This year I wanted to do different activities in our Spanish Classes, tired of same’ol. I wanted to surprise and make our Turkey classes more than coloring pages with color by numbers we have been doing for years. I wanted children as early as 14m to see the meaning of Thanksgiving, even if it was to say Gracias mommy, at the end of a mommy and me class! I believe we accomplished it, hope the children left our classes as happy as I was!

I would like to highlight some activities, since we used 24 different worksheets, 8 songs and more than 20 activities for many different age and proficiency levels.

Pin a Part on the Turkey

We put a new twist and blew up a turkey and cut pieces, the kids had with eyes closed, put the parts on the turkey. They has previously learned:

cabeza, pico, cola, pies, alas

Cabeza – head

Pico – Beak

Cola – tail

Pies – feet

Alas – wings

Color and Cut

We had a Turkey coloring page and they needed to cut and put the turkey back together and tell me the parts.

Turkey doesn’t say Gobble Gobble

Turkey says gluglú in Spanish, the kids laugh and love it! Their Thanksgiving just got a whole new twist! 

Flashcards

We learned flashcards with turkey – pavo, pelegrino- pelegrine, pumpkin- calabaza and others and they held the cards later and the other child would have to give the one holding it, hints, so they one holding would guess it, they did such a great job!

Turkey Dance

We dance cinco pavitos bailan en la clase, uno salió, quedanse 4, 4 pavitos bailan en la clase, uno salió, quedanse 3…..when we end, all the pavitos get together again, they loved it!

Match word and pic

We used a worksheet with vocabulary previously learned and matching with words for children ages 7 and older

Video I really like:

Dear Readers,

Many parents ask me, is there Halloween in Spanish, well the majority of Spanish speaking countries do not  have Halloween as it known in the US. They have Dia de Los Muertos which is a party and celebration to pay respects to the dead and celebrate death!

Spanish and Foreign Language teachers translate materials this time of the year to bring a little bit of Halloween to their classes!

I decided to share some of the words we used this week and let you know we have sets of flashcards and worksheets available for purchase on the website.

Spanish

Bruja – witch

Calabaza – pumpkin

Calavera- Esqueleton

Murcielago – bat

Fantasma – ghost

Bruxa – witch

abobora – pumpkin

Caveira- Esqueleton

Morcego – bat

Fantasma – ghost

Suggestion on activities: bring real pumpkins, place on the floor and tell the children they will go pumpkin picking and they need to count the pumpkins. They can paint pumpkins and tell the colors. You can use our memory cards to play memory game or throw mini pumpkin erasers on cards on the floor and say the word where they fall. We bought large pumpkins and they had to throw balls on pumpkins and say the color before they hit the pumpkins.

Videos on youtube, like Halloween para peques and others.

Happy Halloween – Feliz Dia de Las Brujas, Feliz Dia das bruxas

Dear Readers,

I would like to share some of the activities we have used during the two weeks prior to Halloween.

I would not recommend talking about dia de los muertos with ages 14m-5 years old……we use some of the traditions without naming cemeteries or showing skeletons.

14m-36m

Toss the pumpkin

materials

10 plastic pumpkins

basket

You will instruct the children to line up and toss the pumpkins inside the basket.

Objective: new vocabulary: calabazas – pumpkins

review numbers.

3-5years old

candy corn bingo

Make bingo sheet with candy corn picture and use candy corn to mark the numbers. Children will love it!

5-7 years old

Black cat on the wall

Cat picture

Velcro

Print a cat’s pic and color it many different colors and ask children to match cats to circles on the wall, saying the color in Spanish.

Objective: Follow up activity for color.

We need to make the Halloween experience fun for the children, those activities listed can be done at home as well.

Authentic materials sometimes don’t reach the children and bring a barrier between young minds and the language itself.

Have fun using the activities, it’s Halloween!

¡Dulces o travesura!

Claudia Krusch

CK Translations and EasyLearn Programs.

For free bingo sheet, e-mail me privately.