Students and language learners of each and every age love to have fun with Spanish.  Get them using Spanish the fun way with our new book.

We finally did it!  My parnter Diane and I got our first, hard copy booklet of activities, games, and lessons for Spanish and all language teachers. Each activity is explained and spelled out from materials, time, to clear instructions.  They’re also tied to the ACTFL (American Council of the Teachers of Foreign Language) standards and 5 C’s.

Anybody can use them; not just teachers.  Take a peak and have some fun with literally any area of Spanish: vocabulary, conversation, content areas, grammar, and verbs.

Click here for Middle School Madness: Cooking Up Foreign Language Games.

Enjoy.  You can get a downloadable copy too.

In North America and in some Spanish speaking countries  Father’s Day, el día del padre, is right around the corner on June 21, or el 21 de junio. In Spain and in Mexico, Father’s Day is celebrated on March 19, el diecinueve de marzo, a Roman Cathol saint’s holiday.

Making a Spanish Father’s Day card will show an important man in your life just how much you respect and love him. Here is some Spanish Father’s Day vocabulary to get you started:

• El Día del Padre= father’s day
  
• Feliz Día del Padre= Happy Father’s Day
  
• Te Quiero= I Love You
  
• Te respeto= I respect you
  
• Eres el mejor padre del mundo= You’re the best father in the world

Don’t be shy.  ¡Qué no seas tímido! Tell him how much you adore him.

Summer is here, or ya llegó el verano! Nothing is better for teaching Spanish vocabulary than getting out doing, seeing, and touching the vocabulary itself.  So, go to a park after you review and practice the following Spanish words.  Older or more advanced students can describe the pictures in Spanish or use them to narrate or write sentences, paragraphs, and even stories in Spanish.

Spanish Summer Fun Vocabulary

• the park= el parque
• the swings= los columpios
• the jungle gym= la trepadora
• the sand = la arena

Use the bright picture flash cards to teach or practice more summer Spanish below.

summer fun picture flashcards

El Verano

Practice those Spanish prepositions, location words, with the pool!  Use basic Spanish prepositions and a picture of a swimming pool to play a great game full of repetition, but fun.

Goal: Learn Spanish prepositions well enough to recall and say or write them.

Materials: 1.  a list of basic Spanish prepositions.  See previous post on this site.  2.  index cards: one Spanish preposition per card.  Enough cards for entire group of students necessary; repeats are fine. 3.  a picture of a bright blue swimming pool on an 81/2″” by 11” piece of paper (Use plenty of Spanish to describe this.)  4.  Spanish prepositions song.  See previous post

How-Tos

1. Practice saying, chanting, & singing the Spanish prepositions to the chant and song
2. Pass out 1 Spanish preposition card to each student
3. Place the swimming pool picture, la piscina, in the middle of the circle of players, en el centro.
4. Teacher counts- uno, dos, tres.  Then all players reveal their card.  The teacher chooses the first player to say the Spanish preposition on the card, demonstrate it with la piscina, or even say a Spanish sentence with the preposition & the pool.  This player chooses the next player, and so on.
5. Players all switch cards.

Once you have a class set of cards, the possibilities for card games are endless.  Use your own ideas, experience, and creativity to come up with even more.  Charades are fun and all sorts of races are exciting too.

It’s time to go to the pool and jump in, or va a dentro.  The pool, or la piscina, is the best place to teach, practice, or review Spanish prepositions.  Those pesky little words, prepositions, that show location can be hard to remember.  In English there are about 50, such as at, around, about, behind, beyond, in, out.

Spanish Preposition Chant

Chants are the best way to remember short words.  Check out the chant below

en, debajo, dentro, fuera

delante, detrás, arriba, abajo

al lado, derecha, izquierda,

!las preposiciones!

*English translation

on, below, inside, out

in front of, behind, up, & down

besid, righ, left

the prepositions!

