19. Oktober '13 - "Gib mir den Ball!"

Guten Abend!

We started out with the students switching homework assignments with one another, correcting them, and then analyzing the sentences on the board for what was right versus grammatically wrong.

Then there were *FIRE ALARM FIRE ALARM FIRE ALARM* Huh? Oh, it's a fire drill.

Now where were we? Then there were two group activities involving vocabulary we have learned in previous weeks.
At first, I drew a house floor plan on the board, with each room and significant furniture piece labelled, and the students copied this down and translated it all into German in pairs. Then, likewise in pairs, they re-designed it into their own houses, potentially "Dream Houses" involving such things as indoor swimming pools or, for some reason, a fountain filled with Arizona Tea. Mine had a king-size hammock and a water slide that lead from the bedroom to a giant indoor pool to make waking up in the morning easier.

Getting back to the current grammar unit, we reviewed what we had learned to date on the Dative case, and then went further by delving into the idea of indirect versus direct objects, and how the Dative is used for indirect, whereas direct objects take the Accusative. As a warm up, afterward, we did a challenging group exercise with the class divided into two teams.
A slew of truly random words, including 6 nouns, 3 prepositions, and 3 verbs were written on the board, and the two teams had to somehow form these into coherent sentences with correct verb conjugation and noun declensions. While at first deemed impossible, the results were laudile.

And then there was pizza.

Post-pizza, we threw projectiles at one another, as is our preferred learning style.
This game is called, "Gib mir den Ball!" wherein names are called, responses of "Gib mir den Ball!" are given, and then the ball is tossed to another player, and this continues around the circle. We had 3 balls and a dictionary in the air at once. Anyone who failed to say the phrase correctly or who missed a catch (usually me) crouched in the center of the circle, and then was tagged back in when someone else was knocked out of play.

Now for the homework:
Translate the following, paying careful attention to both the dative (for indirect objects) and accusative (for direct) declensions.

• I’m throwing the football to my brother
• I’m throwing my brother to the football.
• The football is throwing me to my brother
• The football is throwing my brother to me
• I am running in the room
• I am running into the room
• The dog is throwing the football and my brother to me in the room.

Mit Vergnügen

12.Oktober '13 - Das Svenwerfen

We threw a viking around for at least 20 minutes.

Now that I have your attention, today started out rather normally. We went over the homework results, including correcting the most commonly seen errors together on the board.

We then reviewed the Dative case and the common prepositions (in, an, auf, vor, hinter, neben, zwischen) before loading the kids up with sugar. I had brought donuts this morning, and as one student put it, "With Herr Walker, everything has a catch." Donuts were placed throughout the room, and students took turns saying which donuts they wanted and then stating their location with the dative case.
Ex: "Dieser Schokoladedonut! Der Donut ist auf dem Tisch."

Then it came time to throw a viking around. Sven, our actually-a-viking-but-supposed-to-be-a-Teuton doll was thrown around a field that was filled with highly-visible objects (shoes, books, sweaters). The 8th grade class joined us for this one, Das Svenwerfen. Sven was thrown, and the thrower then had to call out where he landed (e.g. "Sven ist unter dem Baum," "Sven landet auf Herr Walker")

Since everyone brought their homework, we took our Ruhe around lunch, and then we hopped into a review of house/room vocabulary using concept mapping to determine what sort of room has what in it, and what one does in which room. We introduced verbs such as "duschen" and "schlafen" and so on.

Then we put a paper bag over someone's head and lead them blind around the school.
This is a game called "Wo bist du?", the object of which is to lead a disoriented, blinded individual around the school and then have them say where they are, e.g. "Ich bin in der Küche?" The highlight to me was walking into the 8th grade classroom, Frau K. having agreed to total silence, and having the paper bag-headed child try to guess aloud where they were. Each child was lead by the hand in front, guided from behind, and had others on either side of them to avoid injury.

And now for the homework.

Use the words below in 5 coherent sentences using the Dative case.
Each sentence must be complete, using at least one regular verb conjugated correctly for the subject of your choice.

• der Ball
• die Stuhl
• die Schwester
• der Hund
• der Gabel
• der Kühlschrank
• die Socken
• das Brot
• das Wohnzimmer
• die Hexe

5.Oktober '13 - Ein Rätsel

What do you get when you combine 1000 popsicle sticks, 5 sheets of felt, two hot glue guns, 50 refill glue sticks, 4 pounds of 'magic model clay,' 6 7th graders and 3 hours of time?

