Passport to the Holidays

“Who knows where we are traveling today?” asks Dual Language teacher Victoria DeJesus, “Get your boarding tickets out and punched and get ready to fly to Puerto Rico! Estamos en Puerto Rico!”

Boarding tickets are punched and the class is off…by way of a video of an actual plane taking off, flying through the clouds, and landing in the tropical climes of beautiful Puerto Rico.

“Look at the water. Mira la aqua. Look at the houses. Mira las casas,” says DeJesus as the plane starts to descend.

Puerto Rico is near and dear to DeJesus’ heart as this is where she is from, so when she describes the beaches, mountains, and maracas, she knows the place. As she describes her home, she repeats the words in Spanish: playas, montañas, maracas.

“That’s why you are a good Spanish teacher,” said Sebastian Yllanes.

The Dual Languages Kindergarten has already been issued passports–they have traveled to Guatemala and Mexico in the Spanish Zone and the United States, Israel, and Sweden in the English Zone. The idea is to both expose students to the different holiday traditions in different countries but to introduce them to Spanish and English vocabulary.

There are many layers of the trip to Puerto Rico all of which are spoken in Spanish and English: the boarding tickets, the plane flight, vocabulary, traditions, coloring flags and flowers and maracas, reading and writing.

In a Cultures/Culturas booklet that each student has been issued, kindergartners write: Miro la maraca–DeJesus emphasizes the sounds in the word ma-ra-ca–and then draw their very own instrument. Next week the two Dual Language classes will march around the school with maracas to show off their skills.

By the end of the class, students have learned about the Puerto Rican flag, beaches, illuminated kayaking, dancing, parades, gift exchange, family traditions and foods.

Where will they go next? ¿A dónde irán después?