Ideas and Resources for Spanish Teachers
Are you teaching Spanish 4 or Pre-AP Spanish? Are you wondering what students need to be ready for a college level class? How do we prepare pre-AP students for AP Spanish? After teaching AP Spanish since 2014, here are the needs I see students come in with.
As the holiday season approaches, it can be a lot of fun to teach our Spanish students about the Christmas traditions of the Spanish-speaking world. It’s a great opportunity for some cultural comparisons! The AP Spanish Exam has a section where students make an oral cultural comparison, but why should we wait until their last year? Even if you live in an area where Christmas is not a big thing in your community, it IS a big thing in every Spanish-speaking country. Here are some fun facts to share with your students!
Now that school is fully underway, it’s assessment season! Benchmarks, Interim, Summative, Quizzes and other types of assessments are practically a daily experience for our students. Test-taking anxiety is real for many students, so here are some test-taking anxiety busters for Spanish class!
The Future Tense is one that my students enjoy the most! We teach this tense after present and past. They’re tired of talking about what already happened and are naturally looking towards the future! They love to talk about what life will be like for them in 5, 10 and 20 years. Here are some future tense activity ideas for Spanish class!
ave you ever visited an Escape Room with a group of friends? It’s a form of entertainment for adults and for younger people! They are so much fun, and that’s why I highly recommend using Escape Rooms for Spanish class!! There is usually an overarching mystery or problem to solve, and you must work through the different clues or puzzles to solve it! In a physical space, you might need to unlock all the locks in a certain amount of time. In our classrooms, we can use technology to make it all digital!
Can your students earn the Seal of Biliteracy? If you’re curious, this is an award given to graduating high school students who are proficient in at least one language other than English. Read more to learn how to institute it in your school!
Looking for ideas for Fall Spanish activities for you high school students? Sometimes we can get bogged down in the required curriculum, and we lose the opportunity to increase proficiency overall when we don’t take advantage of other ways to engage our students! By using the 4 seasons, we can offer a variety of cultural and linguistic opportunities that feel FUN for our students!
Getting students to feel more comfortable speaking Spanish in class is hard. Using leveled questions to improve student participation and being able to scaffold and differentiate the questions can increase student confidence!
Anyone out there consider themselves a “culo inquieto”? Am I allowed to say that on a blog?? 😉 We all have students who need activities that require movement in Spanish class. And we have lots more who like the chance to get out of their seats. I always try to remember these students when I find myself sitting for a meeting that lasts several hours. Our students are asked to sit all day long. So here are some ideas to get students up and out of their seats!
Does your curriculum require that students memorize vocabulary? Vocabulary study checks in Spanish are a great way to keep your students on track!
I realize that many districts are moving away from vocab lists, prescribed themes and grammar and the like. But I also really do believe that students need to have high frequency words in a place where they can easily access them when needed. Vocabulary study checks are a quick and easy way to make sure students are memorizing key vocabulary.