Spanish Pool Vocabulary

• The pool= la piscina (la pees-eeh-nah) /la alberca
• The bathing suit= el traje de baño (el traheh de banyo)
• The towel= la toalla (la toaya)
• The water- el agua (el awah)

Spanish Phrases

1.  Está . . . .  la piscina. He/she/it is  . . . the pool.

2.  Va  en la piscina. He/she/it goes in the pool.

3.  Nada en la piscina. He/she/it swims in the pool.

Use #1 to practice those preposiciones: Está al lado de la piscina.  Está delante de la piscina.  Está debajo del agua.

What could be more of a blast than musical chairs, sillas musicales, and Spanish conversational questions?  Students of all ages love this active, slightly raucous game, and it calls on so much: comprehesnion of the question, saying the correct answer, and then repetition is provided by each round.  Questions can range from the very simple to advanced, abstract questions.  Sillas musicales has versatility all over it.

Materials

• Chairs: number of total students minus 1
• Conversational or other questions written on one side of an index card. NO ANSWERS. (or for a Jeopardy twist: answers and no questions)
• Music.  Spanish lyrics preferred.

Context

You can provide questions from a real life situation, or from a story, a non-fiction reading, or an Action series. BE SURE TO PRESENT THE CONTEXT MATERIAL FIRST.

Procedure

1. Review the context that you used, and then overtly present and teach the questions to the students.  Have students practice them in pairs and even do a round of full class practice.  All of this before sillas musicales.
2. Set up Chairs in a cirle with the seat facing outward.
3. Place an index card with a Spanish question on the seat.
4. Have students stand outside of the chair cirle
5. Play some music and arbitrarly stop it.
6. The student who doesn’t get a seat is out.
7. Each student must read the Spanish question out loud, and then answer it with general correctness in Spanish.
8. If a student is far off of the answer mark, then he or she is out too.
9. Take out a chair and a question.  Saca una silla y la pregunta.
10. Keep playing until you have one person left, the winner!
    

Fruit, or la fruta, is so much fun!  The colors, tastes, & textures make la fruta a hit for Spanish learners.  You can cover so much descriptive ground: colors, shapes, sizes, preferences, comparisons, verbs, & prepositions  in Spanish.  Be sure to use it: the real thing, or plastic fruit which adds its own funny feel.

La Fruta Song

ME GUSTA FRUTA
**to the tune of the song  “I Want Candy”

Me gusta fruta
1, 2, 3, ¡Che!
Me gusta fruta
4, 5, 6, ¡Che!

Manzana, naranja, fresas y pera
Che, che che
Banana, sandía, uvas, limón
Che, che che

Me gusta fruta
1, 2, 3, Che
Me gusta fruta
4, 5, 6,  (shout your favorite fruit.  Grita tu fruta favorita)

English Translation
I like fruit
1, 2, 3, Che!
I like fruit
4, 5, 6, Che!

Apple, orange, strawberries, pear
Che, che, che, che
Banana, watermelon, grapes, lemon
Che, che, che, che

I like fruit
1, 2, 3, Che
I like fruit
4, 5, 6,  (shout your favorite fruit)

La Fruta Lesson

Language Outcome Goals: For older students or those who have had some Spanish all of the above are realistic.  For the younger and the beginning set, start with Spanish colors, and/or shapes and sizes.  Always use an everyday conversation question: ¿Te gusta la fruta? (Do you like the fruit?),  ¿Comes la fruta mucho? (Do you eat the fruit much?)

Materials

• Fruit, or plastic fruit.  Picture flashcards with the fruit and the Spanish vocabulary
• Context: You’ve got to create or provide the surrounding Spanish language that brings the fruit vocabulary to life.  A brief story including the target vocabulary with lots of pictures and gestures, a puppet dialogue including the same, and Action or Guoin series, a recipe for fruit salad or fruit smoothies, a beginner’s reading on fruit in Latin America, etc.
• Song or chant with fruit:  Chants for older students.  They still love them.  Songs are always great.
• Activities! Ask students to choose, point to, touch, and put, escoge, señala, toca, pon. Endless possibilities¡
• Language task for learners: A conversational question and answer based on the fruit that all learners use and practice a lot.

