Here is a “short” reflection about the year in my Spanish IV/4 Honors class, and probably of more importance to you, the details about Interactive Presentations. Of course the year was not “perfect” and every decision I made for student learning and my teaching was not flawless – but it was a pretty fantastic year. In fact, 95% of this year’s level 4 students will earn the Ohio Seal of Biliteracy when they graduate (meaning they earned at least a 6/9 on 3 sections & one possible 5/9 the other section of AVANT’s 4S STAMP Exam with the sections being: Reading, Listening, Writing, and Speaking). Wow! 

First off, I am going to refer to the last few summers’ Spanish IV posts because I am incorporating all of those ideas into my current classes and if you want to know more about what happened this year, check them out. 

2025’s Level 4 Post 

Summer of 2024 – I wrote and reflected so much in a series called: Running Reflection Series: My Experience with Mike Peto’s Approach, My Teacher Struggles, and Next School Year

Spanish IV Reflection 2022-23 ~ Finding the Balance

Reflection 2021-22 Spanish Level IV

Just looking back at last year’s posts and the feedback I received from students, I could still increase the amount of test prep that I do for them with regard to these recommendations:

-listen to and read more challenging sources in class with questions (more informational and news-like sources)

-write and speak more in class using prompts similar to the exam (I wrote a lot about this last summer)

-some students still want more explicit grammar “practice” (even though that is not on the exam)

So I think these are good recommendations for me to consider. The truth is that I really have to strike a balance between the content of the course and “test prep.” Because I know that my students do prefer more engaging activities in class than only being test prep and they do not want a ton more homework (because I do already give quite a bit at this level especially when you add in studying) – so I now have to think about how I can do more of the above comments without adding too much. 

And now, for the first time in probably 4 years, I need to sit back and think about my end-of-the-year survey and how I posed the questions. I asked all students about the four STAMP Sections (reading, listening, writing, speaking) like this: NOW THAT YOU HAVE JUST FINISHED TAKING THE STAMP TEST, WHAT ELSE COULD WE HAVE DONE IN CLASS TO HAVE HELPED YOU PREPARE FOR THAT SECTION? If you really dig deep into the survey, which I shared last year on my resource page here, you would see that I’m always asking about what was good about something, what was bad and didn’t possibly help you about something, and then, what else could we have done to maybe have made it better? I have to remember that when I’m asking them ‘What could we have done more of?’ I’m requiring them to tell me more and come up with hypothetical situations even though looking over the whole survey results, students are most often really pleased with what was happening in class.  

All that being said, the process of writing this post is doing exactly what I set out for this blog to do in 2017 – to be a place where I could reflect (and share resources easily with others), and oh my goodness, it’s working!  

Interactive Presentations: 

For you as a reader, I definitely need to give you more than just these thoughts that are being processed through my mind. One great thing that I started using this year in Spanish 4 was Interactive Presentations. What students have to do is give mini 1-2 minute presentations in Spanish, that are not read, on whatever the topic is for the assignment. Then the student audience members have to make comments and/or ask follow-up questions that the presenter has to answer. The reason I love this activity is it requires all students to pay attention during the presentations by actively listening and responding in a mostly spontaneous way. 

The key for this is providing a rubric with the essential to dos that the active listeners must incorporate during the presentation session. The overall class set-up is a student gives a presentation and then there is time for comments and questions; then another student gives a presentation and there is more time for comments and questions, etc. My role during the session is to quickly grade, making sure not to miss the details; I also have students keep a record of the times they spoke using their own personal rubrics (and I have even had other students keep track for one another). 

I will say that any sort of presentation you have done in the past can work and you don’t have to create anything new except making sure to add the interactive component by creating a rubric that requires active listening and participation from all students.

This year we did three of these in different contexts. One that I am sharing here was based on a topic that I’ve always wanted students to delve into: Patron Saint Festivals/Days (Feast Days) throughout Latin America and Spain. 

Here you can find my student requirements. Of course, it is a four step project that I had students working on (in the tabs on the Doc there is the grading rubric, my explanation for students in Spanish, and also my explanation in English). Remember, I am just showing you an example here. More importantly, I just want to show the active participant rubric below. These were the essential to dos that I required the students who were listening in the class to include during the comment and question sessions after each presentation.

EACH STUDENT AUDIENCE MEMBER MUST INCORPORATE THE FOLLOWING TO DOS DURING THE COMMENT/QUESTIONS SESSIONS DURING THE PRESENTATIONS

Make a Comment about a Hypothetical Situation with regard to another festival/feast day

Describe a similarity or a difference between the festival you researched

Make a personal connection (similarity or difference) to your life

Ask a follow-up question that relates to something you just heard (meaning summarize something they had just said)

In many ways, this is set up in a similar fashion to how I have always run Socratic Circles/Socratic Seminars and/or my Discussion Days. Posts on both of those can be found on these pages: Socratic Circles and Discussion Days. 

Of course we have to have a musical theatre reference with words of advice from Steven Sondheim and James Lapine’s Into the Woods: Careful the Things You Say, Children Will Listen. But in the context of Interactive Presentations, we want the children to listen! A type of assignment like this is a win-win on so many accounts because students had to research, analyze culture based on using the three Ps (products, practices, perspectives), do presentational speaking, interpret what others are saying through listening, practice interpersonal speaking by responding appropriately, make comparisons to their own knowledge and their lives, and make connections on how these cultural practices are affecting a whole community. Wow, all 4 classroom-based Cs of ACTFL’s World-Readiness Standards for Language Learning are there in this one assignment. 

My next post will be about the week-long Alebrije craft activity that I was most excited to write about this summer, and well, it is still the one that is not written. Don’t miss it, subscribe today.