Would you love to do more reading activities with your Spanish students, but find that they get easily intimidated by a chunk of text in Spanish? Do you have students who shut down and complain, “I can’t read in Spanish!”? How can we help our students overcome the hurdle of feeling confident to read in Spanish? Read on to find out the key to my success in getting my students reading.
Frontloading is the secret! The more context you can give them before they ever see the text will help them to feel that they can dive into reading. My best trick is to use pictures to give them a mental representation of what they’re about to read. That way, they already have an idea of what they’re about to read and don’t get so stuck on every little word.
Check out some examples:
I taught a Service Learning course (My favorite class of all time!) and we discussed real issues impacting the Spanish speaking community at home and abroad. One topic we tackled was access to nutritious food and food deserts. This can be a fairly intense and complex topic, but I wanted my students to read about it. So first, we looked at pictures to figure out what the article was focused on. My students filled out a “See, Think, Wonder” worksheet to really get their brains engaged and curious. We then discussed our impressions and then finally read the article together.
This helped to give them the vocabulary and a mental image of what we were about to read ahead of time. This decreases stress when students see a block of text and helps them more more easily absorb the Spanish that they’re reading.
Short Story Examples Perfect for Novice Students
I absolutely LOVE using short stories with my Spanish 1 & 2 students. It is such a fun way to give them tons of Spanish input that is tailored perfectly to their comprehension level. And how do I make sure that my students are excited to read in Spanish? We work on pre-reading activities which reinforce key Spanish grammar and vocabulary while piquing their curiosity about the story. I love making personal connections. For example, if the story is centered around food, we have multiple discussions about our favorite foods and the ones we don’t like. Students work on a handout with a Venn Diagram comparing their preferences with their classmates. Finally, we put all our “data” on the board for the class preferences. This is a great way to include a little math (yay numbers in Spanish!) and graphs. Check out some of my favorite Spanish short stories below by clicking on the pictures!
10 Quick Activities for Frontloading Reading in Spanish:
1.Anticipation Guide (Guía de anticipación)
Present 4–6 statements (true or false) related to the text’s theme. Students agree/disagree before reading, then revisit after reading.
2. Imagen Misteriosa (Mystery Image)
Show a key image from the text and have students predict what the story or article might be about.
3. Lluvia de Ideas (Brainstorming)
Students brainstorm words or ideas connected to the topic using a word map or concept web.
4. Vocabulario Visual
Pre-teach 5–7 key words with pictures. Have students match words to images or act them out in pairs.
5. Frases Desordenadas (Jumbled Sentences)
Give students mixed-up sentences from the reading. They reorder them and predict the storyline.
6. Palabra Clave (Keyword Prediction)
Provide a list of keywords from the text. Students write a prediction about what the reading might be about.
7. Encuesta Rápida (Quick Survey)
Ask a few opinion or experience-based questions related to the reading theme; students answer and share in pairs or small groups.
8. Charla Relámpago (Lightning Chat)
In pairs, students discuss a guiding question related to the topic for one minute each. Examples: ¿Qué te gusta comer en el desayuno? ¿Qué harías si fueras invisible por un día?
9. Título Creativo
Show the text without the title. Students create their own based on a short excerpt or image.
10. Texto con Huecos (Gapped Text Preview)
Provide a short adapted excerpt from the reading with blanks for key words. Students guess the missing words and then read to confirm.
Ready to boost your students’ confidence in reading in Spanish? Try frontloading with pictures and class discussion. Get them to make predictions so that way they’re less intimidated when presented with the text.
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