¡Con brío!, 4th Edition
By Maria C. Lucas Murillo, Donna Shelton, and Laila M. Dawson
Meant for the beginning Spanish sequence, ¡Con brío! 4e offers students a wealth of tools and meaningful activities in a structured learning environment designed to empower them to master the language and be successful in the course. ¡Con brío! addresses the needs and life circumstances of a broad audience through a highly practical approach and focuses on useful vocabulary, functional grammar of high-frequency usage, and cultural content relevant to everyday interactions. It is designed to help students gain the confidence and skills they need to use Spanish in class, in their communities, and in their everyday lives. Its rich media content – including voice recording assignments, an interactive e-text, cultural videos, animations and other interactive activities – is integrated at the learning objective level and provides students with a clear and engaging path through the material.
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Video and Voice Recording Assignments
These interactive voice recording assignments allow students to get the essential speaking practice they need along with just-in-time feedback through time-stamped comments. Use Wiley’s pre-created, text-specific video and voice recording activities or create your own Question & Answer high stakes video assignments that are ideal for assessing oral proficiency.
¡Videos en acción!
Consists of two short videos featuring native speakers and cultural topics drawn from chapter themes accompanied by Antes de ver el video and Después de ver el video activities that appear in the textbook and interactive Mientras ves el video activities found in WileyPLUS
Cultural Videos:
Students develop listening skills around documentary-style videos that explore cultural topics. Videos, along with high-interest readings and a wealth of authentic materials – photos, ads, cartoons, and other media from Spanish-speaking countries, tie into broad concepts and are used to provide authentic, higher-level input in Spanish, support vocabulary, grammar, or socio-cultural activities, and serve as a springboard to discussion and expansion activities.
Interactive Presentations and Activities:
: Interactive presentations, input-processing and form practice activities give students instant-feedback and prepare them to use new language in communicative activities. These presentations and activities often include embedded audio or video and a link to the text.
Make learning clear and interactive:
The Animated Grammar Tutorials explain grammatical topics in a student-friendly way and include simple practice exercises that reinforce what students just learned.
Pre-created Assignments
Allow instructors to save time by choosing from an extensive bank of assignments they can to add to their course. These assignments often highlight questions with embedded audio or video and links to the text.
Self-Scoring Practice:
Self-scoring practice exercises help students see what they’ve mastered and what they still need to master before completing higher-stakes online homework or assessment assignments.
Adaptive Practice:
Every student has a different starting point, and adaptive practice provides endless opportunities for practice to effectively prepare for class or quizzes and exams. Active retrieval of information with practice questions is proven to improve retention of information better than re-reading or reviewing the material, and students who use adaptive practice to prepare for exams do significantly better than those who do not. Students begin with a quick, chapter-level diagnostic to determine their initial level of understanding, and they can use the dashboard and quick reports to see what topics they know and don’t know.
Reading Content is Fun:
Engaging comic strips introduce all of the Gramática sections are now paired with activities offering students a more engaging and interactive introduction to the grammar they are about to learn.
- Improved presentation of new material, optimizing learners’ ability to integrate new language while engaging and motivating them.
- Updated Teacher Annotations in the Instructors Annotated edition, including additional suggestions and alternatives for the use of WileyPLUS.
- A simplified approach to presenting grammar through three to six Gramática sections per chapter. Explanations are brief, concise and facilitate student comprehension.
- Several new segments in ¡Videos en acción!
- Several ¡Lectura en acción! sections with new readings adapted from newspapers published in Spanish-speaking countries.
- A section of course resources including a map and statistics on all Spanish-speaking countries, phrases for classroom instructions, a listing of country names with the corresponding adjectives of nationalities, the Appendices with the dialogs and activities related to ¡Diálogos en acción!, and Spanish/ English, English/Spanish glossaries.
- Additional revisions to the fourth edition include a variety of interactive activities in the WileyPLUS version of the text, updated ¿Sabes que…? culture notes, PowerPoints, Workbook and Lab Manual, Grammar Handbook, and Testing Program.
- Grammar Handbook
- Lecture Presentation
- Media-Enriched Lecture Presentation
- Image Gallery
- Animated Grammar Tutorials Guidelines
- Syllabi
- Exams
- Final Exams
- Final Exams Script
- Final Exams Answer Key
- Midterm Exams
- Midterm Exams Exam Script
- Midterm Exams Answer Key
- Activities Manual Audio Script
- Activities Manual Answer Key
- Video Scripts
- Chapter Exams
- Chapter Exam Script
- Chapter Exam Answer Key
- Grammar Handbook
- Animated Grammar Tutorials
- English Grammar Checkpoints
- Flashcards
- Verb Conjugator
- Videos
- La pronunciación
What’s New
Instructor Resources
Student Resources
María Concepción Lucas Murillo, Black Hawk College – Moline, Illinois: Born in Spain, María Concepción or “Conchita”, moved to the US in 1981. She attended the University of Iowa, and has been working at Black Hawk College since 1987. At Black Hawk College, Conchita has taught a variety of languages at different levels while also participating as advisor to international students, organizer of international events like the annual Fall Foreign Film Festival; the Hispanic Month; The Foreign Language Awareness Day; and to contribute to Black Hawk College’s International Festival.
Laila Dawson, University of Richmond (Emeritus): Laila Dawson was born in Buenos Aires, lived in Mexico City and has shared her love for travel and service-learning with students by developing and leading programs in Spain, Venezuela, Ecuador, Costa Rica and Honduras. Dawson received her B.A. in Spanish Language and Literature from Wilson College and an M.A. from the University of Wisconsin, Madison. Dawson received the University of Richmond “Distinguished Educator” award in 1992 and was named to the “best professor” list 1998. Dawson has been writing Spanish textbooks for over a quarter of a century.
Donna Shelton, Northeastern State University: Professor Donna Shelton started her studies as an undergraduate student at Baker University in Baldwin City, Kansas. A study-abroad experience in Guadalajara ignited her enduring fascination with the cultural richness of the Spanish-speaking world. She specialized in Latin American literature, but soon realized that her passion was working with students in the early years of language and culture study. She taught Spanish at Phillips University in Enid, Oklahoma, led summer study-abroad programs in Mexico, and mentored students preparing to become teachers. From 2004 to 2017 she taught all levels of Spanish courses at Northeastern State University in Tahlequah, Oklahoma. She served as the program coordinator at NSU where she created the performance assessments and related rubrics for the assessment plans for both Spanish degrees offered by the institution. She retired in May 2017 with the rank of Professor Emerita and is now an active volunteer in her new community in Central New York. She is an enthusiastic new co-author on the fourth edition of ¡Con brío!
Chapter 1. Primeros pasos
Chapter 2. La Universidad y el trabajo
Chapter 3. La familia y los amigos
Chapter 4. El tiempo libre
Chapter 5. La comida
Chapter 6. En casa
Chapter 7. La ciudad
Chapter 8. De compras
Chapter 9. La salud y las emergencias
Chapter 10. El barrio
Chapter 11. En el trabajo
Chapter 12. Nuevos horizontes