A mess of epic proportions. I think we broke the vacuum cleaner. Suffice to say, it was awesome.


Today began relatively innocently; the students presented their homemade decorations (the pie plate axe was especially intimidating) and read aloud 2-3 sentences auf Deutsch over each while showing them to the class. We then set about hanging them on the wall with varying degrees of success.
Please keep them coming! Even something as simple as posters or printouts of all things Rome and Ancient Germania (busts of Caesar, maps, etc) would be greatly appreciated to adorn our walls.

The class was then introduced to Sven, our mascot, a viking doll I got in Norway an ancient Teuton warrior here to grace the school with his presence as we learn about his time period. He was presented with a sparkly-haired Barbie horse noble steed by one of the girls, upon which he shall proudly stride into battle!

We began a unit on spatial location and the dative case today, learning the basics of dative declension of definite articles (der/das - dem, die - der, die (pl) - den) and the meaning of dative ("staytive") as, among other things, denoting something's location. We then took notes and made examples with the essential dative prepositions: An, auf, hinter, vor, neben, über, unter, zwischen

This transitioned into shear madness an activity called "Wo ist Sven?" where Sven was hidden in various places throughout the room, sometimes in plain sight, and the students, divided into two competitive groups, had to describe (coherently and correctly, articles and everything) where Sven was in relation to objects, people and furniture.
"Sven ist unter dem Tisch!" "Sven ist in dem Schrank." "Sven ist unter dem Pferd under der Stuhl neben der Ziege unter Herrn Walker" and so on.

For the rest of class, as promised, we made a big mess.

Our end product was a Roman Villa made out of white clay, including wooden furniture, clay fruit, a clay garden with crops, and surprisingly enough, a pool. The other group made a mud-and-wood Germanic hut with Beer kegs, a wood-burning 'stove' hutch, a partitioned space for the goats, a rather sad looking patch of crops, and an accompanying barn.

Much thanks to all who brought supplies for today's lesson! It wouldn't have gone anywhere near as well without your contributions.

And now for the homework:

"Wo ist Sven?"

• Draw Sven in a location somewhere within an imaginary house. So draw Sven and the room he is in. It may be fantastical and strange if you'd like.
• Describe where Sven is in comparison to at least 4 different things. 
• Remember to use the Dative!

Mit Vergnügen

28.9 - All a Matter of Perspective

Guten Morgen, Sonnenschein!


I was very proud of the way class turned out this Saturday; your kids showed more critical understanding than I had originally estimated. To be truthful, I was nervous about this one, but the lesson turned out very well.

The class started out with everyone reading aloud their homework (as is our habit), followed by a
cooperative learning exercise (you'll see lots of vocab like this since I'm currently in an MAT program and kind of got into the habit of using it) where we divided into two groups, each group being tasked with filling out a vocabulary list of "Zimmer und Zuhaus" words which we would use later. The group that finished first and most accurately received points. Then the two groups were pitted against each other in a board race for further points. The winners were promised their choice of Starbucks beverages at the beginning of next class.

We then learned about the Roman Empire and its interactions with ancient Germany in the 1st Century AD. It was a quick little introduction; we covered the basics overview at first, what the Roman Empire looked like at that time under Augustus, what life was like for an average Roman, and most importantly how the Romans tended to treat other nations.
This lead to a "think - learn - do": we webbed out associations with Rome and how the kids thought they would treat their neighbors, then went into a lecture/discussion about what it was ACTUALLY like, followed by the mixed reactions to Roman incursions on the part of ancient Germanians.
The high point of the class was when one student chimed in, "There were no good guys or bad guys. It's all perspective!" I was so proud.

After comparing lifestyles and cultures of Imperial Romans and the teutonic tribes, we then spent our time using the vocab from earlier to design both Roman Villas and Germanic steads (huts + farms). The class voted on the best two, and those are what we will make in class next week. I will make a run to Hobby Lobby for felt, popsicle sticks, paper and hot glue, but if you have any of the above lying around, please feel encouraged to donate them to the cause of creative anarchy for next week!

Homework for the week:

DECORATE THE CLASSROOM!
Choose two of the following to make at home and then bring to class to decorate the walls:

• Germanic or Roman swords, helmets, armor, spears
• Maps of Germania or the Roman Empire
• Roman-style Tapestries
• Fake "animal skin" rugs, wall hangings or beds

Also great but not required would be any posters, prints, or printouts of pictures of anything Imperial Roman, e.g. maps, busts of Caesar, and so forth. 

