Help me give my students access to readable contemporary texts in the form of German-language magazines oriented toward learners, as well as a Safco rotating magazine display rack to entice students to check them out!
I teach at a Title I school in central Oklahoma, where kids often have dealt with, and continue to contend with, trauma. Sometimes this trauma is known to us, but more often details remain hidden. These kids fight daily to rise above their circumstances by deeply involving themselves in both academics and extracurricular activities, including athletics, music, and especially leadership programs such as STUCO and JROTC.
My students inspire me to do everything I can to help them rise above.
They get out there and compete in music and athletics and stomp teams. They strive to raise their grades and be more than society tells them they can. It is my part to provide them all the support and help I can so that they can succeed. Will you help me help them?
My Project
Every week we have free reading time built into our classes. Although students can choose from a variety of books in German, many students will find the familiar format of Scholastic magazines more comfortable. Studies show that reading is the fastest way for students to learn new vocabulary in a new language, but only when that reading is done using sources that are both comprehensible (which Scholastic does well with its use of pictures, graphs, and limited vocabulary) and compelling (again, Scholastic tends to write on topics of interest to youth readers). Language guru Stephen Krashen writes that "Language is best taught when it is being used to transmit messages, not when it is explicitly taught for conscious learning." This is the goal with this project: increasing literacy in German, to improve learning outcomes and the internal sense of success in students.
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