanish and a poem by Federico García Lorca - Examples of children reciting poetry in Spanish and the poem Canción tonta by Garcia Lorca.
Spanish Poems for Children Performed by Antonio Selfa
Spanish Nursery Rhymes
Spanish Nursery Rhymes on Beautiful Posters Sana Sana Colita de Rana and Body Parts Lesson Spanish Sequencing Cards: The Itsy Bitsy Spider 5 Spanish Finger Plays for Preschoolers Finger Plays in Spanish: 5 More Favorites
Collections of Spanish Poems for Kids
Spanish Poems for Children - Three Resources with Poetry and Activities Spanish Poems for Kids: The Poetry Friday Anthology for Celebrations Spanish Poems for Kids: All Bilingual Press
Spanish Poems for Children - Nanitas - Francisco Rodríguez Gómez's website dedicated to his Spanish poems for children. Rodríguez Gómez is a poet, musician and teacher from Cádiz, Spain.

Spanish Poetry for Elementary Students - A collection of poetry by Mariana Llanos. Intended for native speakers of Spanish, several of these poems are also appropriate for Spanish learners.

Photo Credit: Miguel Vera via Compfight cc

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Spanish Poems for Kids - Spanish Playground

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Poems in Spanish are a wonderful way for children to experience and learn language. Below you will find many Spanish poems for kids with activity suggestions. Poems for language learners can be hard to find. Not all poems will be enjoyable or help them learn Spanish.

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PBL in the TL: 15 Facebook Pages for Spanish #AuthRes

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PBL in the TL: 15 Facebook Pages for Spanish #AuthRes

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OK, our kids are probably too cool for Facebook now. Moms--and grandmas (and dads and grandpas)--and teachers have taken over.

OK, not totally. But there are so many resources for us there, we should definitely be taking advantage. Of course there are awesome groups for advice and networking. A few of my favorites are

(Hint: you'll probably want to adjust your notifications for these groups, as they are ACTIVE.)

But you know what I am loving more and more every day? The steady flow of authentic resource access just pouring into my feed every day! I mean, isn't it amazing how your monolingual amigos regularly share videos and posts in Portuguese and Hungarian and Korean and your target language regularly? Proof positive we are a global society. So now when my amigos post something in Spanish, I like the page they got it from too, and BAM a whole other floodgate.

(Caution: I have been burned by some otherwise inappropriate pages with posts that also include "language" and...questionable...topics and have had to unfollow. Oh, who am I kidding? I knew what I was getting into with a page called " Mujeres cabronas", and I not-so-secretly love "language." I do consider keeping the...questionable...ones for my own L2 upkeep, but sometimes they just do things to my feed that spoil the experience for me, so they have to go.)

So I thought I would collect and share some of my favorite pages for #authres so you could have access to the multiple goldmines I enjoy daily!

This is the BEST. Adorable animals + real social issues in context in Mexico. What's not to love? You can't go wrong with animals.

More animals, more videos, more articles, from everywhere. Most of the videos are more for interpretive reading than listening, though.

"News and Information in epic images." WEB COMICS AND INFOGRAPHS IN SPANISH. This makes me so happy I could cry.

Articles and pictures to tantalize the traveler's spirit

All things Earth: more my cup of tea than my students', but ONE DAY I will get them interested.

Gifs, memes, infopics, article: cute, popular stuff--you name it. Are these translations mostly? Probably. Are translations authentic? Kinda. The question makes for interesting discussion. It's still by the target culture for the target culture, right? Interesting perspectives on what's worth translating too.

EVERYTHING. This site has EVERYTHING. Videos, articles, infographs, on any topic possible--yes, some inappropriate. It's not usually as Big C Culture as this, but when it is, it is glorious.

They also have anoticias page that is a little more...elevated? Although still approximately Buzzfeed level elevated.

Speaking of EVERYTHING, this site has it all. All of those popular little how-to tutorials? Random puppy memes, quizzes, and tips about relationships and internet safety and "what your eyes say about your health"? ALL here in Spanish.

Super latino news/gossip source

LOVE the creativity here--plus some of these videos actually have some Spanish listening!

Fun trivia videos and posts, gifs and memes

Click. Bait. Central. I mean, if it works in English, why not in Spanish?

It's like a rite of passage in adolescence to "discover" what your parents were into, right? And who doesn't get a giggle out of 80s or 90s style nowadays? Why not from the target culture?

Using them in class

Never do I recommend setting kiddos loose on a Facebook Page--too much uncertainty ( Sra. Hawkins advises picking out the best stuff, and I'm with her). But pick a post and have the kiddos react!

discuss results of the quizzes in small groups or as a class

they can create--or find--a response meme or infopic

have them react to information with their own 1-2 minute vlog summaries and opinions

post a comment screenshot on Seesaw or Classroom and have them post replies

make a Pinterest board or Google Keep list to collect further resources on a topic

have them contact the author and ask some questions!

Do you guys remember when we had to hope our kids would go for bilingual picture books or translated documents from the DMV to get authentic resources in our classroom? That or rely on the ads we collected on our last sojourn overseas--possibly from 5 years ago?

Authentic resources are everywhere now, and when we find the right pages, we can just watch them flow in. The internet is ours!

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OK, our kids are probably too cool for Facebook now. Moms--and grandmas (and dads and grandpas)--and teachers have taken over. OK, not totally. But there are so many resources for us there, we should definitely be taking advantage. Of course there are awesome groups for advice and networking.