Bolivia
Bolivia is a country in central South America, with a varied terrain spanning Andes mountains, the Atacama Desert and Amazon Basin rainforest.
Lesson Plans
This lesson utilizes technology to introduce students to water crises throughout Latin
America. This particular lesson focuses specifically on Bolivia and the decades-long struggle with water rights and access.
Target Audience: Advanced language learners, Spanish learners in grades 11-12
Subject Area(s): Spanish, Social Studies, Environemental Science
Objectives: Learners will be able to: use vocabulary related to water and the environment; understand and interpert information in the target language; summarize current issues Bolivians face with respect to water access.
Grade Levels: 9–12
Presentation on the history of Day of the Dead and how it is celebrated in Latin America. Includes images and key concepts to understanding the holiday, characteristics, traditions, rituals, and art, as well as celebrations in Mexico, Guatemala and Bolivia.
Author(s): Avery Dickins de Girón
Grade Levels: 5–8, 9–12
This guide gives a colorful historical overview of how el Día de los Muertos is celebrated in some Latin American Countries. In the 16th century Spaniards brought the Catholic celebration of Día de los Muertos to Latin America where it mixed with indigenous rituals honoring the dead. Today, people across Latin America honor their dead and celebrate the cycle of life in early November under a variety of names: “Día de los Muertos” (Day of the Dead), “Día de los Todos Santos“ (All Saints Day), “Día de los Difuntos” (Day of the Deceased), and “Día de los Angelitos” (Day of the Little Angels in honor of children who have died).
In general, families begin the morning of November 1 by constructing altars to honor their deceased loved ones. They place photographs and favorite foods of the dead, candles to light the way, incense, and other gifts on the altars. The celebration then shifts to the cemetery where all gather around the graves of relatives. Families carefully clean and sweep the gravesites, and decorate them with colorful adornments, such as streamers, flowers, crosses, candles, and food—all of which serve as offerings to attract and please ancestors. By early afternoon, the cemetery fills with people joyfully celebrating life and death by playing music, dancing, and feasting alongside the spirits of their ancestors.
Check out this guide that covers traditions in Mexico, Guatemala, and Bolivia. Available in English and Spanish.
Authors: Avery Dickins de Girón with special thanks to Paula Covington, Jennifer Vogt, Marie Martin, Felipe Girón, John Janusek, Ted Fischer, Claire González, Jenni Ohnstad, and Arcelia Vásquez.
Grade Levels: K–4, 5–8, 9–12, College
Lesson Plans:
The integration of digital technologies in the classroom is buzzworthy, occupying many discussion boards, twitter feeds, and faculty meeting minutes. The potential of these tools to unlock and empower learning in the 21st Century is undeniable, yet their implementation is simultaneously as tricky as it is noteworthy; the tools themselves, while innovative on the surface, are neither transformative nor innovative unless the pedagogy that drives them allows them to be as such. This guide was developed with this intentional pedagogy in mind. Each of the activities include low-cost and effective technological tools that help learners to engage in and elevate world language classroom discourse regarding Latin America.
Subject Areas: World Language, Spanish, Ecology, Environmental Science, Global Health, Humanities, Geography, Social Studies, Biology, Economics, History, Literature.
Download all files here or see individual lesson plans below.
Pollution and Recycling
This lesson incorporates technology to teach about pollution and recycling in Latin America and the United States. Technologies used in this lesson include smartphones/iPads, YouTube videos, Tellagami App, and online dictionaries.
- Target Audience: Novice language learners, Spanish learners in grades 7-12
- Subject Area(s): Spanish, Ecology, Environmental Science
- Objective: Learners will be able to: identify and use words related to the environment, pollution and recycling; communicate about the environment of their neighborhood; and write about pollution and recycling using pictures.
Zika Exploration via Gameplay with Plague Inc.
The purpose of this lesson is to expose novice language learners to vocabulary related to science, and world health concerns, principally the spread of the Zika virus. Additionally the activity is intended to help them to engage in critical thinking regarding language negotiation. Through engaging in this activity, learners will practice using context to discern and make predictions about the meaning of unknown words. They will also analyze unknown words through identification of cognates and linguistic patterns. This identification will allow for semantic mapping and the resulting development of complex language schemata.
- Target Audience: Novice language learners, Spanish learners grades 7-12
- Subject Area(s): Spanish, Science, Global Health, Humanities, Geography
- Objectives: Learners will be able to: use context to negotiate and make predictions about meaning; apply learning strategies to negotiate meaning, recognize cognates, and discern linguistic patters; and use context to discern meaning.
Let's Save the Caribbean!
In this activity, learners work to simultaneously understand environmental issues impacting the Caribbean and to how to use persuasive language.
- Target Audience: Intermediate Language Learners
- Subject Area(s): Spanish, Biology, Ecology, Humanities
- Objectives: Learners will be able to: explain thier points of view and provide reasons to support it; understand straightforward recordings; and write content for an advertising campaign.
The Rising Cost of Water in Mexico
This lesson utilizes different types of technology to teach about access to water in Latin America. This lesson focuses specifically on access to potable water in Mexico with a comparison to the United States.
- Target Audience Intermediate language learners, Spanish learners in grades 9-12
- Subject Area(s) Spanish, Social Studies, Environmental Science
- Objectives Learners will be able to: use vocabulary related to the environment and water, compare and contrast access to potable water in Mexico and the US; and understand and interpret information in the target language.
Bolivian Water Crisis
This lesson utilizes technology to introduce students to water crises throughout Latin America. This particular lesson focuses specifically on Bolivia and the decades-long struggle with water rights and access.
- Target Audience: Advanced language learners, Spanish learners in grades 11-12
- Subject Area(s): Spanish, Social Studies, Environmental Science
- Objectives: Learners will be able to: use vocabulary related to water and the environment; understand and interpret information in the target language; summarize current issues Bolivians face with respect to water access.
International Dollars and Connections: Globalization
In this activity, learners work to understand the historical context of Latin America’s economic ties to the United States and the cultural impact of those ties.
- Target Audience: Advanced language learners, Spanish learners in grades 11-12
- Subject Area(s): Spanish, Economics, History, Literature
- Objectives: Learners will be able to: understand the main idea and some details of commercials; understand the main idea and some details of a piece of literature; and make a short, persuasive presentation in which ideas are supported and justified.
Workshop Presentations
Excellent visual slides with particular emphasis on astronomy. Great jumping off point for some research into how Latin American cultures (both past and present) relate to the cosmos.
Author(s): Ohnstad
Grade Levels: 5–8, 9–12
View all Bolivia materials here.