A demonstration essay I wrote to show pupils how to write an A-Level essay in response to Pushkin’s novella ‘The Queen of Spades’. The essay is 323 words long and demonstrates paragraph structure and point-evidence-explanation. The question comes from the 2020 Pearson Edexcel AS Paper 2 (Written Response to Works and Translation): Объясните отношения между Германном и Графиней в этой повести. In Word format so can be edited as required.

An editable reading worksheet based on an article adapted from El País (August 2020). Topic: the uncertain future of theatre and classical music in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. A vocabulary box is provided to facilitate initial comprehension. Activities consist of a vocabulary search on the topic of uncertainty (very relevant!), and questions that pupils have to answer using their own words - i.e., not chunking answers from the text).

An editable worksheet aimed at Year 13 AQA Spanish, to go with a video produced by El País which features interviews with two very different immigrants. The worksheet consists of a gapfill of the transcript, plus a vocabulary exercise that asks pupils to look for expressions in the text and adapt the verb forms as needed. Complete answers are provided at the end of the document.

A series of listening comprehension exercises to accompany the song ‘Johnny’ by Vaya Con Dios (easily found on YouTube). The activities include: gapfill, vocabulary, verb tenses, connectives and time frames, translation. Would suit mid-to-high ability Yr 13 students.

A sample A2 essay anwering the question: ¿Qué aspecto o aspectos de la película Volver te parecen más interesantes? The close reading exercises that follow focus on paragraph structure, and lead to an independent writing task in which students take a stab at writing a clear, structured paragraph of their own.

Since there aren’t many sample materials for the new Edexcel IGCSE Spanish specification (2017), I’ve created this resource modelled exactly on Question 5 of the Reading and Writing exam - the one where students read a literary extract and answer questions about it in Spanish. The only difference is that this also contains a list of translated words to help students, which is NOT provided in an exam. The literary text is an excerpt from a collection of tales ‘Relatos de mi pueblo’ by the Mexican writer Efraín N. Pacheco García. Answers are included at the end of the document. Word document allows you to tailor it to your class or a different exam body.

A medley of activities to accompany the ballad ¿Qué será? by the Puerto Rican musician José Feliciano. Aim: to consolidate the simple future tense, both regular and irregular. Can be comleted independently, in pairs/small groups, or as a class. Can also be used with A-Level groups to revise the simple future tense and to discuss the problem of people migrating away from small towns and villages to cities.

A conjugation drill in the three past tenses studied at GCSE (preterite, imperfect, perfect), which my students have found useful for resolving confusion!

A quick exercise for the Spanish perfect tense - pupils look at stills from The Simpsons and make a sentence in the perfect tense to answer the question, ¿Qué has hecho?

A young sportsman is being interviewed about his relationship with his parents, friends, girlfriend. The audio recording is accompanied by a transcript or listening gapfill (for differentiation) and a variety of reading comprehension exercises to follow, with lots of useful vocab chunks that can be used for writing and speaking. Topic: Relationships - getting on well or badly with people, ideal partner, etc. Could take whole lesson for lower-ability, or half a lesson for higher-ability.

A lesson to complement the Racismo module of the topic of Multiculturalism in the AQA Spanish A2 curriculum. Students read a short article about the Law of Historical Memory in Spain, with comprehension discussion to follow. Students then watch a video of a speech from a convention of the right-wing party Vox (October 2018). They make guided bullet-point notes - answers are included. Finally, a partial transcript of the speech is offered, and students are invited to discuss. Great for up-to-date, idiomatic vocabulary on the topic, and for real-world knowledge of Spanish politics and society.

Classroom poster (in SP, EN, FR) that reads: ‘Google is our friend. Google Translate is our worst enemy.’

A ready grid to print out and get your students to design their own word search. My favourite way of doing this is clues in source language, answers in target language - easy-peasy and educational!

A five-part quiz for revising Pedro Almodóvar’s film “Volver” (2006) for the AQA A-Level Spanish exam. Tests both knowledge of the film and related vocabulary. Activities: Choose the word that fits Guess which character said… Who’s in the picture? Odd one out (synonyms) Definitions Designed to be sufficiently challenging to stimulate the more able students, though the fun format entertains all levels. Exclusively in Spanish.

A lesson introducing the French partitive article using food. Includes a visual introduction, a student-led grammar exercise with cutouts, and a fun speaking activity in pairs. Aim: to be able to say what you eat and drink for lunch at school. Designed for KS3, but could also be used for rudimentary KS4 revision.

A self-guided explanation and exercises dealing with the following often-confused pairs: si – sí mi – mí tu – tú el – él Students figure out the rules based on a body of examples, then complete gapfill and translation exercises. I have found that this tends to clear up a lot of confusion common about accents in Spanish!

To develop comprehension and fluency, an overview of fillers and interjections: match-up of Spanish and English, then a video making fun of celebrities who use a lot of fillers, then a speaking activity in which students are required to use as many fillers as possible.

For AQA A-Level English Language, an extended PowerPoint explaining: 1. Grice's Cooperative Principle, with Robin Lakoff's Politeness Principle, and the maxims involved. 2. Violating and flouting maxims. 3. Implicatures given rise to by flouting. Also included are a one-page summary handout of all of the above (for students to keep handy) and a worksheet on flouting and implicatures.

English Language A-Level lesson (AQA) to introduce students to the terminology of: embodied knowledge, schematic knowledge, co-text. Offers regular opportunities for pupils to write on the board collectively to contribute and to reflect on what they've learnt.

To complement the Year 13 Spanish ‘Jóvenes de hoy, ciudadanos de mañana’ module: 1-2 lessons’ worth of exploration of the 15-m social protests of 2011 in Spain, focussing on the activism of the young. Featuring: A starter activity asking students to analyze real placards brandished by young protesters. An extended video worksheet, with answers, to go with interviews of two young protesters: transcript with listening gapfill; answer questions in Spanish; find the Spanish for…; find subjunctive in transcript; translate a paragraph of the transcript into English.