Finding the Story with Jim Wooldridge aka Senor Wooly

Full disclosure: after last year's presentation in Dallas, I have a bit of a happily-married-woman crush on Senor Wooly.  So I decided to take a break from cramming information into my brain to geek out for a while and watch Senor Wooly talk.

Here are two things I grabbed from my second time seeing this presentation:

1. Use Subtext cards to give students a "secret" before any dialogue or acting.  For example: you have just found out that your partner has a third head, or You have decided that today is the day you are going to tell your partner that you love him/her.  This adds interest to an otherwise boring dialogue (what time is it?  What is the weather like?  Do you like cookies?  etc.)
2. Set up a police investigation where you grill two "partners" in crime who supposedly robbed a bank.  So you are asking questions like "Where were you at 2:00??"  "What is your friend's name?"  "What were you doing?" etc.

Anyway, that's just two things I took away from the session.  If I were a Spanish teacher, I'm sure I would have much more to add, but I just love Senor's story (and, as I said before, he's not too shabby to look at!)