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Growing With Proficiency The Podcast
Welcome to Growing With Proficiency: The Podcast! Are you a World Language teacher who is looking for ideas, strategies, activities, and inspiration to create a World Language class where you and your students enjoy using the language to learn about the world and each other? Do you want to transform your class into an acquisition-driven instruction space where you intentionally provide a ton of comprehensible input?
If you are, you're in the right place.
Let's start this journey together. Head over to IG, and send me a DM @claudiamelliott to let me know what topics you would like me to cover in an upcoming episode.Join my free Facebook community, Growing With C. Also, check out my blog to start discovering some of these ideas and strategies at growingwithproficiency.com
Growing With Proficiency The Podcast
Episode 198. How to Build a Sustainable Language Class with Routines That Support Language Acquisition
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What if the reason your class feels hard to sustain is not because your activities are wrong, but because they are standing alone?
In this episode of Growing With Proficiency The Podcast, I’m talking about routines that support language acquisition—not classroom procedures like entering the room or turning in papers, but pedagogical routines that create the spaces our students need again and again.
We’ll look at how routines can help us provide more comprehensible input, build connection, support communication, create moments for reset and regulation, and give students time to consolidate and reflect.
Because a sustainable world language class is not built on one perfect activity. It is built on intentional routines that help us use the language in ways that are comprehensible, communicative, and connected.
In this episode, you’ll learn:
- Why one great activity is not the same as a sustainable class
- What pedagogical routines are and how they support language acquisition
- How to create repeated spaces for comprehensible input, connection, communication, reset, and reflection
- Why routines need both consistency and flexibility
- How activities like free reading, Calendar Talk, Question of the Day, Star Student Interview, brain breaks, Write and Discuss, free writes, and exit tickets can become part of a sustainable classroom rhythm
- How to start mapping your own weekly routine system without adding more overwhelm
Resources Mentioned
- Free workshop for Spanish teachers: How to Create a Sustainable Spanish Class That Is Comprehensible, Communicative, and Connected
Register here: growingwithproficiency.com/tallergratuito - Join the waitlist for Growing With Proficiency: The Spanish Teacher Academy
growingwithproficiency.com/academy - Cuéntame podcast by Marta Ruiz Yedinak
- Mote Chrome Extension for recording quick listening activities
- Episode with Dr. Bill VanPatten on the two-myths about language acquisition
- Episode with Chelsea Lawrence about Silent Discussion
- Blog post by John Cowart about using data with free writes
The Spanish Teacher Academy supports Spanish teachers in building effective and sustainable classrooms. Inside the Academy, teachers gain clarity about language acquisition, access ready-to-use units and monthly resources, and receive ongoing support—so they can use more Spanish in class without burning out.
👉 Learn more and join the Academy at growingwithproficiency.com
