Inside: Resources to teach the novel Noche de Oro in Spanish class. Authentic resources for Spanish class novel Noche de Oro.
In my original curriculum plan for this year, I was going to start the year in Spanish 3 with the novel Robo en la noche. Since I have a student who read Robo another year in her Spanish class, I decided to switch it up last minute and read Noche de Oro also by Kristy Placido instead. I have never taught the novel previously, but I have the awesome Teachers Guide, which I will be heavily relying on.
Background Spanish Novel Knowledge
I have already had this group for the past two years and they have done many story units, FVR reading, as well as read at least 5 class novels. (Brandon Brown QuP, Esperanza, Felipe Alou, Fiesta Fatal & Bianca Nieves).
Our goal in starting with this easier novel is to keep building confidence and get our Spanish reading groove back. It is also written in past tense, so we are continuing to build on our past tenses, while also working on making predictions for future chapters using the future tense.
Since we are now mostly in intermediate land, I want to tie in more about our world, so with this unit, we are talking about the environment. Most of what we did to prepare for the novel was work with texts on topics surrounding the environment, as well as Costa Rica. This background knowledge will hopefully create for easier reading of the novel.
Before starting the novel Noche de Oro
Before starting to read we completed the following activities:
El Medio Ambiente y Costa Rica Spanish Earth Day Stations in my website store OR
Cultural Stations – Costa Rica & Medio Ambiente from TPT
These stations, posted on Google Classroom, allowed the students a chance to read and hear authentic texts about Costa Rica and the environment. I created them for Robo en la noche, but they worked great for this novel as well. It allowed students a chance to explore real information in Spanish related to the novel. Learn more in this blog post
La Isla de Basura – Reading and Authentic Listening Activity – Martina Bex
We also completed this reading and authentic listening from the always amazing Martina, to give students another perspective on the environment. It is not directly related to the environmental issues presented in the book, but is highly engaging and interesting and allows for comparison and background knowledge. Having a scaffolded authentic listening text, helped to build listening comprehension confidence as well.
Besides the Noche de Oro teacher’s guide, here are more resources to plan for the novel:
- Kara Jacobs – Unidad Didáctica: Desafíos Medioambientales
- Sharon Birch – Pinterest Board – Costa Rica
- Kristy Placido – Pinterest Board – Noche de oro
- Arianne Dowd – Environment Authentic Resources
I planned to share this before we started the novel, but as I am finishing it up, we are in our second week with the novel. I will hopefully share more lesson ideas with the label Noche de Oro as we go. Have you taught the novel? Does anyone have a film that works well with the novel? What other must have additions am I missing? Please let me know!
