Games to Be Played in a Spanish Classroom

Classroom games can help students learn Spanish.

Many high school students are required to take a foreign language class to graduate, and colleges often require a foreign language for entry. Moreover, the world as a whole is becoming more and more multicultural; statistics show that more than 30 percent of Spanish-speaking individuals reside in North America. As such, foreign language instruction has become a critical component of a child's education. To help engage Spanish learners in the classroom, teachers can enhance lessons with fun and exciting games that will help even the most modest Spanish estudiante learn the language. "By playing games in the classroom such as 'Lotería,' 'Mentiroso, Mentirosa' and 'Dados' students are engaged in stress-free activities, which lowers their effective filter and allows for higher-level learning to take place," says Desireé Alba, a Spanish teacher from Harrison City, Pennsylvania. "And with 'Sobrevivientes,' most importantly, if students quit relying on English to learn, they will learn Spanish. How do I know for a fact that everyone can do it? Because everyone learned English in this manner."

Vocabulary Bingo: "Lotería"

Students are given a blank Bingo grid, and they must fill in the squares with words from their vocabulary lists in Spanish. The teacher calls out the clues in English, and students must mark the Spanish equivalent on their respective cards. Students call out "Buenas!" (Bingo!) if they get five in a row.

Dice Game: "Dados"

Students are put into groups of five, and each group receives two dice, a game card and a score sheet. The game card has two columns on it. The first column has "subject pronouns" listed, and the second column contains six verbs from the current lesson. Each die is designated to a column. Students take turns rolling the dice and conjugating the rolled verb with the rolled subject. If they answer correctly, they add up the dice and record that score for that roll. If they answer incorrectly, they receive a 0 for that roll.

Building a Grammar Bridge

Students are divided into two teams and given a set of "steppingstones." Each set consists of subject pronouns and verb conjugations. They must use the steppingstones to make a bridge across the room and, in turn, help to bring their teams across.

Liar Liar: "Mentiroso, Mentirosa"

Students are divided into two teams and given white boards. The teacher reads a sentence in English, and each student is responsible for translating it on his white board. The teacher displays the correct answer and asks each team, by a show of hands, who got it correct. Students have the option of telling the truth, that they did, in fact, get it correct, or they can lie and say they did. The number of hands up is recorded on the board. The opposing team is asked to "call out" the liars. If the team catches catch someone lying, points are taken away from the other team and added to liar-detecting team's score. If a team calls someone a liar and the opposing team actually had the correct answer, points are taken away from the accusing team and added to the first team's score.

Survivor: "Sobrevivientes"

Under no circumstance may students use English while in the classroom (that means from bell to bell). Students may ask to speak English by using the correct phrase in Spanish, but the teacher must agree to allow the student to speak English before he does so. Students may ask for one word at a time. Anything more than one word will be considered speaking English, and you will be eliminated (i.e, "Cómo se dice I need a pencil?"). Students may not, under any circumstance, use what is considered "Spanglish"(i.e., yo likeo puppios); if the phrase is not grammatical Spanish, you will be eliminated. Each week students will receive a 10/10 participation grade as long as they remain in the game. Contest winners can receive bonus points, question passes or homework passes.

References

• Worldwide Spanish Speaking Population Statistics
• Desiree Alba, Spanish Teacher