El Espantapajaros Embedded Reading and Activities by Zachary Bryant
We received this wonderful email today:
Hola,
I have an embedded reading to post! The original story is online, in the past tense and has quite a bit of vocabulary that is not frequent to lower level learners. The story is designed for my Spanish 2 students to review stem-changers, especially this time of year. However, it could also be used with level 1 towards the end of the year.
I created present tense versions as embedded readings, and a “simpler” past tense version as well.
Here’s how I am using the readings in class:
Day 1 – I am giving the students the vocabulary words on top and doing a little bit of conversation around them. I will then use the Dictogloss strategy (Editor’s note: There are a number of resources available online about this strategy!) and read the story to students 3 times, having them copy it down the best they can. They then work with a partner to make a more accurate version of the story. Afterwards, they do the same in groups of 4. Finally, we will read the story as a class and translate it.
Day 2 – With version 2, students will conjugate the stem-changing verbs in the story. We will discuss a little more new vocabulary. We will read this version as a class, and then watch the video.
Day 3 – Students will get the 3rd version. They will read with partners and answer some questions about the story together, or put pictures from the short in order and say what happens.
I hope that helps!
Zach
P.S. The video can be found on Youtube, and there are other resources online. Just search the title, or the title and .pdf. Here are a few:
Info on the animated short- http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0466879/
a ted-ed to answer questions on the short – http://ed.ted.com/on/S6PCan3I
Here is the reading:
Thank you so much Zach!!!
Embedded Reading 
Wow! This is great! Alas, I just finished three days of doing Espantapájaros, La llorona, and Day of the Dead with my students. We finish up tomorrow and then they get a surprise lesson on Friday. Thinking that Friday was going to be my last day, I got permission from the principal to teach my Japanese in an Hour workshop to all the students as a goodbye present. (It’s the workshop I do at AnimeIowa every year.) But since they want me to stay until the end of the semester, it won´t be a goodbye present after all, just a wrap-up of a holiday week.
Charlotte Meyer Spanish Teacher Japanese tutor TPRS Practitioner