Students studying identity or simply interested in recent current events will respond to this short 8 minute film on the topic of wearing the Hijab in school. Lesson includes link to video (there are a lot great free short films on this site) and questions for students to respond to as they view the short film. Writing prompt discusses the topic of mandatory dress codes in schools vs uniforms and provides opportunity to respond to a prompt in a persuasive paragraph. Lesson takes one class period to complete, but could easily be expanded to two. class periods for a discussion/debate after students have seen short and answered preliminary questions. Writing prompt can be completed in class or assigned as homework. This mini lesson is an excellent activity for a level V or Heritage Learner class preparing for the AP test.

This four page reading guide accompanies the short story NOSOTROS NO. (free downloadable black line at http://hispanicexplorer.tripod.com/nosotros_no.htm . Lesson contains a list of useful vocabulary and a practice exercise, pre-reading questions for students to complete and discuss in pairs and small groups, brainstorming questions about the roles senior citizens play in our families and society, comprehension questions that accompany the story and a choice of essay prompts linked to the outcome of the story for students to answer. This lesson works best for a level IV or higher Spanish class or is also suitable for a heritage learner class. Takes at least 2 class periods to complete if you include time for reading in class.

This four page packet reviews usage of verbs like GUSTAR (encantar, importar, fascinar, molestar, fastidiar, interesar) and then applies them to subjunctive clauses. Lesson contains one page of reference notes and charts with examples, 1 page of review simple sentences using verbs like GUSTAR and two pages of practice sentences with GUSTAR verb clauses that prompt for subjunctive. (one page of translations, one page of questions to answer) This lesson works best with a level III class or higher where students have already been practicing the basics of subjunctive usage and conjugation. Practices may be assigned as homework or completed in class together.

This 110 question reading guide accompanies the book The Secret Story of Sonia Rodriguez. Questions are chronologically ordered by chapter and provide many opportunities for Reflections, Connections, and sharing in partner and small groups. Also included is a glossary of terms for the Spanish vocabulary sprinkled throughout the text. This is an excellent book for 9-10th grade readers, with lots of opportunities to discuss discrimination, family, and other challenges young people of color face in our country today. Be ready for some great discussions! The Secret Story of Sonia Rodriguez : Reading Guide by Barbara Davis is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

This project is designed for students at any level of middle or high school Spanish to investigate the life of a famous Hispanic athlete, artist or musician. It could be completed in English at the lower levels or Spanish at level II or above. Students have four options in the presentation of their person, but all of them treat the famous person as if the student were producing project as an autobiography. Project includes overview, list of famous Hispanics for a class to sign up, questions to consider in their work and a grading rubric that applies to any of the students project choices. Project appeals to a wide variety of student interests and will lead to some very entertaining moments in class when they present!

Students use a new and interactive website to create dialogues in the form of mini animated movies. Characters speak Spanish or French in different accents and students can create different scenes, motions and feelings to go with the dialogue they enter. Website is free, easy to use and not difficult to master. Lesson description is in English, so this lesson could be easily applied to Spanish, French or German. Best suited for level I at the end of the year when students have seen interrogatives and regular verbs.

The childhood fairy tale becomes the challenge for students to decide if preterite or imperfect verbs should be used. This works best for 2nd semester Spanish II or Spanish III where students have been working with preterite and imperfect in shorter sentences for some time and are ready to transfer their skills to longer texts. The story is familiar so its a good place to begin as students will have prior knowledge of plot. 73 blanks, answer key with reasons for P or I is included. Practice can be done in class together, in small groups or assigned as homework. Answer key also included.

This 6 station rotation game reviews present tense regular verbs (ar/er/ir) Ser vs Estar, Tener + expressions and IR + a/al/a la. It takes one class period to run as students rotate through 6 challenge stations and conjugate verbs. At the next station students check their work using the answer key and take on the next challenge. Download includes rules of play, student gamesheet and 6 stations of 12 questions each for each category of verbs. Answer key to previous station is posted at the top of each station. Game is easy to follow and makes conjugating verbs and reviewing associated grammar fun. This game is best suited as a year end review for Spanish I students or as a review activity for Spanish II students. Requires at least 2 players, but could work for groups as large as 30.

This A-B partner practice gives students the opportunity to practice conjugation of reflexive verbs, to differentiate between reflexive and non reflexive verbs and to review telling time French. Students first answer questions about their own daily routine, then take turns exchanging information to complete the grid about themselves and other people. Practice takes about 15 minutes to complete in class and works well as a review or warm up before a quiz or after students have been practicing reflexive actions for a few days.

20 slide powerpoint to discuss use of reflexive verbs with students. I break this up into several days of shorter presentations and intersperse practice and partner activities as we look at reflexives in 1 verb sentences, verb pairs, gerunds and positive tú commands. Lots of practice slides in between for guided practice on white boards or just plain paper. Answers given on the following slides so students can check their progress as they experiment with reflexive pronouns. This presentation is best suited to a level II class for introduction or as a quick and comprehensive review to higher levels who need a quick refresher.

