The truth is that you should not have to do anything during your winter break unless it truly makes you happy.
I remember the days where I used to not spend any time with my family because I was all in planning during half of the break or when I used to feel guilty for actually taking the time to enjoy being on my break. A crisis with anxiety for almost two years taught me how to finally enjoy my breaks unapologetically because at the end of the day, all lessons and everything will come together.
So, regardless of whether you did plan for your Spanish class during winter break or now, it is my hope that you can read this blog post and find some quality and engaging resources to begin your year with great energy!
Now, to my suggestions:
Score Major SEL Points with Resoluciones de Año Nuevo
In my opinion, starting with goal setting is a powerful move! With the right scaffold, learners will engage in conversation in the target language, the class community will be strengthened, and this will also be a great opportunity to show learners how to do quality goal setting.
The following is a chat mat I created to support my learners in our conversations about Resoluciones de Año Nuevo in our Spanish class.
The following are also some of my favorite resources that I have either created or used during this time of the year and I highly recommend all of these!
Novice Low & Novice Mid Learners
Grab this free amazing lesson put together by Cecile Laine (and translated to Spanish by Rachel Alexander Johnson). In her blog post, Cecile Guides you step-by-step through 2-3 days of teaching!
Novice High & Intermediate Learners
This is the second year I start January Spanish lessons with goal setting and resolutions in a very powerful way. The results have been incredible, for this reason, I have organized all activities and today I am bringing my New Year resolutions for Spanish class unit!
This unit will easily take longer than a week to teach, such a time saver!
Intermediate Mid, AP, & Advanced Students
Last winter break, I also put together a very successful an Año Nuevo Spanish class unit on mental health for my upper levels. I created it with my AP learners in mind!
You can also find it in my Tpt store. It contains more than a week’s worth of activities so you can save major planning time!
Activities for Día de Reyes
Normally, I start with goal setting, but because I have 90-minute classes, I squeeze as much content as I can in a strategic way.
If you would like to talk about Día de Reyes with your Spanish learners, I have some suggestions for quick activities.
However, even if I don’t get to go all in with a Día de Reyes lesson for Spanish class, I might do a quick picture talk about it or a quick story telling segment. I also make it a point to bring a rosca de reyes from the cheapest place where I can find it (usually Walmart) and I make chocolate abuelita for them (whether atole or plain Mexican chocolate). Get my recipe here!
I usually don’t spend more than $60 feeding my 100+ students between the rosca and the chocolate. I am not saying you have to invest any money, this is just what I do, and I just wanted to be transparent and share with you.
If you want to go all in, some of my favorite Día de Reyes activities come from:
- Día de Reyes unit by Claudia Elliott – this is a comprehensible mini-unit ideat for Novice High to Intermediate low learners.
Songs to Welcome the Year
Finally, you can never go wrong with sprinkling music in! These are a few song recommendations for the month of January!
- Vivir mi vida by Mark Anthony – Find tons of free activities on Tpt
- La Promesa by Andrés Cepeda y Fonseca – my friend Claudia Elliott created a beautiful unit for this song!
- Creo en Mí by Natalia Jimenez
- Celebra la vida by Axel
- Calendario de amor by la Onda Vaselina
