This 1st Day of Spanish class was actually one of my first blog posts, originally posted in August of 2014 when this was just a baby blog. Since then I have tons of newer back-to-school blog posts plus back-to-school resources that you might find more applicable. I am going to include the most popular 1st day of Spanish class resources and blog posts here. I hope it helps you to find exactly what you are looking for as you plan for the 1st day of Spanish class.
First day of class introduction activity- Name Game Speedball
My now go-to 1st-day activity with any new group of students. I have used this first day of class introduction activity with all ages of students to learn names & build community.
1st Day of Spanish 2-4 Plans
Updated first-day activities for Spanish 2, 3 & 4 including paper and digital options.
Learn many ways to use a Find Someone Who in this blog post.
Tons of first week of class introduction activities
1st Weeks of School Distance/Hybrid/Digital
Other 1st weeks of school in Spanish Class Blog Posts
Spanish Back to School Resource Library
Let it go: Back to school on maternity leave
Hybrid Spanish Class- 1st week of school
1st Week of Spanish Class Unit 1 & Daily Class Plans (for a new school)
I have the great problem of having way too many ideas about what to do on the first day of school. This multitude of ideas came from the amazing bloggers Martina Bex, Laura Sexton, Ben Slavic, & Sara-Elizabeth Cottrell. After 5 summers as a camp counselor, I also have a plethora of ice breakers, name games, and getting-to-know-you activities in my mental bag of tricks. But, at a school with a total population of around 140 students 9-12, the only students who I need to get to know are the freshman.
This year I have the special privilege of having the freshman in 1st and 2nd period Spanish I. This means that I will have the honor of being in the first class of their high school career. For the sake of learning and growing from the past, here is what I have done over the past two years for the 1st day of Spanish.
1st Day of Spanish Class – 1st Year of Teaching
On my first day of school, my first year of teaching in 2012 I tried to follow a lot of what is mentioned in the Creative Language Class blog. I modified Megan’s Prezi to tell them about me in Spanish since I was the only new teacher in the district that year. At that point, most of them freaked out since their previous teachers did not speak a ton of Spanish.
Then, I had everyone introduce themselves and we did some sort of name game, so I could start learning 100+ new names. I also had them fill out an information sheet so I could learn more about them as people. Then we did the boring first-day syllabus talk. (I wish I had read how to survive your first day teaching before day one).
2nd Year of Teaching
In my second year, the first days of school were a blur. This was due to the fact that without an air conditioner, my room was 90 degrees. I had three noisy fans running, the lights off and I was just trying my best to not pass out while 20 weeks pregnant. I followed a lot of what I did in year one and added Martina’s first-day seating. Instead of an introduction about myself, I talked in Spanish about pictures of my summer in the past tense ending with a picture of the baby’s room and revealing to them I was pregnant.
Since we started school on a Thursday, most of the students (and teachers) treated the first two days more as just the beginning of the year business days. This meant syllabus, checking out books, logging into online textbooks, and learning names and procedures. The kids come to school not expecting to actually “learn anything” until Monday. I was guilty of this myself those first two years since there is always so much business that I want to just get done and checked off my to-do list. I know that this year I want them to leave the class having LEARNED something, but the issue is what!?!
3rd year of Teaching – Spanish I 1st Day of Spanish class
- BEFORE CLASS – Spanish music playing and all desks have these seating cards.
- GREET – Greet all students at the door in Spanish with a smile, handshake, and a seating card. I will ask their name in Spanish, modeling “Me llamo Sra. Wienhold” “¿Cómo te llamas?”
- INTRO MYSELF – Introduce myself using this Prezi in Spanish with a lot of actions, movement, and enthusiasm.
- NAME GAME SPEEDBALL – Play a name game standing in a circle. I will once again model “Me llamo Sra. Wienhold” “¿Cómo te llamas?” and then pass a ball to another student, the first time next to them. Once everyone has been introduced, then in the second round the ball will be tossed to another student across the way until everyone has gotten it, and they will need to remember the order. We will then add in “se llama” to tell the name of who the ball came from and where it is going. This can keep going as long as there is high interest. Some classes want to be timed to play speedball style and beat a score, others tire of it quickly. The key is to end on a high note and keep them wanting more. Read this blog post to learn more & to get a free slideshow for the game.
