Leesburg DLI Students Write Second Book
April 19, 2024 at 7:08 p.m.
LEESBURG – Fourth-grade students in the Dual Language Immersion (DLI) program at Leesburg Elementary celebrated the publication of a book they wrote as a class.
The book, “!A Contar Se Dijo!,” was published Friday through Studentreasures Publishing. People can order copies through the Studentreasures’ website at studentreasures.com, said DLI teacher Clara Borda. The task was for students to write a creative story in Spanish.
The process of writing “!A Contar Se Dijo!” took five months.
Last year, the same group of students published another book called “Mi Animal Favorito Y Su Ecosistema,” which was about the animals they chose and their ecosystems and was also in Spanish.
Borda said last year the book was focused on informative text, and this year the Spanish language standard is focused on creative writing and speaking. The idea was for students to write a creative story using the Spanish they learned in class, using at least 10 new words they learned this year.
Students were able to write whatever they wanted, but within the context of Indiana “because we learned a lot of the history of Indiana, so I wanted them to have the setting of the story in Indiana,” Borda said.
April is Language Month, so that’s why they wanted to publish the book this month.
The thing students learned the most was to conjugate verbs in Spanish in present and past because that was the standard, as well as being creative and use proper sentence structure.
Wallen said students had a lot of sentence stems provided for them. This year, students were doing a lot of it on their own, “which is a huge step up from last year.”
Pictured is “!A Contar Se Dijo!” Photo by Jackie Gorski, Times-UnionBorda said the standard for Leesburg Elementary school was in English, so Borda decided to talk to Wallen and bring what they learned in English class and produce it in English.
“They produce it in Spanish, but it’s based on the English language standard,” Borda said.
Borda said everything was written by students and they have grown in usage of the Spanish language.
Wallen said it’s amazing to see how the students are becoming more parallel in both languages.
Warsaw School Board Vice President Randy Polston said he was so excited for the students in the DLI program and the teachers involved in the program.
“This is going to take you so far and I’m so proud of every one of you. Well done on these books,” he said.
LEESBURG – Fourth-grade students in the Dual Language Immersion (DLI) program at Leesburg Elementary celebrated the publication of a book they wrote as a class.
The book, “!A Contar Se Dijo!,” was published Friday through Studentreasures Publishing. People can order copies through the Studentreasures’ website at studentreasures.com, said DLI teacher Clara Borda. The task was for students to write a creative story in Spanish.
The process of writing “!A Contar Se Dijo!” took five months.
Last year, the same group of students published another book called “Mi Animal Favorito Y Su Ecosistema,” which was about the animals they chose and their ecosystems and was also in Spanish.
Borda said last year the book was focused on informative text, and this year the Spanish language standard is focused on creative writing and speaking. The idea was for students to write a creative story using the Spanish they learned in class, using at least 10 new words they learned this year.
Students were able to write whatever they wanted, but within the context of Indiana “because we learned a lot of the history of Indiana, so I wanted them to have the setting of the story in Indiana,” Borda said.
April is Language Month, so that’s why they wanted to publish the book this month.
The thing students learned the most was to conjugate verbs in Spanish in present and past because that was the standard, as well as being creative and use proper sentence structure.
Wallen said students had a lot of sentence stems provided for them. This year, students were doing a lot of it on their own, “which is a huge step up from last year.”
Pictured is “!A Contar Se Dijo!” Photo by Jackie Gorski, Times-UnionBorda said the standard for Leesburg Elementary school was in English, so Borda decided to talk to Wallen and bring what they learned in English class and produce it in English.
“They produce it in Spanish, but it’s based on the English language standard,” Borda said.
Borda said everything was written by students and they have grown in usage of the Spanish language.
Wallen said it’s amazing to see how the students are becoming more parallel in both languages.
Warsaw School Board Vice President Randy Polston said he was so excited for the students in the DLI program and the teachers involved in the program.
“This is going to take you so far and I’m so proud of every one of you. Well done on these books,” he said.