Adventures in exploring Las Fallas lesson plans for Spanish class

What are your students into? Do you think they would enjoy learning about a high energy, cultural celebration that involves making giant papier-mâché sculptures that are ultimately set on fire? I know mine do! And that’s exactly what you’ll explore with these Las Fallas lesson plans for Spanish class!

Las Fallas is a celebration that takes place in Valencia, Spain mid-March every year. This celebration is in honor of St Joseph the carpenter. The main part of the celebration takes place around March 14th and last for several days – however, the celebration begins before that with the building of the sculptures. It’s not a quick job!

But the celebration of Las Fallas includes so much more than JUST giant sculptures. There is paella, huge explosions, the flowers, the clothing, and yes… even the process of getting the sculptures in place to show off.

So how do I share this cultural event with my students in a comprehensible and practical way? A gallery walk – of course! With a cultural event that has SO many moving parts, like Las Fallas does – I want to make sure my students have the opportunity to see as many bits and tidbits of the celebration as they can. With a gallery walk, I can give my students a lot of bits and pieces – 9 to be exact – and a scaffolded note catcher to engage with as they take in these bits and pieces. Without a gallery walk, my students would spend days reading and listening to get the same about of content. A gallery walk is so much more efficient!

But don’t just take it from me – here is what some other amazing teachers around the world have said about using this gallery walk for learning about Las Fallas:

10th-12th grade teacher: “Fantastic gallery walk activity! My students were engaged the whole time!”

7th grade teacher: “This was a fun, informative, and engaging activity that provided the students a change from our daily routine. A great addition to our unit on “Las Fallas”!”

9th / 10th grade teacher: “I am not exaggerating when I say that this lesson plan resulted in the HIGHEST level of engagement I’ve had all year in my class of Spanish for Heritage Speakers. They LOVED doing the gallery walk reading and taking notes. 100% participation this late in the year on a Friday is incredible. Highly recommend this resource!!”

Ready to grab these plans? You can grab them on my website here or here on TeachersPayTeachers