The Secret to Teaching Culture Using Spanish Readings

Do your high school students need more Spanish input, more exposure to reading, culture and interpersonal writing? Do they need more information on Hispanic culture, especially during Hispanic Heritage Month? Wouldn’t it be incredible if they could practice all those language skills at once without it being overwhelming for your students? Let me walk you through how to create a simple interpersonal reading passage that will get your students hooked on culture from Spanish speaking countries and get them reading ASAP this school year! This blog post will get your Spanish classroom diving into the target language

What to include:

Teaching culture can sometimes feel overwhelming, so let’s talk about how to make it manageable and full of comprehensible input for your students! First, create a short cultural reading passage using the interpersonal style. Need some ideas for format? Check out this post . Make sure to include some pictures to help with their comprehension and is a great way to include some cultural knowledge about the Spanish-speaking world. (A picture is worth a thousand words, right?) BUT before they jump into the reading, give them some background about the text and the cultural connections. You can even use the pictures to springboard this discussion about Spanish-speaking countries.

Make it cultural:

Instead of just reading a passage on the theme you’re covering, make it cross cultural! Introduce your students to products and practices from Spanish speaking countries. For example, if you’re teaching about food,a great option is to introduce them to churros from Spain or asado from Argentina. This is a simple way to include culture and move our students to being global citizens. In the lower levels, keep it simple! An easy example is to compare weather in the northern and southern hemispheres. Your students will love these cultural activities because they’re teaching them about the real world

Follow up activity – Get them writing!

Now let’s really get the cross cultural connections going in your Spanish classes! Your students will write back explaining what their culture and traditions are like and can even reference current events. They can compare and contrast practices and products with a ton of interesting facts. For example, they might say that we also like to grill in the United States, but instead of choripan we typically grill hamburgers. This is a perfect way for novice learners to make connections and note cultural differences while building their Spanish skills. If this is a new activity for your students and you’re worried they might need soe extra support, put them in small groups and let them discuss and create a graphic organizer before they write their response.

These interpersonal cultural reading activities are the fun way to get your students reading in Spanish and making cross cultural comparisons! It’s like getting 2 skills for 1 activity. And, they’re pretty low prep cultural lessons for Spanish teachers since you can make them as long or as short as you need to! Ready to try a zero prep version? Click here to check out all the reading activities I created for my Spanish class.