TRANSCRIBING
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1. Every day students will be required to find and copy verbatim a famous quotation. When students meet for small group instruction, check the entry in their writing notebooks and discuss the students’ interpretations of the quotations.
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2. As a group exercise a short passage is read aloud two or three times. Students will then try to write it out in full. Some passages to use for this exercise are as follows:
Mother Goose Rhymes
Birds of a feather flock together,
And so will pigs and swine;
Rats and mice will have their choice,
And so will I have mine.
See a pin and pick it up;
All the day you’ll have good luck;
See a pin and let it lie,
Sure you’ll want before you die.
I’ve seen you where you never were,
And where you’ll never be,
And yet you in that very same place,
May still be seen by me.
For every evil under the sun,
There is a remedy, or there is none
If there be one, try and find it;
If there be none, never mind it.
TRANSLATING
(Bilingual students will be encouraged to assist others in the class for these exercises).
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1. Simple passages from a level one Spanish book provide suitable material for exercises in translating. Using a Spanish/English dictionary, students are required to translate short paragraphs or poems from Spanish into English. It might be helpful to give hints. Examples are as follows:
A las cuatro de la tarde, voy a las
tiendas del centro porque tengo que
comprar fruta y mantequilla pare
la cena. Hay que comprar fruta en
la fruteria y mantequilla en la
lecheria. Comemos a las nueve.
Hint: This paragraph describes the eating and
shopping customs in a SpanishAmerican country.
“Ensenada”
By Georgio Castaneda Aragon
13
Cielo azul
sin una nube.
Mar azul
Solo la espuma
sobre la arena
Hint: A poem to learn about the sea.
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2. As a whole class activity using Spanish/English dictionaries, have one of the Spanishspeaking students write the first stanza of a popular song on the chalkboard. Have the student read it over a few times aloud, trying to accentuate the rhythm of the song. Translate it word by word together with the class.