Some days I’ve got my ducks all in a row. Yesterday I was lucky to get all my ducks in the same pond! Goodness gracious, my little darlings were wild beasts …and it was a MONDAY! And pair that with a lackluster lesson plan (I’m running on fumes here…cheerleading tryouts took it out of me last week- #newcoach) totally a recipe for disaster!

You know how sometimes when you’re a wreck, and the skies open up, and this awesome and perfectly timed idea strikes you? Well that happened today in the middle of 3rd period. And it was so easy. And worked great. And it took 0 prep. Win! Win! Win! Thank you, Jesus!

So my plan was: read something then see if they understood it. (I know, lackluster!) My little darlings read 2 chapters of a novela (a little something I’m working on). We acted out the first chapter and I set them loose to volleyball read (Read and translate with a partner, bouncing the task back and forth like a volleyball match…or at least that’s why I think they call it that!? ) the second chapter.

I wanted to see what they understood and wanted to clear up any parts that were confusing. The Lucky Reading Game is  a hit but it’s sort of a production: teams, rotations, answering questions on a whiteboard…yesterday I didn’t have it in me, so The Lazy Lucky Reading Game it was. I didn’t even think to film it because I thought it would be totally lame…but it wasn’t!

After they read with a partner, we divided into boys vs. girls teams. (Fact: all games are 100x more fun when played boys vs. girls). Totally doesn’t matter if the numbers are uneven, just send the girls to one side and the boys to another. Teacher  projects the Lucky Reading Game Slide, grabs a deck of cards (Gigantic cards are the most fun!), and starts asking questions about what they read. Anyone who knows the answer hollers it out and the teacher stands in the middle. The first person to holler out the correct answer gets to draw a card, which counts as points for their teams. If both teams holler the correct answer at the same time, not to worry! Just offer a card to both sides. It’s fun because they don’t know how many points they’re earning for their answer. Even if both sides answered correctly, the girls might have earned 30 points and the boys 2 points.

And you can really milk you questions, to make sure they’re getting a lot of input. Basically I retold the story, pausing every so often to ask questions. They’re focused, listening intently and ready to yell out the answer.  It looked like this:

So there’s a man, What is his name? ¡EDMUNDO! (Teacher fans out cards face down to the girl team and one girl draws a card). Right! His name is Edmundo and he is sitting with his friend reading the newspaper. Where is he sitting reading the newspaper? ¡EL PARQUE! (Teacher offers card to the boy’s team) Oh yes, that’s right, Edmundo is sitting in the park with his pet. What’s the pet’s name? ¡TITO! (There’s no clear winner, so the teacher let’s a girl and a boy draw a card) Yes! Tito! Anyway, he is sitting in the park with his little dog Tito. What kind of dog is Tito? ¡UN CHIHUAHUA! Yes! He is a little white chihuahua!

They were able to expend their energy and I was able to conserve mine. And by the time May rolls around, I’ve got to do everything I can to conserve my energy!