Tumba, by Mira Canion, is the first ever TPRS novel I've used as a FLES teacher. I am reading it with my 5th grade classes. Up till now, we've built stories and I've typed them up and we've read those, but we've never read a published novel. So I decided to try Mira Canion's new novel Tumba, starting in the first week of October as we lead up to the Day of the Dead. The classroom set of Tumba books has been sitting on a table just inside the door to my classroom for a few weeks. Everyone who walks in and out pauses to peruse the colorful cover with its creepy skeleton and marigold-bedecked tomb. But when I announced to my 5th graders that we were actually going to read it, they were stunned. "In Spanish?" they asked in disbelief. "Well, yeah," I responded. "But how will we understand it?" they moaned in despair. "You'll understand it." I assured them. They did not look convinced.
When we cracked the covers last week, it was one of the most exciting classes I've ever had. Mind you, these are students who have been exposed to Spanish twice a week for 30-40 minutes, some of them since Kindergarten, and some even less. Three of them were new students who had had no Spanish at all. As I read the first paragraph aloud to them and they followed along in their books, I could see them one by one glancing up at me in joyful amazement. "I understand this!" they were telling me, either out loud or with their eyes. We translated, we looked for cognates, we continued. They read with a partner and reported back what they had understood. I did a couple of grammar pop-ups. (How can you tell Alex is a boy and not a girl? because he's "nervioso" not "nerviosa" one or two students noted with confidence). "Oh yeah," the others concurred. We've started using journals to recap what's happened in each section we read (in English, for now, but I think we can do it in Spanish before long), list cognates and 'nuevas palabras'. When we broke out the journals this week, one student cried out "Oh yay, we get to draw!" I hadn't even thought of that in connection with this novel, but it would be fun to do that too.
So yeah, I definitely recommend Mira's novice novels. Having worked with her this past summer to translate Agentes secretos from Spanish to French, I have tremendous appreciation for what goes into making a novel comprehensible to the most novice of novices. Mira kept saying, "I want students to be able to read this in their first month of learning French." What might seem boring and repetitive to a native speaker or seasoned upper level teacher is not at all boring to a novice, especially when the content is as compelling and fun as Mira's novels. What I'm seeing in my 5th graders is sheer joy of reading something they are excited about, which is accessible enough for them to forge forward to see what happens next. In the language of my elementary school reading teacher colleagues, they are reading at the "just right level".
My challenge is to keep myself from making it too much of a chore by going all teacherly on them. I need to harness their enthusiasm, while still making sure everyone is understanding and no one is left behind. I need to make opportunities for circling and PQA without losing the momentum of the story. Suggestions and guidance are most welcome. I'm a total newbie at this approach to the 'R' of TPRS, but I am loving it. I'm looking forward to some of the ACTFL sessions on reading, in hopes there will be some FLES-appropriate tips there too. And I can't wait to dive into the many other novice novels I have on my shelves with even younger students. Any recommendations for 3rd or 4th grade?
