NAME:
Señora Linda Gott
SCHOOL:
St. Timothy School
CLASS:
Spanish 2-8
SCHOOL PHONE:
703-378-6932 Ext. 239
Education: B.A. Art History, Mary Washington College; M.A. Spanish, George Mason University;
Certified Catechist, 2007; Virginia Catholic Educators Association Certification, 2008;
ENL Licensure, University of Notre Dame, 2010; Foreign Language Endorsement, 2011.
This is my eighth year teaching Spanish at St. Timothy School, and I have enjoyed every
minute of it!
I also am the Mission Coordinator for the school, and we are all enrolled as
Missionaries with the Holy Childhood Association, a Pontifical Mission
Society.
Our Mission is to spread the Word of God while providing for the spiritual,
academic, social, emotional and physical growth of our students.
In Second Grade, we begin to use a workbook. We learn
greetings, pleasantries, members of the family, numbers, shapes, colors,
parts of the body, weather, animals, parts of the house, plus prayers and
songs. The children begin to write the words that they've
learned well. In our textbook, we begin to discuss nouns and
gender/adjectival agreement, singular and plural. Our Social Studies
curriculum focuses on Mexico. We meet twice per week for 20 minutes/class.
In Third and Fourth grades, we continue in our workbook series, with
expanding our vocabulary to telling time, saying the date, clothing, etc.
Our third grade culture unit focuses on Explorers and maps of the Spanish
speaking world, while fourth grade studies the California Mission Trail.
Fourth grade vocabulary continues to expand. We meet twice per week for 30
minutes/class. From third grade on, the children have Spanish homework.
Fifth grade studies South America in their Social Studies curriculum. I
focus on the Maya and Aztec. We begin conjugating verbs in a formal,
systematic plan. The benefit of formally introducing Spanish grammar is that
it reinforces their English grammar! Vocabulary continues to expand,
including money, higher numbers, etc. through our workbook series. We meet
twice per week for 40 minutes/class.
Sixth grade meets twice per week for 45 minutes/class. By now they are very
comfortable with Spanish verb conjugation and we drill with activities, and
continue to expand our vocabulary through our workbook series and unit
studies. Our culture unit is Spain.
Our workbook series is Let's Learn Spanish, Hayes School Publishing, 2003,
Grades 2-6. After 6th grade, the studies are well prepared to begin a formal
textbook at a Spanish (High School) Level 1. The goal is for the students to
text into Spanish Level 2 when entering high school. Throughout our grades
we begin each class with prayer (in Spanish of course), and in grades 4-6 I
try my hardest to speak in Spanish Only. Their pronunciation is beautiful,
and there does not ever seem to be hesitation or embarrassment about using
their Spanish. Our environment is compassionate and welcoming, and they are
eager to use their language in class.
We have not had unsurmountable challenges with new students coming in to our school with no
Spanish. Since we review each year on old vocabulary, they seem to catch
right up! With all classes we play games, and sing songs to make it fun. I
also use some sign language to give the students a motor-sensory tool to link
to the Spanish words.
Please check grade pages for weekly vocabulary updates, plus quiz, test and
project deadlines.