This project works best for students who are completing French II or higher and have already had practice with partitive articles and passe compose verbs with AVOIR. Students prepare and demonstrate a recipe giving commands to a classmate to prepare their project step by step live in class. Hilarious project, especially when a student is randomly paired who has never cooked before. This project works best as a final assessment after a unit on food and incorporates their knowledge of past tense verbs, words of quantity, partitives, words of order and food vocabulary. Project takes several days to watch in class, you can see about 5 students per day in a regular class period, more if they are making sandwiches. Students will need time outside of class to write their presentations and you may wish to give them a day in class to proof their work and make corrections before they begin to memorize.

This practice worksheet helps remind students of the basics covered in the GUSTAR powerpoint and is a good homework assignments for follow up after viewing the presentation or after being introduced to GUSTAR and like verbs. Worksheet contains several CIERTO/FALSO statements about verbs, and IOP chart for the pronouns, ten short practice sentences where students choose the correct pronoun and form of GUSTAR and four free response open ended questions where students can apply what they know about GUSTAR to related verbs and prepare some responses for in class conversation the following day. Worksheet is best suited to a Spanish II students who has seen GUSTAR and has a working knowledge of some simple sentence vocabulary.

This little comparison activity works great as a warm up or reinforcement when working with comparisons and numbers. (Plus de, moins de and autant de) Students tally up their candies and then make some comparisons between the colors, then they compare their candies to a classmates. Teacher needs to provide a small cup of M & M's or similar candies to each student. (I use dixie bathroom cups) Students enjoy the activity and when finished, eating the results. Works well for French I or intro students who can count to 20 and know their colors.

This movie is made in Puerto Rico and is like a combination of Mean Girls + Election with a hint of GLEE in the directing style. Emilio decides to run for student council in order to capture the attention of his big time crush. Its a funny film that deals with a lot of issues that students face in any country regarding acceptance, popularity, friendship and integrity. The movie guide is broken into 11 scene episodes that you could show weekly to students like a serial or all at once. Film is in Spanish with subtitles. Movie guide has35 questions, all in English, as this film is best suited for a Spanish I or II class where the audience is middle school or high school underclassmen. Answer key also included. Total film is about 90 minutes, PG rated and available on Amazon or Netflix.

There are 5 separate Vocabulary squares in this lesson. These work great as warm ups at the start of class for Spanish II or higher level students, or you could assign them as homework if you are studying any of these units thematically. Students choose 2 words from the grid and explain the relationship between two words, either how they are connected, are similar or are different. Gets kids thinking about vocabulary words relationship to each other and offers a change from standard Spanish to English vocabulary practice. Animals, clothes, food, house and weather words all combine with adjectives.

This powerpoint is designed as an introduction to Indirect Object Pronouns and works best for level II where students have already had some experience with DOP's or reflexive pronouns and where placement of pronouns in relation to verbs is somewhat familiar. This presentation walks students through idenitification of IO's and replacement with IOP's in 1 verb and two verbs sentences. It also introduces students to clarifiers and how they are used with IOP's in sentences. Takes about 30 minutes to present and practice in class. Works great with white boards if kids like to practice as you present.

With Cuba in the news more and more this article is a great read for Spanish Heritage Speakers or Level V AP students who are proficient at reading newstext. Lesson download includes a copy of the article formatted to word.doc, and a guided reading lesson with useful vocabulary/matching to definitions, 10 predictions for the pre-read to get students ready to watch for details and a grid chart to complete comparing what they read about Cuba to Mexico (or their home country) and the US. There are follow up questions for think/pair/share and a place for students to respond based on what they learned. This lesson takes two class periods to complete if you give time for sharing out at the end, or you can start it and assign the writing prompts as homework. Great information about all the benefits that Cubans get, plus all the restrictions imposed on them by their government. Excellent launch piece if you want to teach students the basics about Cuba today.

This 17 minute broadcast tells the story of some Colombian musicians who were kidnapped and forced to play music at a paramilitary birthday party in the middle of the jungle. 10 queestions in chronological order that follow the podcast and an essay topic for reflection aftewards make up the guide that follows this program. This lesson is best suited for a Heritage Learners Spanish class or a Level VAP where students can follow sustained spoken Spanish for a period of time. You may wish to break the episode down into smaller segments or repeat the broadcast several times for students who do not speak Spanish outside of your class. Lesson takes one class period to complete. Answer key is included.

With Cuba in the news more and more this article is a great read for Spanish Heritage Speakers or Level V AP students who are proficient at reading newstext. Lesson download includes a copy of the article formatted to word.doc, and a guided reading lesson with useful vocabulary/matching to definitions, 10 predictions for the pre-read to get students ready to watch for details and a grid chart to complete comparing what they read about Cuba to Mexico (or their home country) and the US. There are follow up questions for think/pair/share and a place for students to respond based on what they learned. This lesson takes two class periods to complete if you give time for sharing out at the end, or you can start it and assign the writing prompts as homework. Great information about all the benefits that Cubans get, plus all the restrictions imposed on them by their government. Excellent launch piece if you want to teach students the basics about Cuba today.

This lesson is designed for a Heritage Learners, AP Spanish Lit or AP V Spanish class where students will be creating short stories. Lesson contains five famous intros from Latino authors and charts for students to record what they learn about a story from the intro and further wonderings they may have. I like to divide students into groups and assign them each a quote, then share out their results as a large group. This activity is particularly useful if you will be asking students to create a short story and want to encourage them to present information in a way that piques readers curiosity. Lesson takes one full class period to complete, key not included bc student answers will vary.