Spanish 1 Lesson Plans Cognates in Spanish

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If you are working on your lesson plans for the first days of school with your Spanish 1 students, you might consider starting with cognates. Cognates in Spanish are a great way to provide an easy win for your novices and help them grow in confidence! Check out these ideas for a unit of Spanish 1 lesson plans to explore cognates in Spanish!

Cognates in Spanish Unit Walkthrough

How to teach cognates in Spanish?

If you’re wondering where to get started, it doesn’t have to be complicated! A quick definition of cognates as a word that looks like and means the same thing as a word they already know is a great place to begin. Then, give them some examples of cognates in Spanish! Here are 10 examples of Spanish-English cognates:

banco
café
hamburguesa
familia
computadora
minuto
menú
problema
música
pizza

When they start to see some examples, they’ll be ready for the next step. Let’s look at some lesson plans you can use with your students!

Spanish 1 Lesson Plans Cognates

Day 1

On the first day of the unit, begin by introducing cognates as detailed above. Next you’ll do a sorting activity for students to pick out what isn’t a cognate! After working with what is and isn’t a cognate for a little bit, it’s time to introduce a slightly longer text.

Have students silently scan the short paragraph and count how many cognates in Spanish they can find. Then, talk through it as a class. What cognates did they see? Now is also a great time to reinforce that cognates might be different for everyone! My favorite example here is the word “octava”. If you have musicians in your classroom, they might be able to relate it to the word “octave” which is a musical term, but non musicians might not have ever heard it before!

Now you’ll work on the strategy of using cognates to help your students determine what other words in context might mean. Read the reading out loud and have them guess what it’s about, based on the words they do understand. Remind them that it’s okay to guess! Then you’ll do a choral translation activity with the same reading.

Check out the video below for a short tutorial!

Finish off the day with some independent practice as students complete a word search and extension activity with cognates in Spanish.

Spanish 1 Lesson Plans Cognates Day 2

You’ll start the day with a quick refresher! Pop a list of cognates in Spanish up on the board and ask students to draw an illustration representing each one. Then you’ll refresh their memories with the definition of cognates that you shared on day 1.

Have them turn in their homework – or go through it together, then it’s time for ¡Corre en Círculos! (a scavenger hunt game). Hang the clue cards with cognates in Spanish and students follow them to solve the puzzle, while using cognates and strengthening their language skills! If you’re new to using this game, the video below might help you introduce it to your students the first time:

As students often finish the game at different times, it’s nice to have a fast finisher handy. Give them a short reading PACKED with cognates and let them work as classmates wrap up.

Day 3

You’ll start off with day 3 of the Cognates unit with another bell ringer focused on cognates in Spanish. This time, give them a short reading and have them find as many cognates as they can and write what they think each one means.

Next, you’ll check on the worksheet they finished at the end of Day 2. It’s important to check in and see how they’re doing!

Choose from a printable worksheet or Google form option!

The rest of day 3 is all about listening. Cognates when listening are a little different than reading! Just think about the word “chocolate” in Spanish. A student will almost certainly recognize it immediately when reading, but if they hear it they might have to hear it a few times to catch it- if they do at all. Let your students start applying those language skills to what they hear!

Spanish 1 Lesson Plans Cognates in Spanish Day 4

On day 4 you’re going to bring in more of those listening skills, but in a different way. Let’s play Partner Matamoscas. Here’s a quick tutorial!

After Partner Matamoscas, we’ll play memory. In this game, students read and match simple, cognate-heavy sentences in Spanish to their English translation.

Round out the day with another short reading full of cognates and comprehension activities.

Spanish 1 Lesson Plans Cognates Day 5

On the last day of this unit plan, students will start with either the memory game from the day before, or play a few rounds of Quizlet.

Next, you’ll check on the worksheet they finished at the end of Day 4. You’ll check for understanding and clear up any questions they may have.

Finally, students will do a short assessment to show what they learned! They’ll apply their skills and explain how to use cognates to help them be successful.

Spanish 1 Lesson Plans Cognates in Spanish Full Unit

This unit bundle is everything you need to spend five full class days on cognates! It includes:

Teacher’s Guide and Notes for the individual activities
Presentation for use in Google Slides or PowerPoint to guide your students through the activities and lessons
Two different readings and activities to introduce your students to cognates.
Listening activities practice a range of different skills, from recognition to comprehension!
A ¡Corre en Círculos! activity to have some fun movement-based practice with a variety of cognates.
Games to engage your students in a variety of ways while applying their understanding!
Use word search pages as homework, an after test activity, for fast finishers, as sub plans, or with some of my other seasonal activities to complete your lesson!
A quick quiz that’s perfect to assess your students’ understanding and application of cognates in their language learning.