Category: theatre

I’ve yet to see The Greatest Showman but I love the soundtrack so when I found this video today I was delighted.

This is me in Spanish – Así soy. Below the video I’ve posted the lyrics too. It won’t be a song I necessarily teach the children but it’ll make a pleasant background to activities, and it has such uplifting and important lyrics that I’ll happily tell the children what it means. Unlike Despacito…

No soy ajena a la oscuridad

Escondete me dicen

No te queremos como estas

Ya aprendi mis cicatrices pena dan

Escapate me dicen

Porque así nadie te amará

Que me eliminen, no los dejaré

Tenemos un lugar, yo sé

Somos gloriosos

Con palabras duras me quieren herir

Las voy ya inundar y las voy a hundir

Fuerte soy con dolor

Porque soy quien debo ser

Así soy

Paren porque aquí voy

Si marchando voy a mi propio sol

Sin temor veanme no me voy a disculpar

Así soy

Oh oh oh

Oh oh oh

Una ruta más de balas viene a mi

Disparen más, porque ya

Más penas no voy a permitir

Barricadas vamos a destruir

Hasta llegar al sol

Si es lo que solo soy

Que me eliminen, no los dejaré

Tenemos un lugar, yo sé

Somos gloriosos

Con palabras duras me quieren herir

Las voy ya inundar y las voy a hundir

Fuerte soy con dolor

Porque soy quien debo ser

Así soy

Paren porque aquí voy

Si marchando voy a mi propio sol

Sin temor veanme no me voy a disculpar

Así soy

Oh oh oh

Oh oh oh

Así soy

Yo se que me ves con tu amor

En nada equivocada estoy

Con palabras duras me quieren herir

Las voy ya inundar y las voy a hundir

Así es hay dolor

Porque soy quien debo ser

Así soy

Paren porque aquí voy

Si marchando voy a mi propio sol

Sin temor veanme no me voy a disculpar

Así soy

Oh oh oh

Así soy

Oh oh oh

Así es hay dolor porque soy quien debo ser

Así soy

Songwriters: Justin Paul / Benj Pasek

Long time no blog, eh? Life’s been rather hectic over the last week or so – and I really should blog about it!! However, thought I’d flag up this opportunity as it has just arrived in my inbox and looks great!

The Consejería de Educación, in collaboration with the Instituto Cervantes Londres, has arranged a full day of activities for teachers of Spanish in primary schools. Taking place on Friday March 27th at The Instituto Cervantes, the day looks packed like ‘una lata de sardinas’ with fun and examples of good practice, with workshops on things like storytelling, food, CLIL, .. showcases and a performance of a play written and produced for children who are learning Spanish in KS1 and KS2. And all for £25!

It doesn’t matter if your Spanish isn’t brilliant as the email stated –

‘The whole event will be friendly to teachers with a limited competence in Spanish.’

You can download details of the day, the programme and abstracts of the sessions here on the Consejeria site.

Despite living in Birmingham, I’m seriously considering going, as the sessions on storytelling, extending writing, five minute activities and starters for the Spanish classroom all look very interesting – and that’s just from a curspry glance. Added to which, I’d love to see El viaje de Matilde presented by A cuerpo as I blogged about it a while back and, now that we have a new Head at school, now might be the time to plant my suggestion…

Closing date for applications to attend is March 16th so if you fancy it, why not ask your manager if you can attend?

I was really excited to read a blog post on Talkabout Primary MFL entitled Theatre in Spanish for Primary children. Clare Secombe, who (amongst other things) is webmistress of the Sunderland MFL site, reported that there is a group called A Cuerpo based in Leicester who offer performances, workshops and resources in Spanish for children aged 6-11.

As Clare rightly points out, Spanish is often the poor cousin of French when it comes to such things so it’s great to hear the news. And looking at the A Cuerpo site, I’m even more excited! Here are a couple of extracts about the play they are currently touring – El Viaje de Matilde– check it out for yourself though.

A Cuerpo is thrilled to present El viaje de Matilde (Matilde’s Journey). El viaje de Matilde is a newly devised theatre performance in Spanish with an original script for children aged six to eleven, which offers the unique opportunity to learn Spanish whilst having fun.

El viaje de Matilde is an innovative theatre performance that uses an interaction of film with live theatre, as well as puppetry and music

Summary

The main character is a cheeky eight year-old Spanish girl called Matilde (a real size body puppet).

Matilde leads a normal life, she lives in a small town in Spain with her family, goes to school and has friends…but she is not completely happy, as she dreams of travelling to the jungle and having lots of adventures.

Luckily Matilde’s dad is an inventor and he is working on an instant travelling machine…

Well, Matilde can’t help herself and decides to build the machine herself…

As you can imagine things aren’t as easy as they look and Matilde gets into one or two tight spots…

They provide pre and post performance materials as well as the opportunity to ask questions of the actors; they also offer workshops. WOW!

I’m off to contact them now to find out when they can visit, especially as we’re supposed to be having a Language Focus Week next academic year!

The ever innovative and very talented Leigh McClelland from Comberton Village College sent me a message on Facebook last week about a theatrical novelty taking place in the West End very soon.

Peter Pan El Musical: Spanish musical adaptation of JM Barrie‘s famous children’s story comes to the West End’s Garrick theatre from 28 March to 27 April. Peter Pan El Musical, which has enjoyed box office success in Spain, features all the familiar characters from this most English of stories – Wendy, Tinkerbell, Captain Hook and Peter Pan himself – who reveal a previously unknown aptitude for languages by performing the musical entirely in Spanish, with English subtitles. Adapted by Cristina Fargas, the show includes 14 original songs, performed by a cast of 25, led by Spanish musical theatre star Miguel Angel Gamero as Captain Hook and Mr Darling. Interesting? Lx

So I investigated further and discovered a website of excitement with photographs, music and news from the production. I particularly like all the photographs of the production.

The production is in London for a month before returning to complete the tour of Spain with Badajoz, Zaragoza and Valencia. A shame London isn’t nearer to Birmingham for a school trip but I might get there. If you want to find out more, go to the website, or here for tickets.