The room will be divided into the "Germania" side and the "Rome" side with the Rhein running down the center. 

My recommendations for making things such as weapons would be to cut shapes out of cardboard (like from boxes), then color and cover with either foil, glitter, or colored paper. Wonderful Roman pyla (cavalry spears) can be made from 5-6 paper towel rolls taped together with a cardboard spear tip at the top.

21.9 - EXTREM DEUTSCHES HOPSCOTCH

Hello All,

This Saturday had a bigger class in attendance, of 5 students, so thank you for that! Also thanks to those of you who sent your kids to school with a sports event schedule in hand. Those are very helpful, especially since I do not always have time to check my email on Friday nights (I work very strange hours). Please send me a copy of your child's events schedule--games, meets, etc--such that I can more readily plan for however many students I am going to have on Saturday.
As a wise man once said, "A lesson plan is a terrible thing to waste."

Saturday was our benchmark day, wherein through rigorous academic exercise (mostly games) we managed to determine:

• how much has been retained over the years
• what knowledge has been gained or built upon

Aside from reviving some old classics that I know they had missed since leaving 5th grade ("Hast du mein Obst?" and "Board Scrambles"), we revived the most dangerous game of all: EXTREM DEUTSCHES HOPSCOTCH, wherein hopscotch, recitation from memory, yelling things out loud, and throwing projectiles at the teacher all come together for the sake of learning/re-learning conjugation rules. 

I'm happy to report that most seem to recall how to conjugate haben, sometimes sein, and the guidelines for regular verbs. They have also learned how to use dictionaries, which warmed my heart to no end. I could not tell you the number of times I'd seen verbs used in place of nouns and such in papers.

This having been shown, I'd like to emphasize that my goal this year is to track mastery as best as I can, and not to worry about grades. That being said, with each homework assignment, please avoid helping them. Give your child absolutely zero assistance on homework, please, unless otherwise specified, so that I can accurately track understanding and growth. 

Next week, should all go well, we will be learning about this year's historical-cultural theme, "Ancient Germany and the Roman Empire," an oft overlooked topic near and dear to my heart, and accordingly decorating our classroom. The walls are bare right now, but shall soon be covered with decorations made by your children! We should begin learning about this topic and decorating the classroom next week.

Erster Schultag - 14.9.13

Guten Abend, alle!

Welcome to the new school year with the 7.Klasse of the German School! I'm pleasantly surprised that you all seem to be pleasantly surprised at the pleasant surprise of my being your children's teacher once again, which I find surprisingly pleasant.

Our attendance today was rather sparse, with 4 students at the beginning which ended up dwindling down to 1 by the last hour. To avoid miscommunications and planning difficulties, I'd asked those present to present me next class, or whenever possible, with schedules for their sporting events and the like for my reference. This way, I can easily check these calendars to know in advance who is going to be absent, which is extremely helpful, so please turn in to me all event calendars/meet schedules and such at your earliest convenience.

Most of our time was spent creating the class charter, or the rules and expectations for this year, as a collaborative effort, hoping to inspire 'ownership' of the class and investment in its orderliness and success. The best part, I'd say, was that those who bring their homework to class will be allowed 10-15 minute break (possibly nap time) after lunch each day, whereas those who don't will need to use this time to do the homework.

Next class we will begin our more academic forays, and possibly go pearl diving off the coast of the Virgin Islands, if all goes well.

Mit Vergnügen~

18.Mai - Letzter Schultag

Guten Abend, liebe Leute aus Lernenland!


Today was our last day of German school for the '12-'13 school year, to recommence in September of this upcoming Fall.

For the duration of our class time, we played GEIST (it's like "SPUD," apparently) with the 7th grade class as lead by Fr. Noelke. This we did up until the Graduation Ceremony and subsequent picnic.

Report cards were handed out, and all past assignments that had been posted on the wall throughout the classroom were taken down to be brought back home.

Those not present will have their report cards mailed to them by Fr. Lussem.

Much was learned this year, much was played, much was eaten, and there was definitely children in attendance most of the time: this much is certain. Thank you for the privilege of teaching your kids, and I hope you all grace us with your continued presence and patronage in upcoming years.

Wie immer, mit Vergnügen~