Videos Divertidos

Hola Chicos!

Here are links to several YouTube videos that are educational and very fun for students to watch.

The first is simply called Gusta and is a video made by two high school Spanish teachers. This video is perfect to show to your class whenever you cover Gustar and Gustar-like verbs. It's fun and definitely catchy- my students sang this tune for about a week after showing it in class and then begged me throughout the rest of the semester to show it again. The song is very repetitive, so it provides great reinforcement on how to use Gustar in affirmative and negative sentences. I even caught a few students singing the tune to themselves during the Gustar quiz to help them remember how to use it in a sentence. There are 2-3 mistakes towards the end of the video, but this is a good opportunity to have students look for and find the mistakes after the second or third viewing.

The next video is Reflex Your Verby and is made by the same teachers as the Gusta video. I love this video because it is put to the song 'Dance with Me' by Justin Timberlake, and the students are able to sing along with the tune. It also provides great examples and explanations on how to conjugate reflexive verbs, so it's wonderful way to show your students the same material in a different way. After watching the video once or twice, you can get the class involved, and surprisingly, the students love it (as long as you are willing to belt it out with them!).

The third video is Cry Me a Verb and reviews verbs that are irregular in the 'yo' form, stem changers, and several irregular verbs. Like the first two videos, this video is fun, catchy and is a great tool to review stem changers and irregular verbs after you cover them in class. Since irregular verbs seem to be difficult for students, this video is a good supplement to your instruction and other activities. Plus, it's set to the tune of 'Cry Me a River' by Justin Timberlake, so the students seem to enjoy it.

The fourth video, called ConjugationsBack, reviews present tense -ar verbs. This video is very descriptive and presents the conjugations of present tense -ar verbs very clearly. It is great for visual and auditory learners because they show the conjugations as they say them. It is gives great examples and is set to the tune of 'I'm Bringing Sexy Back' by Justin Timberlake. Again, this video would be great as a review after you have already taught the material and have coupled it with other diverse activities.
The last video, The One Semester of Spanish Love Song is great for Spanish I classes because the phrases used in this video are fairly simple and include vocabulary that would be used in the Spanish I class. The pronunciation is clear, so it is very easy to understand, and it includes pictures/gestures that go along with the words. A way to incorporate this into the classroom would be to use it as a listening activity, having the students write down 5-7 phrases they heard throughout the video. It then could be turned into a speaking activity by having the students pair up with another student who wrote down the same phrase(s) and then building conversations off of these phrases. (ie- if the phrase is "Me llamo Mike" the students can begin a conversation with meeting a new person, and then getting to know that person: Que te gusta? Como eres? etc.

With all of these videos, students are able to watch them outside of class, so you can provide them with the links and they can watch them at home or at a friends house. A possible extra credit assignment would be to have students make their own music videos over whichever topic (Gustar, Reflexive Verbs or Present Tense Verbs) or to write lyrics to a song (for students without access to a video camera).

Hope these help! Enjoy!