Valentine’s Activities for High School Spanish
Love is in the air! Or maybe it’s just pubescent sweat and my coffee breath. Either way, high schoolers deserve some fun, low-stress, Valentine’s day activities too! Here are some fun, friendship-focused, Valentine’s activities for high school Spanish I’ve used with my classes.
“Una en un millón” by Jesse y Joy
This song has SO MUCH going for it!
-The lyrics are slow and clear
-The vocabulary is accessible to even my Spanish 1 students and provides opportunities to talk about cognates (ventilador, crema, sensación, millón)
-My students always enjoy listening to it and request it later in the year
-It’s easy to talk about this as a song about friendship rather than romantic love which helps all students to feel included and enjoy it. For example, my best friend is the cream in my coffee. Life is great (just like coffee) but my friend (and cream in coffee) makes it better.
Activities
I usually do a CLOZE type activity.
Then talk about the lyrics with the class to figure out what the song means. I like to have students draw some of the key phrases.
Finally, I have students create a valentine for a friend following the “Eres _________ a mi __________”. For example, “Eres la leche a mi galleta” or “Eres el buñuelo a mi café”.
They have fun working in their own inside jokes to these cards AND it provides a great opportunity to hone their WordReference.com skills.
“Chocolate” by Jesse y Joy
My students love this song too. Unlike “Una en un millón”, it has a cool video that’s fun to watch. While this song talks about love, I like to have students assign flavor or sensations (feels like, smells like, etc) to other parts of their life like friendships, hobbies, family. For example, “Leer siente como una manta cómoda” or “Fútbol sabe a Gatorade rojo” or “Estar con mis amigos huele a galletas”. Students create a visual with the main line (Leer siente como una manta cómoda) and then do a short writing to explain why they made that comparison.
Activities
-CLOZE
-Chunky Monkey
-Writing
“Tú fuiste quién” by Samo
Looking for a different type of Valentine’s activity for high school Spanish? How about this break-up song?! Yes! A break up song for a Spanish Valentine’s Day activity. Hear me out.
My students LOVE this song. Honestly, it’s a jam. It has amazing use of the preterite tense if you’re working on that and the lyrics are comprehensible for an intermediate-low or higher student. Love songs tend to be the norm so when my students realize what this song is actually about, they are always surprised!
Activities I’ve done with this song:
CLOZE activity
Chunky monkey by Carrie Toth. Chunky Monkey is essentially cutting the lyrics into chunks (stanzas, or smaller depending on the learner’s proficiency level), giving students the papers, having them listen to the song, and put the lyrics in order
Translate from Spanish to English in groups
Extension
This Valentine’s activity for high school needs to be done with a class that can handle the boundaries. I have students write their own version of “Tú fuiste quién” but NOT about a person. They write about habits or things. For example, mine is about coffee making me dehydrated. Another example, Netflix keeping a student up late binge-watching shows and not getting work done. A particularly disappointing series finale (I’m looking at you Sopranos and How I Met Your Mother). Again, this extension is reserved for mature students who won’t take shots (obvious or covert) at other people.
If you’ve got two class periods, I’ve used “Inevitable” by Samo as a follow up. “Inevitable” is all about him finding who he is again. Who doesn’t need that after a break-up?!
Want more Spanish song goodness? Check these out!
