Use Wordle to Teach Spanish to Children

You might be familiar with Wordle, the really fun website that makes word clouds with any text. Wordle is a great tool for adding Spanish to any space.

The program works with individual words, so to make it an effective tool for children learning Spanish you will need to use related vocabulary and add context. You can add context by making a Wordle to describe a photograph and displaying them together. Another option is to make a poster that describes an object or a room in the house. Hang the Wordle in the room or on the object. You can also make a Wordle related to a picture book or story.

The size of the words in Wordle will be determined by their relative frequency in the text. In other words, the word that appears most often will be the largest. Enter the object or place that you are focusing on more than any other, and then enter related words that you want to appear in your poster. The easiest way to do this is to use a word processor and decide which words you want on your poster. Then copy and paste each of the words several times. If you are making a Wordle for puerta, your text might look something like this:

puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta puerta
tocar tocar tocar tocar tocar tocar tocar tocar tocar tocar tocar tocar tocar tocar tocar tocar tocar
abrir abrir abrir abrir abrir abrir abrir abrir abrir abrir abrir abrir abrir abrir abrir abrir abrir abrir
cerrar cerrar cerrar cerrar cerrar cerrar cerrar cerrar cerrar cerrar
madera madera madera madera madera madera madera madera madera madera madera
timbre timbre timbre timbre timbre timbre timbre timbre timbre timbre
seguridad seguridad seguridad seguridad seguridad seguridad seguridad seguridad
privacidad privacidad privacidad privacidad privacidad privacidad privacidad

Copy and paste the text into Wordle.  It will create a word cloud, and then you have the option to change the font, the layout and the colors. You can choose black and white to save ink, or click on the screen to get the outline of the letters.

The text above produced this Wordle:

Then print your poster and hang it on an object, with a photo or with a picture you have drawn.

This is a good exercise for agreement. If you are using adjectives to describe something, they will have to agree. For example, if you were making a Wordle about this picture of flores,

the text might look something like this:

flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores floresflores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores flores

rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas rojas

amarillas amarillas amarillas amarillas amarillas amarillas amarillas amarillas amarillas amarillas amarillas amarillas amarillas amarillas amarillas amarillas amarillas amarillas amarillas amarillas

hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas hermosas

bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas bonitas.

This is a Wordle from that text:

Making a Wordle about a story is another way to establish context and to focus on the key elements of a narration. If you have an online version of the story, it is fun for kids to predict which words are going to be the biggest. Logically, these should be the most important elements in the story. Then, copy and paste the story into Wordle. This is a Wordle made from an online version of Caperucita Roja (Little Red Riding Hood). As you can see, the characters and the setting feature prominently.

Wordle is lots of fun to use. Just playing with the layout and color is very entertaining! Putting in the words of a favorite song, a rhyme or poem, or even a list of vocabulary words is interesting enough to keep children playing with Spanish and engaged with the language.