Unit 1 — Likes and Dislikes and Food
Description
Students explore food as an integral part of culture and learn to express preferences and describe meals. The unit examines how food choices, mealtime rituals, and etiquette differ across Spanish-speaking countries and the United States. Students recognize that different foods are considered acceptable in different cultures and understand that food reflects cultural values and traditions. The unit integrates career awareness and financial literacy standards as students consider decisions about food and consumption.
Essential Questions
- How is food different throughout the world?
- Why is it important to discuss food in Spanish-speaking countries?
Learning Objectives
- Express likes and dislikes using memorized words and phrases
- Identify food items and describe meals in Spanish
- Recognize cultural differences in mealtime etiquette and rituals
- Respond to questions about food preferences using simple memorized sentences
- Read menus and answer comprehension questions
- Create and perform a restaurant skit demonstrating interpersonal communication
Supplemental Resources
- Chart paper for displaying food vocabulary and cultural menus
- Picture cards or printed images of Spanish-speaking foods and meals
- Index cards for vocabulary flash cards and memory games
- Printed menus from Spanish-speaking restaurants for reading practice
Interpersonal Mode
Interpretive Mode
Presentational Mode
Students engage in collaborative discussions about cultural practices and perspectives, write narratives describing family members and personal attributes, read and interpret authentic Spanish texts, and present information about school environments and communities using narrative and descriptive techniques.
Students create visual presentations such as posters and floor plans, develop skits and role-plays to demonstrate cultural practices and communication scenarios, design multimedia projects, and explore art and cultural expressions from Spanish-speaking communities.
Formative Assessments
- Pair interviews about food preferences
- Listening to oral directions related to food items and responding with physical actions
- Reading short descriptions of meals and identifying key information
- Picture-based identification of food vocabulary
- Classroom dialogues and role-plays about ordering food
Summative Assessment
Integrated Performance Assessment: students write and perform a restaurant skit, read a menu and answer questions, and create a video project using three modes of communication related to food
Benchmark Assessment
— not configured —
Alternative Assessment
Students may demonstrate understanding of food preferences and descriptions through structured oral responses with visual supports such as picture cards or menus, or by matching/sorting activities in place of written or performance-based tasks. Sentence frames and word banks may be provided to support expression of likes and dislikes.
IEP (Individualized Education Program)
Students may benefit from visual supports such as illustrated food vocabulary cards and graphic organizers to help organize likes and dislikes before speaking or writing. For the restaurant skit and other performance tasks, allow students to use a script, sentence starters, or a word bank to reduce the language production barrier while still demonstrating interpersonal communication. Extended time and the option to record responses rather than perform live can help students access the summative assessment more equitably. Chunking the multi-part performance task into smaller sequential steps with frequent check-ins will support students who need additional processing time or organizational scaffolding.
Section 504
Students should be provided with preferential seating during listening and role-play activities to minimize distraction and support auditory processing of Spanish input. Extended time on the menu reading and written components of the summative assessment ensures that access barriers do not interfere with demonstrating content knowledge. A print copy of any vocabulary, menu text, or directions displayed on the board should be provided directly to the student.
ELL / MLL
Visual supports such as illustrated food vocabulary charts, bilingual word banks, and real or pictured food items will help students connect new Spanish vocabulary to concepts they already know, including foods familiar from their home cultures. Teachers should use simplified directions and check for understanding by asking students to restate tasks in their own words before beginning. Where possible, drawing connections between Spanish food terms and cognates in a student's home language can accelerate vocabulary acquisition and build confidence during pair interviews and role-play activities.
At Risk (RTI)
Connecting food vocabulary and cultural content to students' own mealtime experiences and familiar foods provides a meaningful entry point and activates prior knowledge. Reducing the number of target vocabulary items required for mastery at one time, while ensuring students build genuine fluency with core expressions of preference, allows for success without overwhelming working memory. Sentence frames for the restaurant skit and structured dialogue templates give students a supported way to participate in interpersonal tasks and experience the communicative purpose of the language.
Gifted & Talented
Students who quickly acquire the unit's core vocabulary and preference expressions can be challenged to explore how food-related language varies across different Spanish-speaking regions, including dialectal differences in food names and mealtime terminology. Extending the restaurant skit or video project to incorporate culturally specific etiquette, regional menu items, or a comparative analysis of food traditions across multiple Spanish-speaking countries adds meaningful depth. Students might also examine the economic and social dimensions of food culture introduced in the financial literacy strand, connecting language production to more sophisticated cultural and analytical thinking.