It is true, learners will not like every song that we bring to the classroom, but that doesn’t imply that they won’t be able to make personal connections with these songs.
It is very easy to connect learners to Shakira, Marc Anthony, Camilo, and Gente de Zona just to name a few examples. And with this, I am not saying that we shouldn’t bring these artists to the classroom.
However, one of the mistakes I made my first years of teaching was only exposing my learners to genres I liked or genres I thought they would like. I honestly didn’t know better.
Yet, Spanish speaking countries offer such a rich variety of styles and genres.
So today, I want to invite you to ask yourself…”Am I intentionally bringing songs that promote positive messages, rich culture, feature different rhythms and instruments, and/or people who may not be the most popular artists of the moment?
If you are already doing that, rock on! It took me a long time to let go of my fears to try genres that might be less liked.
How Can We Not Only Introduce but Also Connect our Learners to New Songs?
My favorite way to do this is by asking learners to listen to the song without the music video.
This is because I want my learners to close their eyes and get a “feel” of the rhythm without paying attention to the lyrics yet.
Then, I invite them to rate the song based on a few questions as seen on the image below.
I point to each of the questions and I may cold call on learners to share their opinions, and all opinions are valid even if they rate the song at a 1-2. I might then call on the class to raise their hand if they agree with that learner’s rating.
I have learners keep this sheet and then we have fun with the song and other activities during the next couple of days.
Once I am ready to wrap up my activities with the song after a few days or a few weeks, we go back to this same initial document and discuss the main message of the song as well as the artist’s most prevalent emotion in the song. Basically, we have a discussion about the main idea and tone.
I also invite my learners to grab a different writing utensil and rate the song again on that same document. They are usually surprised as usually their ratings at the end of our song study end up being much higher. Surprise!!!
I really enjoy to see how my learners’ music styles are so diverse and my favorite moments are when learners tell me they can’t get the song out of their head or that they have added it to their playlist.
If you would like to try this activity to introduce any song at any time of the year, you can grab it a my Tpt store.
If you are more of an auditory learner, I explain a bit more (en español) about this activity in the following video in my YouTube Channel.
Try More Activities with this Freebie
Want to try some more music activities with culturally rich songs? I have a freebie that I want to share with you for the song SOMOS LOS PRIETOS by ChocQuibTown.
Want to Learn More About Successful Integration of Music in Your Spanish Classroom?
If you are looking for more ideas on how to successfully integrate music with your learners, I will be presenting at the World Language Teacher Summit 2022.
This event is 100% FREE!
The title of my session is:
What to Avoid when Teaching Songs in the Target Language & What To Do Instead.
Make sure to check it out for more ideas.
Did You Know I Have a Music Course with
La Maestra Loca?
Yup, you heard it right! La Maestra Loca and I have come together to share many of our best practices with the integration of music into our lessons.
The course contains over six hours of content about the use of music in our Spanish classrooms, templates, music lessons, plus so much more!
Interested? Click on the button or image below!
What Are Teachers Saying?
“I liked the overall presentation of lessons, short and to the point, and it is obvious you thought out how to organize it all. I also appreciate ALL of the resources, this is very important to me. I am going learn and grow on my own based on this course. I loved all of the lesson plans as well.” – Claudia A.
“I love how it is laid out in order. I can learn about it and then there are practical ways to use the information I learned to help me internalize the information. Learning about Google Maps! Using TPR before playing a song, the games, connecting the artists with their culture and making that a lesson are just some that are jumping out at me.” – Mindy P.
What Else Would You Like for Me to Share About Using Music in the Spanish Classroom?
Leave me a message and I will do my best to create a YouTube Video for you!