Do your students struggle to master the usage of gustar and verbs like gustar? Check out these Gustar Spanish Activities for Verbs Like Gustar and your students will be using gustar, chocar, doler, encantar, interesar, and fascinar correctly in no time!
Gustar Spanish Activities for Verbs Like Gustar Teaching Guide
Many teachers introduce gustar in all its forms and the verbs like gustar at once and this confuses students. To achieve mastery, take gustar and verbs like gustar one step at a time. Instead of teaching a weeklong unit, spend 10-15 minutes a day and teach verbs like gustar over 2-3 weeks, combined with other topics during class. This type of learning leads to mastery vs. the learn it and forget it model.
Step 1: Teach Me gusta/n and No me gusta/n
Hold up photos of foods, colors, or sports. Ask students if they like the things or not. ¿Te gustan los gatos? ¿Te gustan las zanahorias?
Teach them to say Me gusta for singular things and Me gustan for plural items. Emphasize el, la, los, and las when you’re saying sentences. After they have mastered this concept, add in Me gusta + a verb. These verb photo cards might come in handy for this activity and throughout the year.
Ex. Me gusta el baloncesto. Me gustan los guisantes. No me gusta el brécol.
Ex. Me gusta esquiar. Me gusta pintar. No me gusta hacer mis quehaceres. No me gusta hacer la tarea.
Variation: Hold up cards and ask students to say whether it would be me gusta or me gustan. If they’re not getting it, try using a singular object and a plural object.
Ex. Me gusta el lápiz. Me gustan los lapices.
Step 2: Practice the “te” and “le” forms.
They will have already heard you asking individual students, ¿Te gusta? and ¿Te gustan? so this step should come pretty easily.
Teach them to change me to te to ask a question. Pass out photo cards to the students and have them walk around the room asking their classmates if they like certain things. If you don’t have photo cards, have students draw a picture of something that they like or don’t like.
They record the person’s name and if he/she likes or doesn’t like the item. Be sure to model sentences on the board beforehand so they have a correct example.
Ex. A Juan, no le gustan las espinacas.
No need to make up a worksheet for this activity. Get this free digital or printable worksheet in my Free Resource Library. Get access to the library here.
Step 3: Teach Me encanta/n, Me choca/n and teach the nos form.
This should be simple now that your students know gustar well. Model saying things that you love, like, hate, and can’t stand. Show individual students photo cards and ask them to say Me gusta/n, No me gusta/n, Me choca/n, or Me encanta/n.
Then for a group activity, post signs in each of the 4 corners of the room: Nos gusta/n, No nos gusta/n, Nos encanta/n, Nos choca/n. Get these free signs in the Free Resource Library (see above).
Show a photo and ask students to move to the corner that represents their opinion. Then the whole group says their feeling or writes it on a whiteboard. Ex. Nos chocan los guisantes.
For homework, have students write 8 sentences: 2 things they like, 2 they don’t like, 2 they love, and 2 they can’t stand. Have them read examples out loud the next day in class.
This is a great time to introduce Gustar Boom Cards (digital, self-correcting flashcards), for additional practice to reinforce everything you’re learning in class.
Step 4: Teach Me duele/n
If your students have learned body parts, then start introducing Me duele/n, te duele/n, le duele/n. If you haven’t taught Spanish body parts yet or if your students need some spice up your teaching with one of these resources: large classroom body parts flashcards, interactive notebook flashcards, trifold story flashcards (digital or paper), or Spanish Body Parts Boom Cards (digital).
Simón dice (Simon Says) is a great game for reinforcing Me duele. Say, “Simón dice, me duelen las piernas.” Students touch their legs and say, “Ay, me duelen” or if they’re more advanced, “Ay, me duelen las piernas.”
Have students walk around the room and ask each other what hurts. ¿Qué te duele? Me duele la rodilla. Then the student writes down. A María le duele la rodilla. To make it more exciting, award a prize for the first student with all the correct answers written correctly. Need prize ideas? Check out this post with 50 unique reward ideas for middle school and high school students.
Get this free digital or printable worksheet in my Free Resource Library. See above to join.
Step 5: Teach the “les” form and fascinar and interesar.
Talk about different categories of people/professions and what they are interested in/fascinated by. Brainstorm a few as a class: A los científicos les fascinan las células. A los maestros de matemáticas les interesan los números.
Then, play a game with your class. Divide the class into groups of 3-4 students. Give them a category. Give them 2 minutes to write as many sentences for that category as possible. Let them use their phones/devices to look up words. 1 pt. for each grammatically correct sentence.
Ex. Los niños, los adultos, los bomberos, los gatos, los perros, los reporteros, los pilotos, los deportistas
Ex. A los niños les fascina jugar en la arena. A los niños les fascinan los insectos.
Hope ideas help your students master Gustar Spanish Activities for Verbs Like Gustar. Happy Teaching!
2 Comments
Stumbled across your page/blog, how refreshing and interesting! I am fixing to teach my nephew Spanish via zoom once a week. He is an adult and familiar with Spanish but he gets very frustrated when he can communicate.
Boom Cards would probably work well for teaching him this concept. I’ve tried it with family members who don’t speak Spanish and they were able to use gustar correctly afterwards. My family members are my guinea pigs. Ha, ha!