Thank you Megan!

It is a great opportunity for all the schools to have a language assistant because the children, the teachers and all the community can live a different experience during the school year. However, as always, we have to say "see you soon" by the end of May each year. And we hope to see you again after this COVID-19 situation at school.

What advantages have our students had with Megan, our language assistant, in our natural and science lessons? Our assistant has shared with all of them an unique linguistic experience and her culture. They have developed everyday communication with the use of language skills in real-life situations. 

As we all know, the best option to learn a language is with games and a lot of fun. Megan has combined the work in the classes with oral interactive activities and a very good English. During this lockdown due to this coronavirus situation, she has done a great contribution to our school for the online education with the creation of materials.

To sum up, our language assistant has done a great job and I would like to include the following tasks:

• motivating students to learn English,
• encouraging our children to participate in oral communication activities,
• preparing classroom materials and activities,
• encouraging children to explore the different cultures.

Some posts of these years are:

The Universe Project: 5th Grade	Layers of the Atmosphere in 4th Grade
The Five Senses in 1st Grade	5 Senses Project in 4th Grade
Me on a Map! 5th grade	Christmas Time!
The Water Cycle	5th Grade 5 Senses
Animals!	Sensitivity and the Nervous System
Geography and Culture Around the World	Jeopardy!
Animals and Ecosystems	Thanksgiving! 5th grade
School Day of Non-Violence and Peace: Light a candle for PEACE	Springtime!
Shop Role Plays	Parts of the Cell
Thanksgiving in the USA	So good to work as a linguistic assistant

Thank you very much!

Hope you come back soon!

Layers of the Atmosphere in 4th Grade

The fourth graders here at CEIP San Miguel have been learning about the different layers of the atmosphere. We have also learned about the layers in English, which are the Troposphere, Stratosphere, Mesosphere, Thermosphere and Exosphere. They even know key components of each layer! For example, the ozone, which helps keep harmful UV rays from the sun away from the Earth, is located in the Stratosphere and the Exosphere (the outermost layer) has extremely thin air.
We watched a video talking about the different layers of the atmosphere and explained fun facts about each layer, and also the distance, size, and temperature.

The students drew a picture showing the Earth and all of the layers that cover it. They wrote and drew the unique parts about each layer in the picture. The Troposphere is where the weather occurs, so they drew different types of weather, like sunny, rainy, or snowy. In the Stratosphere, they drew the ozone, in the Mesosphere, they wrote ´very cold´,and in the Thermosphere they wrote ´very hot´. The students really seemed to enjoy this activity and it also helped them visualize the different layers of the atmosphere and to understand the unique parts of each layer.

Here you can see some examples of the Layers of the Atmosphere that the students drew:

And here is a photo of them working on the project:

Animals and Ecosystems (2nd Grade)

In the second grade, we have been working on learning about ecosystems and about all the different animals and plants in ecosystems. In My Pond Community, we made a pond ecosystem with water, plants, the sun, birds, fish, frogs, and turtles. We are learning about the many parts that make up an ecysystem and why each part is important. And here you can see the different types of ecosystems we have learned about.

Here you can download the ecosystem template, just print it for your class.
Pond Ecosystem Cut & Paste template
Cycle of the frog template

Here you can see the life cycle of the frog: 

The life cycle of a frog starts with an egg, then a tadpole, a tadpole with legs, a tadpole with arms and legs, a froglet, and finally, an adult frog. 

The earth has many different ecosystems and we have learned about a few key ones: forest, desert, ocean, and polar. The children learned about the different plants and animals that belong in each ecosystem. For example, in a forest, you will find pine trees, deer, and owls, while in a desert, you will find sand, cactuses, snakes, and camels. 

So good to work as a linguistic assistant here!

My name is Megan and I am the new English language assistant at CEIP San Miguel! I am very excited to be working in a school with such helpful and welcoming staff and students that are very sweet and eager to learn :)

This will be my second year working in Spain as an English language assistant. Last year I worked in a secondary school in Ciudad Real. Though I am somewhat familiar with the city of Granada after having studied there in university, this is my first time spending time in the cute neighboring town Armilla!

