CONFERENCES / PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
CALL FOR PRESENTATION PROPOSALS
KEYNOTE SPEAKER
Señor WOOLY
ABOUT OUR SPEAKER
From senorwooly.com:
Jim Wooldridge, a Spanish teacher in Evanston, IL (near Chicago) for nine years, used to struggle to find high-quality educational materials for his middle school students. Most existing materials treated students as though they were in kindergarten, or took the opposite approach and treated them like humorless adults.
While Wooldridge’s students were beginners, they weren’t babies, and didn’t want simplistic, babyish stuff. They were drawn in, like tweens and teens are, to funny, creative, and absurd stories with unexpected twists. So, Wooldridge decided to make those kinds of stories himself.
In 2005, Wooldridge began writing his own music for his students. Although he had not even considered seeking a wider audience, it wasn’t long before other teachers found his first website, JamesWooldridge.com.
He renamed the site Señor Wooly in 2009, when he released the music videos Billy la Bufanda and ¿Puedo ir al baño? Both were hits. Since then, he has created numerous well-known musical stories, such as Guapo, Las Excusas, and Sé Chévere, among many others.
Although he is not currently teaching, Wooldridge keeps close ties with the local Spanish educational community, frequently casting Spanish students and teachers to perform in his productions.
Jim Wooldridge lives in Skokie, IL with his wife and two children.
NATIONAL & REGIONAL CONFERENCES
Dear World Language Teachers,
Thanks in part to four highly recommended Kansas World Language teachers and our partnership with Greenbush University, we will be able to offer summer professional development events at no cost to teachers across the state. This four-part series is practical and theoretical with materials that you can either adopt or use as a springboard for your own lesson plans.
Go to this link to register and look for the World Languages Summer 2020 Professional Development. There are 4 dates on consecutive Thursdays: June 18, June 25, July 2, and July 9. Each session is two hours long from 9:00-11:00 a.m.. You can attend just one or all four, but you must register separately for each date.
Register here: https://continuouslearning.greenbush.org/greenbush-university/
Here is what the registration page looks like and a more detailed description of the progressive series. Once you find the session on their website, click on the green oval with the date and time that is located below the description. Register separately for each of the sessions you are interested in.
