How to Celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month in Spanish Class

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Hispanic Heritage Month is coming! Let’s talk about tips, things to consider, and then lessons you can use throughout the levels that you teach in order to recognize and celebrate the month in your middle school and high school Spanish classes!

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This post is pretty long so I thought I would share some quick links so you can jump to the pieces that interest you most!

Tips for Hispanic Heritage Month

If you’re making plans to introduce your students to history and culture during the celebration, check out these tips for teaching Hispanic Heritage Month! I think they’re important pieces to consider as you make your plans to celebrate:

Celebrate year-round
Coordinate across various levels and with other teachers
Share multiple perspectives
Bring in the experts

Tips for Hispanic Heritage Month #1 Celebrate Year-Round

As a Spanish teacher, you’re probably already working to learn about history and culture year round, but I just wanted to remind you that you don’t have to save that special event for Hispanic Heritage Month. Host that assembly, take the field trip – whatever, whenever!

Tips for Hispanic Heritage Month #2 Coordinate Across Levels

If you are not the only teacher in your department and district, it is vital that you share plans with each other. Not only to support each other, but also to make sure students are learning about different topics year after year. Try this exercise:

Take a list of the Spanish-speaking countries, and a highlighter.
Go through your curriculum and pacing guide.
As a country is included, highlight that country.
If they are mentioned again, put a tally mark next to it.
Continue throughout the year.
Then, grab a different color highlighter and repeat it for each level that you teach – or print a secondary list!

What patterns do you see? Are all countries highlighted? Are some highlighted in several colors, and have multiple tally marks?

If you need help with some of the missing countries, check out these blog posts:

Spanish Cultures Class (resources for every Spanish-speaking country!)
Spanish Readers Organized by Country

Tips for Hispanic Heritage Month #3 Share multiple perspectives

After that reflection activity, you might notice some missing pieces in your curriculum. I just wanted to emphasize how important it is for our students that we share multiple perspectives – even within the one country!

Unpack your Impact is a book for social studies teachers, but I think there are some GREAT culture (personal culture and society) activities in there. I highly recommend checking it out!

A great way to do that is to make sure you are using authentic resources and perspectives from within the culture itself, where people are sharing about their own culture from their personal experiences and memories.

You might be interested in reading more of the Author Spotlight series I have been working on to see some of the amazing authors sharing their stories with Spanish students around the world! Another good option to help you is Acento Latino. Acento Latino Libros is a collective of independent Latin American authors who write easy readers for Spanish language learners. Check out their catalogue here!

Tips for Hispanic Heritage Month #4 Bring in the experts

This fits right in with highlighting authentic resources and books written by authors who are telling their own stories in their own voices like the Acento Latino team. However, I also wanted to give you a few more options!

Josefina Cabello has a blog post on bringing guest speakers in that is a great resource where she highlights five members of the Hispanic community who are ready to virtually visit your classroom.

You can also reach out through your own community! Send a school wide email, reach out to local colleges, send an email to guardians, or post on a community Facebook page to look for recommendations and make connections.

Activities for Hispanic Heritage Month

Research Projects for Hispanic Heritage Month

These printable research poster projects are a great option for Hispanic Heritage Month! They come in Spanish and English, so you can choose what works best for your students. They make a fun display in the hall or in your classroom!

Reading Activities for Hispanic Heritage Month

Gallery walks are a great way to get students up, moving, and thinking in the target language! I love this set because it is perfect for the beginning of the year! It’s all about famous people of Hispanic heritage written in comprehensible language. Each reading is a basic introduction and personal description of each person.

Explore Culture during Hispanic Heritage Month with a Virtual Field Trip!

This one day lesson is the perfect option to fit in with a packed curriculum. Students explore the interactive map, then use the information they find to complete comprehension activities. Grab the map here!

Click here to download the map and activities!

Another virtual field trip option that is perfect for your novice students is this field trip that focuses on “ser de” or saying where someone is from in Spanish!

Click here to check out the “ser de” activity!

Play Hispanic Heritage Month Trivia with your Spanish Classes

This could be a one day activity, a school wide celebration, or you could play once a week throughout Hispanic Heritage Month! There’s a lot of flexibility with this set of 100 trivia questions! Click here to download.

Check out the digital and printable trivia game here!

Hispanic Heritage Month Puzzle

These QR code matching puzzles are a great station activity! Students read the descriptions written in English and match to the person described. To check to see if they are correct, they scan the code. Perfect for independent station work!