
**Update You can now download all of these plans as a Spanish high frequency verb unit. Or the same unit, but in French.
Some of my most popular posts of all time revolve around what to do during the first week of Spanish class (1st Week of Spanish Class – Daily Plans, Unit 1 & 1st Day of Spanish Class). As you may know this year I will not actually be at school the first day, since it is my due date for baby boy #2! Since it is a topic that so many of you are interested in, I will share what I would be doing if I was there the first week this year, with more of a comprehensible input focus.
If you are starting at a new school, or will have all students who are new to you, I would recommend following this week long Unit 1 that focuses on proficiency, procedures and positive people. One of the main activities is the Proficiency Puzzle, which helps students who are new to the concept of language proficiency learn to distinguish proficiency levels, and help to figure out what will be expected of them during the year (per your Syllabus). You can see my Daily Plans post for exactly what I did each day last year. You can download everything you need in this Back to School Bundle.
1st Week of Spanish Class – This year
This year I am in the unique #deptof1 situation that I already know and have had every student, with the exception of anyone new to the district. I even already know Spanish 1, since I had every 7th and 8th grader last year in Exploratory Spanish. This means in Spanish 1 we can skip a lot of the typical first week introductions (like my introduction Prezi), and get right into the focus, the Super 7 verbs (from Terry Waltz – es, tiene, le gusta, hay, está, va, quiere). Below would be the tentative plan for Spanish 1. Hopefully I will share plans for upper levels in another post.
Day 1 – Spanish 1 (from Spanish Super 7 unit or French Super 7 Unit)
BEFORE CLASS – A Spanish Pandora Station will be playing, all desks will have these seating cards & students can take pictures with the Instagram Photo Booth
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 Señora Wienhold” “¿Cómo te llamas?”
INTRO MYSELF – Make sure that all students know who I am, flipping through a few pictures of my summer in a slideshow to talk about what I did prompting discussion.
NAME GAME SPEEDBALL- This is a fun way to review how to introduce yourself and essential to class bonding if there are any new students.
PERSONA ESPECIAL – Normally them we would go into Ben Slavic’s circling with balls using nameplates talking about everyone. Since I know everyone’s names, we will not be making nameplates and instead will go right into special person interviews from Bryce Hedstrom. I will ask for a outgoing volunteer to sit on the special stool, and as a class we will ask them questions using this list. Depending on time, we may go through a couple people and then do a quick free write at the end to write down everything they remember about their classmates for future use. Each day of the week there will be one target structure of the super 7 that will be introduced and focused on.
Day 1 – Focus Word of Super 7 – es
- ¿De dónde eres? – Soy de… Es de…
- ¿Eres (cognate adjectives – ex. atletico) – Soy… Es…
PASS OUT MINI SUPPLY LIST – As students leave they will receive a mini supply list, so they know what to get for class. (Chromebook, Binder, loose leaf paper, 8 tab dividers & writing utensil)
Day 2
Day 2 – Focus Word of Super 7 – tiene
- ¿Cuántos años tienes? – Tengo ___ años. Tiene ___ años.
- ¿Tienes hermanos/animales? – Tengo… Tiene
START STATIONS – For all of those necessary first week logistics, I like to do quick stations that students move through at their own pace. These involve completing the following tasks:
- Instagram Photo Booth – Take and post pictures in the using out class hashtag.
- Parent Newsletter/video permission form – Students pick up & take home to get signed.
- Schoology – Students sign up using the class code.
- Info Form – Once on Schoology, they fill out the posted Google Form that helps me get to know them, their interests, and their language abilities
- Spanish Twitter – Students create Twitter account that will be used for class & follow our class account.
- Syllabus – Students look through the posted syllabus and post questions or comments on Schoology.
- Proficiency Puzzle – Students work with a partner to distinguish proficiency levels. We will discuss these later once everyone is done.
Day 3
- ¿Qué te gusta hacer? – Me gusta ___. Le gusta___
FINISH STATIONS
Day 4
- ¿Cuántas personas hay en tu familia? – En mi familia hay ___personas. Hay ___ personas en la familia de ___.
- Syllabus – Discuss questions or clarifications.
- Proficiency Puzzle – Go over proficiency levels, class expectations and have students make their own proficiency goal. Students write this goal down and share with the teacher.
Day 5
STORY – The class will create a story using the four target structures of the super 7 so far (es, tiene, le gusta, hay) and using two volunteer actors. The goal is our story will use some of the real information we learned about the class during the special person interviews. Below is just a basic example that uses the target structures. You can find the story in this unit.
The next week would continue with adding in the rest of the super 7 – está, va, quiere.


Resources & posts for back to school
Love this!
amazing!! looking ahead to next year and I am so thankful for your suggestions/bundle!!
How long are your typical class periods from this plan?
My typical classes are about 45 minutes. Our first couple days of school are always early outs and only 35 minutes
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Good ideas. Just one thing. When teaching le gusta with a name, make sure to use the personal A. A Sara le gusta … I thought at first it was a typo but then I saw it repeated over and over. We're not perfect of course, but just thought I'd help out. Not trolling you. We are educators after all.
Thank you for all of your wonderful resources. They are great! I have a question about La Persona Especial. How do you ask questions about age and birthday, when beginning students don't yet know numbers or months? Are they responding to your questions? Thank you
in my slideshow they are projected for students to reference
Do you just pick up where you left off with your questions or do you each time you interview ask the kids the previous questions in the presentation?
i usually start at the top each time!
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