The first week at school I introduced myself and taught the students about where I'm from. I told them a little bit about me, my interests and hobbies, about the USA in general, and some fun facts about my state, Washington (not to be confused with Washington, DC). The students then asked me questions about myself and told me a little bit about themselves as well. They told me their names, ages, favorite foods, and hobbies. After showing them a map of the world and demonstrating how far my home is from Spain, many of them were curious to know how long it took me to get here (12 hours, but so worth it!)

Here is a link to my intro presentation

I am very excited to be working at this school and am looking forward to getting to know the students and teachers better! :)

Last Day in CEIP San Miguel

It has been such a beautiful and enriching experience to be working alongside the teachers and students at CEIP San Miguel.

My favorite experiences were getting to talk about my country (mi país), teaching a short story about the elements for some classes, seeing different theater performances, being a part of the Mindfulness and Yoga during the Cultural Week, and learning about Social and Natural Science in English.

Thank you so much to all the staff, teachers and students at CEIP San Miguel! It has truly been a pleasure working with all of you.

I will never forget this experience.

I hope to come back to visit soon. Granada and CEIP San Miguel will always have a place in my heart.

Muchas gracias a todos desde mi corazón!

A Portfolio in Natural Science

We have been working on so many different themes in all of the classes!

 The common theme we have all been working on is nature.

 In first grade, we have been learning about the Sun and the Earth. We learned that the Sun is a star, and the Earth is a planet. We also learned about the four different seasons - spring, summer, autumn-fall and winter!

What is your favorite season?

 In the second grade classes we have been learning about the phases of the moon, as well as the order of all of the planets.

We drew the different phases of the Moon, such as waxing Moon, full Moon, new Moon and waning Moon.

 In our journals, we created a beautiful drawing of the planets and our Solar System!

 Lastly in fourth grade, we did crafted a project about the parts of a flower.

We labeled all of the parts in English and Spanish. Inside the petals we wrote about the Sexual Reproduction and their roots.

If you click on these lovely photos, or here I have attached a link to the portfolio of the student´s work:

Spring Solstice

Spring is finally here!

Flowers are blossoming and the sun is finally coming out to play. We hope to see lots of rainbows, flowers and sunshine! 

As we prepare for Easter holidays, here are some interesting links, songs and printables you can use to learn more about spring.

Poems are a great way to learn about new vocabulary.

Spring is Here song:

https://youtu.be/DobrRgD5aOU

Here is an activity about a chick hatching from an egg:

https://www.kidssoup.com/craft-and-resource/chick-hatching-craftivity


Make sure to go outside and enjoy nature! We hope everyone has a lovely week of Easter break!

Natural Science in 2nd Grade: My senses and the respiration

In our 2nd grade natural science class we learned about the five senses: smell, hearing, taste, sight and touch through drawing pictures and writing sentences for each sense.

 "I smell with my nose."

 "I hear with my ears."

"I taste with my tongue."

"I see with my eyes."

        "I touch with my hands."     

We also learned about respiration.We did a breathing excercise together where we breathed through our nose and then our mouth!

Beautiful drawings, children!

The Very Hungry Caterpillar

We had a very special day together reading The Very Hungry Caterpillar. 

We learned about the days of the week and counting.

I read them the story outside and they were all showing me how good their listening skills were.

At the beginning of the story the caterpillar is a tiny egg on a leaf. He is very hungry and eats through many different types of food. He grows large and fat and builds himself a home called a cocoon. 

Finally, he turns into a beautiful butterfly! 

After, the children made and colored their own books.

Great job!

Halloween Special Festivities

Hello everyone! I can't believe it is already November. The weather is starting to feel colder and the leaves are changing color.

This past week we celebrated Halloween, a tradition that originated from the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain. The children celebrated by dressing up in their scariest costumes - witches, ghosts and vampires!

