Los Colores de la Montaña y Juanes

It is always a challenge to find good, appropriate movies for Spanish class. So when I saw the movie Los Colores de la Montaña, I decided I was going to use it in class. Although the topic of Colombia during the 80s and 90s is not current, the conflict is, unfortunately, somewhat similar to what is happening in Mexico now. So, when we get to our Narcoviolencia unit, students will see a lot of parallels. Also, this unit works as an excellent pre-AP unit. It includes the major temas of Los desafíos mundiales and Las familias and las comunidades. It includes some of these sub-temas: los temas económicos, la población y la demografía, el bienestar social, la conciencia social,  la geografía humana, la estructura de la familia, las comunidades educativas, y las tradiciones y los valores.

Here is a sinopsis of the movie:

Una representación de la vida cotidiana en el campo montañoso de Colombia, que cuenta la amistad entre Manuel y Julián. Un día, mientras juegan al fútbol, tiran el balón a un campo de minas. Acompañados por Poca Luz hacen todo lo posible para recuperar su preciado bien, una parte imprescindible de sus vidas y sueños cotidianos.  (Fuente: Press Book de la película)


Also, although I don't use a lot his songs in class, I realize that students love Juanes. With the use of some resources from Sharon Birch (and here) and Zachary Jones, I was able to put this unit together. The three main components are the two Juanes songs and the movie Los Colores de la Montaña. These are the essential questions for the unit (unit packet here):

• ¿Qué pasaba en Colombia durante los 80 y 90?
• ¿Ha cambiado la situación en Colombia? ¿Cómo? Explica.
• ¿Cuál es el mensaje y/o el propósito de la canciones Minas Piedras y Sueños por Juanes?
• ¿Cómo se manifiestan las realidades de Colombia durante los 80 y 90 en las canciones Minas Piedras y Sueños y en la película “Los Colores de la Montaña“? 
• ¿La música y el cine pueden ser promovedores de la paz? ¿Cómo?

And these are the assessments for the unit:

• PRESENTATIONAL ASSESSMENT: Explica la situación en Colombia durante los años 80 y 90. Puedes usar fotos y/o dibujos para ayudarte con la presentación.

o
Crea una presentación multimedia que describe la situación en Colombia durante  los años 80 y 90. Usa fotos, audio, y texto. Cita tus recursos.

• INTERPRETIVE ASSESSMENT: Compara y contrasta la canción y la película y describe ciertas líneas y/o escenas que muestran las realidades de Colombia durante los años 80 y 90.
• INTERPERSONAL ASSESSMENT (possibly next time): Escribe una carta a un niño de la película describéndole tu niñez y cómo era similar y diferente de la suya.

Before we started the movie, I wanted students to be able to answer the first and second Essential Questions. Without background knowledge about Colombia, the movie would not be meaningful. This is not the type of movie you use for a sub day ;)

The first day of the unit, I gave students notes about what was happening in Colombia during the 80s and 90s. I explained the four groups that were fighting: FARC, ELN, AUC, and the Colombian Army.

In order to get the students more familiar with Colombia, and to have some concept of what the country and its people look like, we watched (most of) Anthony Bourdain's show "Parts Unknown: Colombia" (available on Amazon). The show is in English, but as we watched it, I paused it and gave students notes in Spanish. This video addresses the first and second Essential Questions. 
And here is an article about the game that they play (thanks Bethanie) in the episode (beware Anthony makes a vulgar joke when they are playing the game, definitely want to skip that!).

For homework, students watched this UNICEF video (in English) about las minas antipersonales. Students wrote about what they saw in Spanish and we reviewed it the next day. I think the next time, I might this video instead.

They also watched this video, did a cloze activity and answered some questions about it. The idea that land mines remain active and are not removed after a conflict is a particularly foreign idea to students in the US. And, again, in order to understand the movie, they have to know that this is still a problem, and not just in Colombia.

Next, students explored the website for Juanes' Fundación Mi Sangre. As they looked at the sight, they answered some questions about the Fundación and what it does. Although all of the information on the site might be a little advanced, the questions (on page 6-7 in the unit packet) are basic and guided so they are able to "interpret" the authentic resource.

As we talked about these videos and the Fundación Mi Sangre, and focused on answering the 1st and 5th essential question, we started with some music. Students did a cloze activity for Minas Piedras, translated the song, and answered some comprehension and discussion questions. They did not particularly like this song, but it is quite powerful and it will help them to answer this Essential Question: ¿La música y el cine pueden ser promovedores de la paz? ¿Cómo?

Minas Piedras por Juanes

 Students also created infografías to illustrate the answers to the first and second inforgrafías. I got this idea from Carrie Toth (@senoraCMT). It was a good way for students to organize their thoughts and review all of the information that they learned during the first four days of the unit. I will get some examples here soon.

After four days, we finally started the movie. I found a fantastic and very comprehensive film guide for the movie, so I incorporated that in to my unit packet. We read the sinopsis and talked about the main characters. I warned students that we would be watching short segments of the movie and that we would be talking about those segments... in other words, we are going to take our time watching the movie. The movie is excellent and very easy to talk about. We did watch the movie with subtitles in English, as the Spanish would be rather difficult for my students to understand.

As we watched the movie and did the assessments, we started with the second song, Sueños by Juanes. Students liked this song much better!

Sueños por Juanes

There were two evaluaciones for the unit:

• The first was a spoken assessment. Students had to answer the first and second essential questions. This assessment was done after about five days of the unit.
• The second was a written assessment (click here to see it). This assessment focused on the other essential questions. (There was also a small spoken part on this one)

A few other things we did during the unit:

• We sang almost every day in class.
• Lots of talking in partners and repeating information.
• When students were answering movie questions, they worked with a partner and spoke as they wrote.
• Lots of summarizing what we saw in the movie, together as a class and then in partners.

The next time I do this unit, I will use this song as well. It is played throughout the movie - Los caminos de la vida (wksht from Zachary Jones):