I used to have a very grammar-based curriculum I had to teach. I had to teach students when to use ‘personal a’ in stand-alone sentences with no context. They had to learn the rules for how to know which nouns are masculine or feminine, and memorize common exceptions. I didn't love the way I had to teach, but I found ways to make the information fun and digestible for students! When I had a lesson or topic coming up that bored even me (and I’m the teacher!) , then I had a couple of activities in my back pocket that make any lesson more engaging. Including the "write this down and memorize it because it’s on the test" lesson. 😣 Make any lesson more engaging with coloring activities I know, I know. You’re thinking – coloring activities?! In HIGH SCHOOL?! Oh, yes. Coloring. In high school! Coloring automatically makes anything more engaging, and it’s also calming – even to the craziest of students or classes. Once I taught my students the colors in Spanish, I could includ......

I was in the classroom for 7 years and I had to pack up my entire classroom and move everything out at the end of every year. I got to be a freaking PRO at packing up my classroom and (entirely too many) teacher possessions, and then moving back in 2 months later. If you also need to completely evacuate your classroom, here are some ideas for how to pack up your classroom for summer and make it easy!...

Looking for some fresh, new speaking activity ideas to keep students engaged in the target language? Check out these 3 activities to keep students speaking Spanish!...

Teaching is sometimes... really hard. Like really really hard. 🥴...

  Sometimes it's easy to make and give students a quiz on the vocab and/or grammar they've been learning. Don't get me wrong - I'm not hating on quizzes. But sometimes you want to give students more creative freedom to put together a skit or project to show off their Spanish language skills....

It can seem hard to keep my Spanish skills up when I spend all day with Spanish 1 students, where I have to speak… super… slow… and… ee-NUN-see-ay-ted… Spaaaaaniiiiisssshhhh… ¿entiendes? Have you ever spoken real Spanish to a native-speaking student and had them be surprised that you *actually* speak Spanish? Not just that super slow enunciated Spanish they hear in Spanish 1 class?...

If your lessons are going well this year, you should reuse them next year! Because it'll be waaaaay easier.  If you save your files digitally, here are some tips to make sure your desktop isn't a dumpster fire and next year can be suuuuuper easy with lesson planning....