Gail Burkhardt Seay, OWLA Executive Vice President
Spanish Teacher, Marysville Early College High School

Are you looking for a fun way to build community and add a little whimsy to your classroom? Student family groups might be your answer. I learned about creating family groups at a joint OFLA/CSCTFL conference several years ago, and I was excited to try it. It was a little rough at first, but after many tweaks and new ideas, it is now one of my favorite parts of teaching. These are the strategies and ideas that have worked in my classroom.

The Set Up

I wait until after my first assessment and then make a list of students based on their language abilities. I then create heterogeneous groups of four or five students for each family. I try to mix more outgoing students with my quiet students as well as keep the number of boys and girls in each family close to even. That tends to make students feel more comfortable.

Gestures

Each group then chooses an animal mascot to represent their family. I teach on semester blocks, so I have a different region for each block (ocean, jungle, and desert). Students choose an animal from a list of animals from that region. They then choose a gesture and a sound that they will do as a group when I call out their animal name. Some of them are as simple as a stomp; some are a sound their animal makes; and some are just off the wall. For example, this year I have a family of sloths who wave their arms and say, “¡Pío, pío, pío!” (Spanish for “tweet, tweet, tweet”).

Family Posters

To give students more ownership of the classroom, each family designs their own poster to hang on the wall. I give each student an outline of their animal to color in, and then they can choose what they want to put in the background of their poster. The designs go from realistic (a coral reef for the Octopus family) to ridiculous (a group of parrots on a spaceship or a bunch of toads standing in front of a Waffle House). The posters show off each family’s personality while also helping me to remember who is in each family. The students love showing off their posters to other classes.

The Competition

My colleague, Marc Fencil, took the families to the next level by turning it into a competition. Each family is striving to get five points to earn a prize. My prizes are things I can get in the party favor aisle at Walmart or in bulk on Amazon (think: bouncy balls, finger skateboards, and bubbles). They can earn points through games, brain-break challenges, work completion, and more. We also have a wheel of fortune (using a template from wheelofnames.com) that we spin on Mondays. Students can earn, steal, or lose points depending on their luck and willingness to compete in silly challenges. I also throw in other more spontaneous challenges. For example, we recently had our homecoming dance, and I gave out points to students if they found the rest of their family members who were at the dance and took a picture together. Once a family earns five points, everyone goes back to zero and the competition starts over again.

The Benefits

• My students make new friends: Some of my classes have freshmen through seniors in the same room, and it is such a joy to see students talking and laughing with others that they might not normally interact with.
• I have ready-made groups: Sometimes the worst part of playing a game or doing group work is getting students into groups. Now, I can just quickly say, “Go with your families,” and students know where to go and what their role is. I still let them choose partners and groups for some activities, but by the end of the semester, some are choosing to work with their family groups all the time.
• It’s fun, and it lowers the affective filter: When you have to stand up and squawk or yell, “Pío, pío, pío,” every time your family name is called, suddenly speaking in a different language does not feel so scary.