In my search for Web 2.0 tools available for Spanish teachers and students, I found “musica.com.” Musica.com is an educational Spanish Website powered by Google. Since my students are not able to travel to Spanish speaking countries or attend Spanish concerts or events, I decided to implement this tool in my classroom. It provides so much engagement and has helped to increase their motivation and improve their pronunciation. With musica.com my students are not just learning Spanish songs. They are participating in the Spanish forum, downloading their favorite Spanish songs to their MP3’s and cell phones, playing games, creating videos, and much more.
Learning Spanish through music is helping my students to remember vocabulary and expressions faster and easier. With musica.com students are able to write their comments in Spanish and chat with native Spanish members. Another advantage is that students can read the songs’ lyrics while watching and/or listening. Discovering this Web 2.0 is helping me to keep students engaged while learning grammar rules and vocabulary. I have assigned homework where students needed to search for the most popular Spanish song or video, and participate in the “foros de música” (music forums). Recently my students posted a comment in Spanish for their favorite Spanish song. They copied and pasted the link in a Word doc. and e-mailed it to me. I was amazed! Students completed their assignment and expressed their enjoyment.
Why “musica.com?” Music integrates right and left brain learning to help students internalize grammar patterns, remember vocabulary, and develop more native like pronunciation. Also it is known that music is a powerful tool. Friedman (1997), in his article “Drumming to the Rhythms of life,” said that listening to music with rhythmic cues improves motor coordination in stroke patients and in those with Parkinson’s disease, helping them walk up to 50 percent faster. My students have been using this Web 2.0 for two weeks, and I am amazed with the results. At this moment I am using musica.com with my advanced classes, but I am planning to incorporate this tool into my Spanish 1 curriculum next year.
Friedman, D. (1997). Drumming to the rhythms of life. Retrieved from http://www.healthysounds.com/feature9.htm
Maritza, are you doing any kind of documentation as you are implementing these tools? This is fantastic! I am so excited to read this post - both for you and your students. You are connecting your content with them "where they are" and it is AWESOME!
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