Practice remembering the subject pronouns, learn the verb hablar and some useful phrases that include this word, match languages to countries in Europe and around the world, conduct a question and answer session with friends as themselves and role-playing other people, revise the lesson with excercises and animated slides.
The children can find out what the animals eat, put ears, legs and tails onto shapes (not included) to make horses and sheep, play snap, and sing a memorable song with the opportunity to create actions for it.
I present the shapes and each child should draw the relevant shape next to the word on their sheet. Learners then give each other instructions using some Spanish to build the given shape with the material given (playdough etc.)
Spanglish Fantástico is a set of video lessons. They use a mixture of strong Spanish cognates and English to present the learning. The videos have text and the sound together learners can get a good grasp of pronunciation.
These are lessons that I am teaching in class, and teachers can watch them and copy the lessons easily. There is a strong focus and emphasis on speaking Spanish in these lessons.
My learners access the videos in 2 ways: either they watch the videos before the classes to boost their confidence in class and in preparation for speaking; or they watch the videos after class to review what we have done, and to give themselves time to take it all in at their own pace. (A third way they are using the video books is to catch up with lessons that they are unable to attend).
If you are a teacher and want some ideas for your classes, or if you want to recommend some easy to watch videos to your students, then I would love to share my work with you.
The children sort out the animals in carpet time, taking pollitos to sleep in the nido, and perritos to sleep in the cesta.
The finger book takes a bit of making, but is very popular. The pages need to be stuck on card then holes cut where indicated for your fingers to come through to be the gusanitos that the chicks go hunting. Only for those who do love clarting on!
There are 2 little folding pages - one about owls and one about fish. The language and actions may be repeated with these two sheets. I have put the chants and the instructions in the lesson plan.
Count the hands and say what they do - clap, wave, talk etc.
Read the words that come up and put your hands in if you have that strip. Count how many hands are in.
A bilingual English girl experiences bullying while living in Spain for the summer. A gentle, enjoyable story about two cultures that includes lots of Spanish words for your class to learn. The children’s friendship issues are resolved by talking, working and playing together.
The story is parallel text English Spanish by new author, Natalia Simons and is available from Amazon. https://amzn.to/3pxoIIH Your children will enjoy reading the book and I recommend you buy a copy for your classroom, but you can access this complete lesson before your book arrives. There is a reading of the book available to you on YouTube accompanied by the book artwork and endorsed for use in school by the author. https://youtu.be/drGtlvFntxU
In this beautiful cross-curriculum lesson the first sheet, WORDS AND IDEAS, focuses on 7 high-frequency and strong cognate items of vocabulary, followed by discussion questions on the main themes of the story: having two homes and cultures and the difficulties of being different. The second sheet gives children a chance to play with the word RARA, meaning strange, with a focus on rolling the letter r and creating Spanglish sentences using the word RARA. There are then two vocab tests so you can assess children’s understanding and openess to Spanish as a second language. There is no need to teach this vocab if the children have watched the video of the story.
The third sheet provides flashcards for 18 key vocab items from the story. You can use these however you like to use flashcards. There is a suggestion for a game of bingo. Make sure you are comfortable with the pronunciation by watching the video https://youtu.be/drGtlvFntxU or play using an excerpt of your choice from the video (if you fancy paying very close attention to the Spanish words that are being used!)
The last sheet for students is a vocabulary list of all the Spanish used in the video to present the story. You can challenge the students to re-tell the story using as much of the Spanish vocabulary as possible, or perhaps they can create new stories of their own. It is nice for children to have a choice, after all.
Finally, I have included a Spanglish text for teachers, explaining the use of Spanglish as a teaching method. Having tested this text on non-Spanish speaking colleagues, I am confident that you will be able to access this text, whether or not you are already a Spanish speaker. I hope you and your students enjoy the lesson, and I hope that your school buys a copy of THE SPANGLISH GIRL for your classroom. Thank you for looking!
