20 Spanish Reading Games

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Reading in Spanish is a great way to get your students to acquire more language! Sometimes sitting and reading quietly can be tough to do day after day, depending on your groups. Let’s look at some Spanish reading games you can play with your students!

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Spanish Reading Games

While there are tons of reading activities you can do with your classes, in this post I want to focus more specifically on Spanish reading games, rather than lesson activities. If you’d like to see those, check out my blog post here!

Click here to read the post!

Here are the Spanish reading games featured in this post that you can play with your students:

  1. Mi Lápiz
  2. Details, details, details
  3. Running Dictation
  4. Word Chunk Game
  5. Tabata Timeline
  6. Pareja Mentirosa
  7. The Marker Game
  8. Game of Quotes
  9. Plate Sketch Game
  10. Grid Puzzles
  11. Storyboard Bingo
  12. Pass it up
  13. Quizlet Live Reading Game
  14. Partner Matamoscas
  15. Reverse Running Dictation
  16. Dado de suerte
  17. Lucky Reading Game
  18. What’s my answer?
  19. Sound Effect Reading
  20. 1,2,3 Salta

How to Play these Spanish Reading Games

Mi Lápiz

Check out the blog post for details!

Mi Lápiz is a great review game that can also be used for re-reading! Use short sentences or simple yes/no, true/false, fill in the blank questions to play with any text.

Pass it up

Carrie Toth shares how to use this game from Wooly Week and a demo from her own classroom:

You can use it with different stories! If you don’t have a picture to go with, you can always do a Read and Draw earlier in the week (or even that day) to create illustrations.

Details, details, details

This game from Señora Chase is super fun! Students work in pairs to re-write a story you’ve been working with. After writing it, they’ll trade papers with another pair. Then, the teacher calls out a detail from the story. Students search the writing for the detail. If it was included, they underline it, and mark a point at the top. The pair with the most points wins! Learn more here.

Running Dictation

Running Dictation gets students up and moving while they work with a partner or small group. Use it for reading practice by having students play with chunks from a story, or words from a reading you have been working with in class.

Word Chunk Game

You might call this one “translating trashketball” and it’s one of the sportiest Spanish reading games shared here! Students get a chance to translate chunks or sentences from the target language, and earn points based on their ball tosses. Learn more about how to play here!

Tabata Timeline

Tabata Timeline is a speedy way to do sequencing of events with any story! Students write events on pieces of paper, then rotate according to the timer as they put each others’ events in order. Learn more here!

The Marker Game

This fun true and false game is made competitive by adding speedy reflexives and rotating partners into the mix! Students listen to statements and grab the marker (or not) to state if the sentence is true or false according to the reading. Learn how to play here!

Game of Quotes

This game is different from the other Spanish reading games shared here because it works best when students are doing their free choice reading and everyone has a different book! The game play is a lot like Apples to Apples, only students respond by writing a quote from their book on a mini whiteboard, trying to pick the funniest option for the scenario projected on the screen. Learn more and grab the slides to play here!

Plate Sketch Game

This game is great for listening and reading. You could illustrate a scene from a novel or story, or you can do a fun holiday scene like the example in the walkthrough blog post here!

Pareja Mentirosa

Mentirosa is one of my favorite partner read aloud activities! In this game, students read a selection aloud, changing minor details. When their partner hears a lie, they call out “pareja mentirosa!”. Learn more about how to play here.

Storyboard Bingo

This simple game from Señora Lovely is posted on the Comprehensible Classroom. Super low prep to set up, with lots of input opportunity! Students draw a 3×3 grid on their paper, then copy 9 sentences from the text exactly. Swap pages with another student. The student then illustrates the sentences in each box, then swap one more time. Before playing, remind students that they should each have a board that has sentences AND pictures from other students. The game board should be brand new to them!

To play Bingo, the teacher calls out sentences from the text. Students mark the cards on their boxes with small pieces of paper. They win when they get 3 in a row! Learn more details here.

Grid Puzzles

This one is great for reading and re-reading. You can do it with translations or chunks from stories. I personally love this one as a warm up or fast finisher! Click here to learn more.

This is puzzle can be made to feel more game-like by switching it up with one of the variations from this blog post. I think the hands and the brain would be fun with this, too!

Quizlet Live Reading Game

Click here to see a variety of ways to play Quizlet Live in your classes!

I love LOVE Quizlet Live. It’s super fun and there are a ton of different ways you can play it. Señora Chase has a great post with examples of how you can take Quizlet Live and expand it beyond the vocabulary translation style of play. Check out her post here!

Partner Matamoscas

Matamoscas is great, but sometimes I just don’t love the turn taking games that have a few players and the rest has to wait. Partner Matamoscas is a great way to use the same game set up, but have everyone playing at once!

Reverse Running Dictation

Check out the blog post here!

You know running dictation, you love running dictation, but have you tried changing it up just a tish? Try reverse running dictation! I especially like to do this one with Señor Wooly videos because they have beautifully illustrated images for their songs!

Dado de suerte

While I am generally team low prep, there are times something is just SO fun it’s worth it. Check out this one from Señora Chase – that element of LUCK is just so great for hooking them into the game!

Lucky Reading Game

If you read “prep is worth it” on the last one and thought, “NOPE. Not for me!”, I gotcha. Or rather, Señora Chase has you because this is another one from her that is just a huge hit every stinking time! Students read & answer questions using the text. Correct answers get a chance to draw a card and earn points for their team.

Watch a few rounds here to get the idea:

Learn all the details in the blog post here!

What’s my answer?

Mis Clases Locas is definitely my go to for learning about teaching novels in your Spanish classes! In this post she shares a reading game called What’s My Answer? she learned from Mira Canion. I love elements of hustle and competition – this has got both!

Sound Effect Reading

This one toes the line between activity and game, if I’m being honest. BUT it’s so darn fun and it can be very silly, so it feels like a game! It’s a no-prep, during reading activity where students make sounds while someone reads out loud. Learn more here!

1,2,3 Salta

Check out this unit for your novices here!

I first heard of this one in a Facebook group and it is so fun! I actually wound up putting it into one of my high frequency verbs units as a reading game because I was so sure other classes would love it, too! It’s very similar to the marker game (shared above), but instead of grabbing a marker, students jump to the right or left. Mis Clases Locas has a great blog post explaining how to play here.

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Check out more reading resources here!

Ashley Mikkelsen

Hi, I'm Ashley. I'm so glad you're here! I love helping secondary Spanish teachers with engaging activities and ideas for their lesson plans. I can't wait to support you with no and low prep activities to help reduce your workload!

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