Mayo brings us weather beautiful enough for a picnic, and a Spanish-speaking, Mexican style picnic at that.  The family picnic is a cultural institution in Mexico, and weekend family picnics are often multi-generational with abuelos (grandparents), tíos (aunts & uncles) and bebés.  Picnic y la familia go together like tacos and salsa.  Try a Mexican style picnic with some Spanish sprinkled in with friends, family, or students.

Teaching Tip & Spanish Material:  Introduce each item from the Mexican picnic with its Spanish name such as la naranja for orange.  Then ask learners to identify it by pointing or touching it.  Vocabulary is taught best with the real item, or a picture of it.  The visual and tactile support of a real orange, for examples, lends so much to the learners.  A delightful, simple bilingual book for foods is Mi Comida.

So here is some familia review:

Spanish Family Members: Pairs

• abuelos = grandparents
• papás= parents
• hijos= children
• nietos= grandchildren
• tíos= aunts & uncles
• primos= cousins

Conversation Fun

¿Quíenes van al picnic? Who is going to the picnic?

Mis abuelos, mis papás, mis tíos y mis primos van al picnic.

¿Qué traes para el picnic? What are you bringing for the picnic

Yo traigo . . . . I m bringing.

La familia is the next theme to explore right after Mother’s Day, el Día de la Madre. Everyone talks about their family, so learning Spanish family members is a must, as well as a couple of everyday questions and answers.

La Familia Vocabulary

• la madre= the mother
• el padre= the father
• el hermano= the brother
• la hermana= the sister
• el abuelo= the grandfather
• la abuela= the grandmother
• el tío= the uncle
• la tía= the aunt
• los tíos= the aunts & uncles

Spanish Q & A

• ¿Cuántas personas hay en tu familia? En mi familia hay . . . personas.

How many people are in your family?  There are . . . people in my family.

• ¿Con quién vives? Yo vivo con mi madre, mi padre, mi hermana y . . . .

Who do you live with?  I live with my mother, my father, my sister, and . . .

La Familia Song
¿Cuantas personas hay?
**To the tune of Row Row Your Boat

¿Cuántas personas hay en tu familia?
Madre, padre y los hijos
¡5!
¿Cuántas personas hay en tu familia?
Abuela, abuelo, y los tíos
¡8!

English Translation
How many people are in your family?
Mother, father, and the children
5!

How many people are in your family?
Grandmother, grandfather, and aunts & uncles
8!

Click here for a lesson for young learners

It’s almost here, a day to honor the person who gave life to you, or for YOU to be honored. El Día de la Madre is such a great time to practice using the language of love, gratitude, and honor, el amor, las gracias, y el honor.

Spanish Vocabulary Groups

You can also review and practice FAMILY, DAYS & DATES, SEASONS, & WEATHER, días y fechas, las estaciones, y el tiempo, and family activities. The more vocabulary groups are reviewed and recycled in different activities and lessons, the better learners retain, recall, and use Spanish.

Es el Día de la Madre, domingo el 10 de mayo de 2009.  Es la primavera y hace buen tiempo.  Hace sol. Vamos a cenar en la casa de mis abuelos.

It’s Mother’s Day, Sunday, May 10, 2009.  It’s spring and the weather is nice.  It’s sunny.  We’re going to have dinner at my grandparents’ house.

Conversational Questions & Answers

The basic description above is perfect for using Spanish questions & answers–the most important conversational skill.

1. ¿Cuándo es el Día de la Madre?
2. ¿Qué estación es?
3. Qué tiempo hace?
4. Qué van a hacer?

The Answer come directly out of the description. Take a few minutes to wish that special mam in your life a wonderful day tomorrow– qué tengas buen Día de la Madre.