August 30, 2009
Karaoke Videos
You are the teacher. You are not cool. By default, any music you introduce is also not cool.
There’s always that one class that rebels against any music you introduce. It’s usually the result of one or two loud-mouth students who try to make the rules in class. Each year, I would try a couple of songs, and it always went so poorly that I would give up with that class and just do other activities. The problem is that there really are students in those classes who are quietly thinking to themselves, “I wish we could hear that song.”
That’s why I created karaoke videos. I wanted an activity where students could study the music in a structured fashion away from the pressure from their peers. Karaoke videos are available to subscribers who purchase full site access.
Late last year, I tested out the karaoke tool for the first time with my students. I told them that they had to learn the song La Dentista using the karaoke tool. Please know, I have attempted to give music homework in the past, but it was rarely successful. Only a few students would actually go home and listen to the song. And those who did would often listen to it in a completely unstructured fashion (while doing other homework, playing videogames, etc).
The karaoke tool changed things completely. A majority of my students showed up to class the next day with the song almost entirely memorized.
The reason the karaoke tool is so useful its flexibility. A student can listen to the song while reading the lyrics in English or Spanish. Or, she can turn off one or both of the subtitle sets to challenge herself. If she really wants a challenge, she can turn off the pre-recorded vocals and supply her own.
But enough with the explanation. If you haven’t seen it yet, go check out a sample karaoke video.
- Page 1 - Introduction
- Page 2 - Lyrics Sheet
- Page 3 - The Performance
- Page 4 - Concrete Instructions
- Page 5 - TPRS
- Page 6 - Verbally Fill in the Blanks (and a game)
- Page 7 - Karaoke Videos
- Page 8 - Closing
Too much clicking? Combine everything onto one page
Gracias Sr. Wooly,
Your tips are great. We have been enjoying your songs in class and the students request it daily, but now you offer some great advice and I look forward to applying them. Especially the “crawling all over the desks” part. jejeje.
Keep up the incredible work.
Sr. Kent de la Chalupa
I fully agree with you about setting things to music that you want them to remember. My principal last year in one of his visits, took up some maracas and sang with us. He reminded me this fall that he still knew “fui, fuiste, fue.”
I found that some verbs can also be learned with the Mexican Hat Dance main refrain music. Verbs like “Estoy, estás, está…” fit to the rhythm — but only if one includes the vosotros form.
I do admit to the kids that they’ll hate me forever, but music works!
Thanks for the great ideas! My students LOVE “Guapo”. We draw Victor and talk about what he’s really like. We sing it and the boys take turns acting out Victor’s role and the girls are the “Victorettes”. This quarter I think I’ll have them bret out into groups and perform the song with props of course, as a presentational assessment. They will videotape it and then we’ll watch them all in class. Gracias Sr. W!
One of my classes found an explanation for “Sam” not having enough time to get to el baño before class…he was talking with friends at the supermarket while looking for a special pink apple that could “rap” “Feliz Cumpleaños” to give to Mr. Bill, his math teacher. He finally found the special apple at Disney World, where a vacationing classmate sold him the apple for $250. Mr. Bill estaba muy contento…pero Sam no tenía la oportunidad para ir al baño antes de la clase de español. Now that you know the background, you can see that “le traeré una manzana” is quite an offer from Sam! Thanks for the inspiration!
Hi! I just wanted to share something that has worked really well in my class. We did the invitation song and after listening and singing the original, I put them in pairs and then they changed the lyrics to other vocabulary words–like jugar al futbol, ver la tele, etc. Then they presented to the class–with fake phones, props, etc. It has been so fun!!!!