I made a presentation about Halloween teaching them about how to turn a pumpkin into a jack-o-lantern by carving two eyes, one nose and a mouth. I also showed them how children dress up for Halloween in the United States and go door to door saying "trick or treat" with bags for candy.

After my presentation, I taught them about the four elements (air, water, fire and earth) through interactive storytelling. The children had to stand up and do different gestures and movements to help me tell the story. For example, when the fairy in the story had to get the element of fire from the dragon, the children acted like they were fire-breathing dragons!

After, they all drew symbols to represent the elements in their notebooks along with their own version of a fairy.

Legends: Nessie Monster

As part of the class 4a and 4b we recently studied the topic of Legends! The children made different legend stories ranging frm the Trojan warriors to the Greek Gods, how cool! They then presented their legend to the class and acted out the story. This was really cool and intresting, I decided to tell me own Legend story which was about the Loch Ness Monster, which is a mythical beast found in my home country, Scotland!

The story told the tale of a young boy who ignored his family and friends warnings and visited the famoud Loch Ness Monster which was said to have great big teeth, six eyes and a love for eating children! The boy wanted to see for himself if the stories were true although he knew that all living things have good points and bad points. The boy travelled to the lake and found the scary monster but soon realised that the monster was actually nice and friendly and they made friends. The moral of the story is to not judge a book by its cover!

After I had told the Legend story and scared the children we did a drawing of the Loch Ness Monster. I have attached a few of the drawings below, they were all really good and scary looking!!

If you want to find out more about the Loch Ness Monster there is a really great film about it called the "The Water Horse", we will try and watch it in class as well. I have attached the link for the trailer below. In Spanish "Mi mascota es un monstruo".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iuvPpCMgA9U

Second Blog Post - Holidays, Space, and Geography

Second Blog Post - Holidays, Space, and Geography

I´ve now been teaching at C.E.I.P San Miguel for 4 months! I´m starting to really like my classes and I can honestly say that I´m very impressed with the kids level of english which is constantly improving. Since my last blog post (2 months ago) I have helped teach a huge range of topics, ranging from Space and Geography to Economics and Healthy Diets. In this blog post I´m going to highlight some of the projects that I helped create and teach.


Layers of the Atmosphere - with Class 4A and 4B.

At the moment we are studying the layers of the atmosphere in classes 4A/B. As part of this unit we put together a small flipbook which the children seemed to really love making. Attached below is an exmaple of one of the completed flipbooks, which contained alot of very important information and diagrams.

The Solar Sytstem - With class 5A and 5B

With class 5A/B I had the chance to help out and add my own input with the Solar System topic. This topìc was great to teach and was very practical. The children got involved with creating some great looking posters and models. Attahced below is some photos I took from some of the space models and posters which are proudly presented on the top floor. I helped mainly with the order of the planets poster which again I have attached below as the picture on the right..




The Earths Movement - With class 3A and 3B

Again this is a recently finished topic which was very interesting to teach. We created a poster which described the types of movements which the earth has, Rotating and Revolving. This unit was very fun and engaging to teach. Below is an example of one of the posters which was created! As part of this unit the children also learned about the different seas and oceans around the world as well as the different continents.






















The Economy - With class 6A 6B and 6C

With class 6A 6B and 6C we have been working on the economy in the last couple of weeks. The children have been very engaging when I have asked them questions in english on the topic and eager to learn. This was demonstrated in the recent Kahoot test that we did which involved 14 questions on the economy, 7 in Spanish and 7 in English. The children got on really well with this with some students even scoring 100%! I have attached the link for the Kahoot below where you can see the questions that were asked.

https://play.kahoot.it/#/k/5d3c1f9b-ac11-4b42-bc10-529f59b6d9bc

Danny, blog post 1

My name is Danny and I´m the new English language assistant at C.E.I.P San Miguel in the town of Armilla. This is now my third week of teaching and this is the first of hopefully many more blog posts describing my experience teaching at Colegio San Miguel!