1st DAY OF SPANISH 1 STATIONS
- Updated this back to school bundle has everything you need for 1st week stations that we usually do not get to until day 2
- The goal of the 1st week’s stations was to learn about students, incorporate choice, fun, culture, new 1:1 laptop on the first day. I decided to base the stations around the number one student obsession in my school at the time, Twitter. (remember this was 2014 🙂 They created a new account just for our class, where at the time I posted class reminders, they followed Spanish artists and tweeted in chats during the year. (Update at a later school they were not into Twitter and we stopped the Spanish accounts).
- During stations I had a chance to informally walk around and chat, getting to know them as people. The stations could include the following:
- Practice introducing themselves
- Follow Spanish speakers on social media (exposing them to culture and language)
- Find and post books from our library to read –(showing their interests)
- Find and post Spanish music (giving them a voice in Música miércoles)
- Read & reflect on the class syllabus (Not just boring me droning on, but they get the information, take it home to their parents to sign, and we will discuss it as a dialogue and question/answer the next day.)
- A later addition, my favorite station – the proficiency puzzle
- (also see 2nd Day of Spanish I)
First Day of Spanish II – IV Introduction ideas
- BEFORE CLASS – Spanish music playing & all desks will have these seating cards.
- GREET – Greet all students at the door in Spanish with a smile, handshake, and a seating card. Since I know all of them and had them last year, instead of asking their name I will ask them about their summer.
- TALK ABOUT SUMMER – In place of the introduction Prezi, I showed a slideshow of pictures of my baby, while talking about what HE did this summer (making it slightly ridiculous and over the top). This will naturally lead to asking them about their summers and everyone sharing and practicing the past tense (III & IV). *UPDATE See this post for all of my newer Mi verano activities including the options of Find Someone Who, differentiated question cards, or a digital option to talk about summer. You could use these for multiple days to introduce or review the preterite.
- STATIONS – Since I had all of the upper-level students, they just did short modified stations and then moved on to other activities.
**If you would like to download all of my back-to-school products together, you can find them in my Spanish Back to School Mega Bundle in my website store or here on TPT.
Plus Bonus Free Virtual PD with me- WLTS Back to School
The Back to School World Language Teacher Summit is online July 17th-21st. I present on the first day about the 1st Weeks of School: Proficiency, Procedures & Positive People. Sign up TODAY for the free encore July 23rd-24th to watch all of the sessions*!
What fun ideas! I especially like the one about having students find some music that they like in Spanish. That could give us some new things to play for Baile Viernes!
Muchas gracias Bethanie! I can not take credit for much as most ideas come from great blogs like yours!
Do your students create a separate twitter just for your class? I know my students would not want to post this stuff on their personal site. Do you have a separate account?
Yes, I had students create a Spanish Twitter account just for class, and I created a school Twitter as well. So far they have had fun following each others Spanish accounts, and creating their bio in Spanish.
Hello Allison. I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE all of you ideas; a huge thanks for sharing! Is there any way I can edit your Prezi with my own personal information for my classes? I have never used Prezi and my 2 year old seems to think she no longer needs naps lol 🙂 Thanks in advance. My email is [email protected]…just in case. I'm not really sure what information you need from me.
Great ideas. I've been teaching for years and still like to find new ideas- I never quite do my first day the exact same way. By the way, I also worked at Camp Adventure! The title of the Prezi should be "Todo sobre mí" or even better, "Todo acerca de mí" to be grammatically correct.
Sabrina,
That is so neat that you did Camp A! Where did you go? I got the Prezi template from the ladies at the Creative Language Classroom.
Allison
Great ideas! Thanks for sharing. I am doing something really similar in my classes. I have a prezi about me, then plickers to check for understanding since my presentation is totally in Spanish. Then we go to stations. I love the use of twitter. However, in my District the use of twitter accounts in class is not allowed. Therefore, I created a Twitter and Instagram board in my classroom. In one of the stations, my students write a goal for the year #sisepuedenespañol, and one goal for their future (10 years) #silopuedesoñarlopuedeslograr. Level 1 can do it in English, but Level 3 and AP do it in Spanish. Other station is called "El mundo perfecto". Then, they can read each other tuits, choose at least 2 and draw an emoji (only positive emojies are allowed).
Great ideas, thanks for sharing! When getting students to share music and videos that they pick themselves, what's your approach to making sure they choose songs/videos that are appropriate? I'd love to hear how you handle that part of it. – Thanks.
thank you for sharing your great ideas! I am excited to implement some of them this semester.
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