Weeks 16 and 17

¡Feliz Cumpleaños!

The past two weeks in Spanish we have been celebrating birthdays!  In addition to learning how to sing Happy Birthday in Spanish, we have been practicing expressing our age in the target language.  To reinforce the concept each child took a turn sharing their age and placing their name on a birthday cake with a candle representing their age.  You can spot these beautiful cakes in the hallway at school!

¿Cuántos años tienes tú? / How old are you.

Tengo un (1), dos (2), tres (3), cuatro (4), cinco (5), seis (6) años. / I am 1,2,3,4,5,6 years old

This was an interesting activity to see the children work through.  Although many of the older children knew how to count to 6 in Spanish, they still needed to transfer this knowledge in order to be able to use it to express their age.   Of course, it was extra challenging for our toddlers who are still learning what it means to be a certain age and how that relates to numbers!  But they all did a great job. 

 Learning about birthdays allowed us to explore some fun cultural aspects of the language as well.  We sang a traditional song that is sung during birthday parties when breaking the piñata in Mexico:

Dale, dale, dale no pierdas el tino

Porque si lo pierdes, pierdes el camino

Ya le diste uno

Ya le diste dos

Ya le diste tres y tu tiempo se acabó

We also read a book by Canticos called Las Mañanitas.  This is a beautifully fold out book based on the lyrics of another traditional Mexican birthday song.

Finally, we reviewed the colors rojo (red), azul (blue), and verde (green) using a song about a little balloon that floats aways and pops.  We first learned the song and then I sang the song using different colored balloons.  Our Primary children each chose a different color balloon and acted out the motions when I sang about their color.