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Susan Massey |
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Introduction
Using the Internet, students will prepare presentations
on individual Latin American countries focusing on high interest aspects of
culture such as popular music, sports and food as well as geography and recent
history.
Subject: Spanish III or Spanish for Native Speakers
World Cultures
Topic: Latin America
Grade Level: high school
To see the student lesson go directly to
Standards Addressed
High School grades 9--12 Foreign Language
Standard 2: Students understand and interpret written and spoken language
on a variety of topics.
Standard 3: Students present information, concepts, and ideas to an
audience of listeners or readers on a variety of topics.
Standard 6: Students reinforce and further their knowledge of other
disciplines through the foreign language.
Social studies--World Cultures
10.2. Describe the recent history of the regions (includes South
America) including political divisions and systems, key leaders, religious
issues, natural features, resources and population patterns.
Instructional Objectives
1. Students will be
able to fill in a map of Central and South America with names of countries,
and major cities.
2. Students will be able to name and identify by country at least 5 performing artists of different Latin American countries.
3. Students will be able to name and identify by country at least 5 Latin American athletes.
4. Students will be able to name and tell the ingredients of at least 3 national dishes from different Latin American countries.
5. Students will be able to identify the major geographical features and tourist sites of one Latin American country of their choice.
6. Students will be able to identify the type of government and recent political history of one Latin American country of their choice.
7. Students will explain the ethnic composition of the country of their choice.
8. Student will read a short work (poem or short story) by a famous author of the country of their choice.
9. Students will use Spanish to present information to the class about the country they have chosen as their focus.
Student Activities
Introductory Activity
Teacher shows students pictures from various Latin American countries. These may be from a book or projected from the Internet depending on available technology. If an online computer lab is available, students will surf the site http://creativewoodworking.com/spanish/countries.htm which contains many photos of different Latin American countries. Students have the opportunity to choose a country for their report. You may want to you the document "Going to the Computer Lab" to introduce some rules and give them their first assignment
Enabling
Activities
1. Teacher teaches names of 5
countries daily using 2 maps, (one with names of countries and one without) and
pneumonic devices. Students repeat names aloud.
2. Each student uses Internet to research chosen country. (Work may also be done in pairs or in groups depending on the time available for the project.) Report must include information on
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geographical features
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major cities
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current government
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religions and ethnic groups in country
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population and population density
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information on student's choice of three (3) of the following
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one performing artist
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one athlete
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one national food
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one type of music
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one plastic artist (painter, sculptor)
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one writer
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3. Student prepares map of chosen country.
4. Student makes the national flag of chosen country.
Culminating Activity
Each student will make a 15 minute presentation about
the chosen country to the entire class. The presentation will include various audio-visual aids such as pictures of people and places, music, a map, a flag, food, handout of a poem, or possibly a video. Teachers may wish to use the document "Instructions for Saving to a Floppy Disk"
Class
will have
outline to use for taking notes on presentations.
back to topLesson Plan
Assessment
Teacher may use the following documents:
Pretest
Post test
Evaluation of Project
Results
This project was implemented in April, 2001 with a group of students in a SDAIE World Cultures class. The chart shows the difference in the pre- and post tests
The following chart shows the grades on the presentation as compared to the previous semester grades. Generally there is a high correlation between their achievement over a semester and their grade on the presentation. Two students who failed the class the previous semester did not do the presentation.
Web
Resources & Supplementary Materials
Introductory Activity
The following are extremely comprehensive sets of links to all kinds of information regarding all Latin American countries.
http://creativewoodworking.com/spanish/countries.htm
http://lanic.utexas.edu/subject/countries.html
Enabling ActivityWorld Fact Book: general condensed information on all countries of world; http://www.theodora.com/wfb/abc_world_fact_book.html
Encyclopedia Britannica with links to articles in journals; detailed and lengthy information regarding all countries
collection of maps of Latin America http://www.lib.utexas.edu/Libs/PCL/Map_collection/americas/
Latin America Geographia: Excellent condensed information regarding geography and tourist sites in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Guyana, Mexico and Venezuela
http://www.interknowledge.com/indx05.htm
links to condensed history and tourist information on all Spanish speaking countries.
http://creativewoodworking.com/spanish/countries.htm
maps of every continent and country
Recipes from several Latin American countries
http://members.yourlink.net/kappa/espanole/cocina.html#all
http://www.latinsynergy.org/tm6.htm
links to musicians from various Latin American countries
http://worldmusic.about.com/musicperform/worldmusic/cs/latinamerica/index_2.htm
Culminating Activity
Students will make presentations about
the country of their choice.
Students will be tested on map of Latin America and selected information from presentations.
back to top Lesson Plan
Holtville High School
Holtville, California
Susan Massey
e-mail: susanlil_8@yahoo.com
Last Revised: 06/12/01