If you are teaching AP Spanish Language and Culture, you are probably looking for cultural comparison activities. You know that your students must learn to do an oral cultural comparison for the AP Exam. For many students, this is one of the most challenging aspects of the Exam. To ease nerves and improve scores, here are some ideas for cultural comparison activities that you can do all year, and even start in earlier levels of Spanish classes!
Written Cultural Comparison Activities
My go-to confidence builder is to introduce the idea of the cultural comparison. THIS is the presentation I show my students. But then, instead of asking them to do a timed, recorded comparison, I let them write.
One idea for a written cultural comparison activity is to ask them to read some articles, and then write about what is similar or different between the 2 places.
Another idea is to ask students to do a project about X topic in a Spanish-speaking country. Part of the project would be to compare this cultural aspect to that of the United States (or your home country.) What do they have in common? What is different? HERE is one of the first projects my students do in AP Spanish.
Last, I always have students write a cultural comparison as a formal assessment. We often do a rough draft so I can give feedback, and then students try again. I give them a copy of a rubric that is very similar to the one used for the oral cultural comparison. We use that to make sure students have the things they need, like an introduction, a conclusion and an equal number of data points for each culture.
Oral Cultural Comparison Activities
Another way to work in cultural comparison activities is by offering speaking opportunities. Eventually, students will have to be able to produce a well organized 2 minute oral presentation with 4 minutes to think and prepare. So, how can we build in low pressure practice opportunities first?
One type of oral cultural comparison activity I use frequently is related to reading. At least once per unit, I assign students a topic, and they must find an article from their assigned Spanish-speaking country. On the due date, they are asked to get into small groups (usually 4 students per group) and summarize their article out loud for their group. The other group members take notes on the most important details.
The next part is that each student must plan and then record a comparison of what they learned in their article to one or more of the countries they heard about during the small group summaries. Students get a lot of speaking practice in this activity and it also keeps the listeners engaged since they know ahead of time that they will need the information their classmates present to complete the next activity. You can choose whether or not to grade these!
Another way I practice cultural comparisons is by using prompts that either I make up or find in resources like AP Classroom or in a text that my district has purchased. I let students record each one twice, and then they can tell me which one to listen to. It alleviates a lot of the nerves students have when they know they are allowed to try again if they don’t like their first attempt.
Start Early With Cultural Comparisons
Of course, the best way to prepare AP Spanish students to do well on their AP Exam cultural comparison is to make sure that it’s not a new activity for them. With structure and with some memorized phrases, students in earlier years of Spanish can absolutely make cultural comparisons, and should! Below please see the other blog posts I have about the cultural comparison along with some ready-to-use resources if you need them!
Resources
AP Spanish Cultural Comparison How To Presentation Spanish & English
AP Spanish Unit 1 Project: Las tradiciones
AP Spanish Exam Prep Mega Bundle
Other Posts You May Like
How To Teach AP Spanish Students the Cultural Comparison