I have marked chapters in the video to make it easier for you to navigate in class. By hovering the mouse over the bottom of the video you should find bars to indicate where the chapters start and finish: Intro, Story, Outro.
You need 2 dice. Assign frog or ladybird to each child, and pass the dice round the circle to the tune. When the song finishes, the two dice holders throw them and see who gets more 'flies'.
A variety of verbs which can be enacted fit into each consecutive verse of this song. You may add your own verbs. I find sleep and clap work well as the final two verses.
I choose 3 children to hide under a sheet, then get everybody to sing Debajo de la sábana. At the end I choose children to name the people hidden under the sheet. I use a tune from Diez deditos 'Debajo del botón'. The document I have loaded turns into a little guessing display presentation when I have put a flap over the main picture, so the children can guess which character is 'Debajo de la sábana'. Sometimes I write the first letter of the character's name on the flap.
In lockdown 2020 I set out to create an accessible Spanish course for beginners by making one video lesson per day for 100 days. The complete set of 100 videos is now available on YouTube, and to compliment them I made notes outlining what I thought were the key learning points from each day. I include these notes as a PDF for your students.
Most of the people who use my lessons are older, but there are some school age children that I know who subscribe and they have been really successful in learning to speak Spanish. I believe that learning languages doesn’t have to be a formal thing. Learning languages is a natural thing. When you already have a language, the easiest way to learn a language and the most natural way to learn a language is to mix your new language with the one you already have. I create my resources in line with this view, which means I can optimize the amount of Spanish that learners are exposed to without compromising on understanding. This gives learners confidence to engage with Spanish and to speak Spanish. That is what I have found with my learners, and I hope you will find the same with your learners.
Students learn the vocabulary for rooms and spaces in their homes by making a video. Show them an example video with upper and lower differentiated tasks on the accompanying slides for you to print. Let them read the full script. Then set the homework and enjoy hearing them use the vocabulary about their own houses.
Children learn to say we give thanks, who to give thanks to - Mother Earth in this case, and what to give thanks for - fruit in this case. They sing a song and make a greetings card.
There is a youtube video of me teaching this lesson to 3 puppets (!) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iBMPqk4Pybk
A block of 4 lessons based on farm animals.
Children learn to say "I like your cow/ pig/ duck/ dog" through song, and in another song they learn "there is" and that adjectives come after the noun.
They practice rhythm, learn about nouns, gender, and that the word for "the" is different for each gender. They also play a game in which they practice saying "I want" and another game in which they practice numbers 1-6.
By the end of the block lower differentiation learners will be very familiar with the animals, and upper differentiation learners will be familiar with several key pieces of transferable language. Throughout the block children learn and practice items of British Sign Language to accompany the translations from English to Spanish, engaging children in movement, and illustrating meaning and word order.
Spanish e-book to support learners as they begin to speak Spanish. 160 pages of explanations, examples, exercises and resources to help and encourage your students.
Written in Spanglish, the English - Spanish mix that maximises exposure to the target language at the same time as allowing full comprehension (as long as the student is preparado to make a few guesses inteligentes). Cognates are used wherever possible.
The course is written around 5 themes: introductions, countries, occupations, the family and ordering in a cafe. There are also lots of varied activities throughout to practice the basics of pronunciation and using numbers.
This book is designed to be easy to use in the classroom, and for learners to be able to read through and remember outside the classroom. It minimises preparation time. With plenty of pictures throughout, 14 point text and double line spacing, it is accessible to dyslexic students. This book has a friendly, conversational style and makes suggestions about how to study and how to remember new words.
Non-Spanish speakers have read this book, and told me that they were able to read it from cover to cover. One reviewer said, "You don't realise when it is Spanish you are reading, because it all blends in." I hope Spanish teachers and students give this book a try, because I have found it to be successful in engaging my learners and giving them the knowledge and the confidence to speak Spanish.