I arrived in Granada on the 13th of September asnd quickly found a flat to rent in the centre of Granada in Calle San Anton. It took me a couple of weeks to adjust to the warm spanish weather as I´m used to cold rainy Scotland. In my first two weeks in Granada I made lots of new friends, ate alot of free tapas and discovered whats Granada/Armilla had to offer. One thing I still need to do is visit the Alhambra but Yolanda has promised me tickets sometime this yeat!

I started school at the end of the month in Armilla. My first week was really great. All the teachers were really welcoming and I had a fun week introducing myself to the children. I prepared a presentation about me and where I come from which seemed to go down well with the children! Ive attached the presentation below. They seemed intrested in Scotland, where it was in the world and what it is famous for. After each presentation I played a game to see how much they were listening by asking them questions about my presentation. To my suprise they turned about to be extremely good listeners answering almost all of the questions correctly! I also got them to draw a Scottish flag which they seemed to love doing constantly trying to show off their flags!

In week´s two and three I started actually teaching science in english. I was very impressed with the level of english the children had and the type of material they were learning. I have to admit I think I have leanred as much as the children about the human body in my first few weeks! I have been giving lessons on a whole range of topics, ranging from the solar system to types of landscapes to red/white blood cells. This week I´m teaching alot about the human body and living things. I look forward to posting on here regularly and keeping you updated on my time at C.E.I.P San Miguel!

It´s almost time for Christmas...

My first term at CEIP San Miguel is coming to an end. I´ve had a wonderful time; the teachers and students are all so brilliant! Let´s take a look at some of the things we've been doing this term.

We´ve covered many different topics in both natural and social science; the solar system, the locomotor system, healthy habits, and so much more! Now third grade can tell you all about healthy eating, fifth grade can tell you about the climates of Spain and first grade can tell you about the five senses.

Fifth grade also made some wonderful displays of the solar system:

In both fifth grade and sixth grade we have done quizzes with Kahoot, which the children have really enjoyed!

Last week many classes started preparing for their Christmas show. It´s been really fun to practice Christmas carols with third grade, they´ve been singing so brilliantly! They´ve been singing one of my favourite Christmas songs that I only knew in English; now I know it in Spanish as well! Fourth grade have been singing another of my favourite Christmas songs and they´ve made some beautiful posters too!

Third grade made some beautiful Christmas cards:

Also, thank you very much to 3ºA for the lovely Christmas present!

I hope that all the staff, students and parents have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. See you all in January!

Holidays - Halloween and Thanksgiving

Hi everyone! What a busy week it´s been! I´ve had lots of fun this week doing lots of different things; in 1st grade we learned about the parts of the face and drew some scary monsters! In 3rd grade we were learning about the Earth - we listened to a really cool song about our planet and tried to pick out the important vocabulary. Also in 5th grade we finished off the topic of the nervous system and got prepared for a test on the unit - good luck to fifth grade on their tests!



Today I´m going to talk a bit about some different holidays that will soon be celebrated in the English-speaking world. Of course we have Halloween coming up at the end of the month! I´m sure everyone is very excited! Are you all going trick-or-treating? In Scotland, we sometimes call trick-or-treating: guising. The word guising sounds a bit like ´disguise´, which is what you do when you dress up in scary costumes - you disguise yourself!



Another important holiday that is celebrated is Thanksgiving; Thanksgiving is mainly celebrated in the USA and Canada. Thanksgiving is literally a day of giving thanks - easy to remember! Traditionally it is a celebration of a successful harvest. People spend the day with their friends and family.



They also eat lots of tasty food; turkey is the traditional meal for Thanksgiving, and it is normally eaten with sweet potatoes and cranberry sauce. After eating their meal (normally eaten in the middle of the afternoon!) the whole family normally spend time together and discuss what they are thankful for.

What about you? What are you thankful for?

Some games to have fun!:

-Thanksgiving!
http://www.primarygames.com/holidays/thanksgiving/games.php
http://www.abcya.com/thanksgiving_game_for_kids.htm

-Halloween!
http://www.primarygames.com/holidays/halloween/games.php
https://learnenglishkids.britishcouncil.org/es/category/topics/halloween