Getting Students to Sing
Hi all.
I’ve been using in my classes for the last six years. I’ve had great success
with a number of songs - from grammar songs to pop songs. This is what I
typically do:
1. Create a cloze-style activity where students fill in missing words.
Usually these
involve vocabulary that they already know or cognates.
2. I play the song twice and students fill in the missing words.
3. I then highlight a few lines that I want the students to translate. From
that, they
tell me the meaning of the song. Upper level students can handle more
lines.
4. I always do a mini-biography of the singer . . . and I love to point out
regional
differences, both in pronunciation and word choice.
5. Okay, now for the singing part. Well, honestly, I’ve only had a handful
of
students who don’t sing. Most love it. In fact, on my evaluations,
students say
that singing is one of their favorite activities. The first time I have
them sing, I
tell them they are just trying to pronounce & enunciate the words
correctly -
in rhythm with the singer. Of course, I don’t expect them to get all
the words -
but I do tell them it’s great pronunciation practice. After a couple of
days of
practicing with the song, I divide the class into two groups and we have
a
“Sing-Off” - each group sings part of the song. I give them a score
(from 1-10)
based on (1) the number of students I heard singing and (2) the amount
of
words they were singing correctly. That way, even my most quiet
students will
participate because they think they are helping their group out. The
winning
team earns bonus points or candy.
6. Toward the end of the year - works great for cinco de mayo - I host a
fiesta for
my classes. Students bring in food from different Spanish-speaking
countries
and we have a Karaoke day. Students work in pairs or groups and perform
one
of the songs that we learned that year. They are allowed to use their
scripts if
they need to. Props & costumes are encouraged. I get other teachers or
administrators to act as judges and they pick the top 3 winners. The
students
love it. At the end, I teach them a few salsa and cha cha steps to go
with their
songs.
Anyway, I hope this helps a little.
Inga 
