Objective
Students will be able to identify when and how to use correct punctuation.
Day 1
Introduction - Spanish only
Teacher will begin the lesson by showing students various sentences in Spanish and asking students to identify all symbols that are not letters. Sentences should include, beginning and ending punctuation, commas, quotation marks, and em dash to indicate dialogue. Once students have identified all non-letter symbols have students make a list of each of the symbols they see. Students should divide their paper in half longitudinally to allow for the English connections tomorrow. Ask students if they know the names of any of the symbols. Explain that these symbols are called punctuation marks and they all have a place and purpose. Ask students if they know when and/or why the punctuation marks would be used. The teacher should try and pull as much background knowledge as possible from the students to gauge their Spanish knowledge. Any unknown symbols and their purposes should be explained by the teacher.
Day 2
Lesson Begins in Spanish
Students will look back in their notebooks at yesterday’s list of punctuation marks and review each one and its use.
New Information is Previewed in English
Teacher will now present a different text in English. The text should include, ending punctuation, commas, and quotation marks. Once again students are to find the non-letter symbols and record them in their notebooks. This time, students should record identical punctuation on the right side of their page, lateral with the Spanish equivalent. Students should notice some punctuation marks do not exist in Spanish that are used in English and vice versa. After teacher introduces students to the new vocabulary words have them add it to their notebooks. Their page should look something like the chart below:
Los signos de puntuación en Español
English Punctuation Marks
! signo de exclamación
. punto
? signo de interrogación
, comma
— la raya
¡ signo de exclamación (posición inicio)
¿ signo de interrogación (posición inicio)
! exclamation mark
. period
? question mark
, comma
“ “ quotation marks
Lesson Review and Close in English
Students should review the new English vocabulary words and the correct usage for each punctuation mark. Students can make a venn diagram to compare and contrast the similarities and differences between the two usages of punctuation. The venn diagram would look similar to the example below:
Day 3
Lesson Begins in English
Teacher and students will review the punctuation marks and their correct usage with students by presenting class with various sentences that have the necessary punctuation marks omitted. Students will use their notebooks to help them figure out which symbols are missing. This activity should be done as a whole group to check for student understanding and clarify misconceptions.
New Information is Previewed in Spanish
This sentence activity is then repeated in Spanish for the same purposes. Teacher will explain the usage of Spanish specific punctuation and students will practice writing sentences that include punctuation marks specific to Spanish writing only; including the inverted exclamation and question marks and the em dash.
Lesson Review in Spanish
Class will end with a discussion of all the punctuation marks learned. Teacher will ask students to point out the similarities and differences in the punctuation used in English versus Spanish. Teacher will show students a text with some correct and incorrect punctuation and students will have to figure out which does not belong then explain why.
Day 4
Entire lesson in English only
Students will practice writing sentences to include dialogue since quotation marks are used instead of the em dash. Students should be clear on when and how to use quotation marks correctly. This includes where to place punctuation directly preceding or following a quotation. Students should also practice choosing which punctuation would go at the end of various statements. For the next day ask students to try and find another punctuation mark that has not been taught yet.
Day 5
Evaluation in Both Languages
Students will be given two paragraphs with incorrect and missing punctuation; one in each language. Students will have to identify which punctuation is missing or incorrectly placed. In addition students will be asked to write two paragraphs on a topic of their choice; on in each language. Students must use each languages punctuation marks at least once. Offer extra credit to students who can correctly use an untaught punctuation mark; such as a semicolon or colon.