Thematic Unit: Los Miedos

**UPDATE** I am still using parts of this unit, but I have greatly enhanced and improved it! It is now called Miedos y Leyendas - click here to see what the unit looks like now.

This unit about fears is one that I developed after seeing a activity from Zachary Jones. I have changed the activity a bit and made a unit about Fears. This unit is the first on in my Cultura y Civilización (Spanish 4) course. The song Azul by Natalia Lafourcade is a fun, catchy, comprehensible song for a level 3 or 4 class. The video is engaging and there is a lot that students can analyze and talk about.

The other song that I will use for this unit is "Miedo a caer" by Ruido Rosa. Zachary Jones suggested this one for this unit and it will fit perfectly. I like to have two songs per unit if possible, as it can be great to compare and contrast.

The essential questions for the unit are the following:

1. ¿Qué efecto puede tener la ansiedad sobre nosotros?*
2. ¿Tienes "miedo a caer" con respecto al aprendizaje del español? ¿Qué riesgos tenemos que correr? ¿Cómo podemos superar esta ansiedad?*
3. ¿De qué se tratan las canciones “Azul” y "Miedo a Caer"? ¿Cómo son similares y diferentes?
4. ¿Quiénes son Natalia Lafourcade y Ruido Rosa?

*Questions taken from Zachary Jones worksheet.

The students in this class are CTP students with varying levels of ability. They have been in very traditional Spanish classes, and this class is a major shift in how/what they will be learning. These are the goals I hope to achieve with this unit:

• Overcome fears of speaking Spanish
• Enjoy speaking Spanish
• Enjoy listening to Spanish
• Become comfortable with authentic resources (songs, interviews, commercials, Facebook, twitter, Wikipedia)
• Gain confidence with speaking and listening abilities
• Become comfortable with being a little uncomfortable

Some of the activities that students will do are the following:

• cloze activities with the songs
• investigate and talk about the singers and answer questions about them
• sing, sing, sing
• talk about the fears that students have
• watch some commercials that Natalia Lafourcade is in and do some cloze activities
• translate the songs
• illustrate some lines from the song
• compare the fears of the singers to the students' fears
• listen to an interview with Natalia Lafourcade and discuss how she came to write Azul 
• watch and listen to an interview with Ruido Rosa and try to understand some words and/or ideas that they talk about 
• talk about the videos
• analyze the relationship between the videos and the songs (the video for Azul (in my opinion) shows the growth of someone who has overcome her fears)
• discuss the essential questions

The assessments for the unit will be:

• a spoken interpersonal discussion about what fears students have
•  a written interpretive assignment answering all of the essential questions.
• maybe some others 

Hopefully, after this class and unit, they will feel like the 4th grader after she went down the ski jump.

What do you think? Suggestions? Other ideas?