Each year during the second week of March, the Young Adult Library Services Association sponsors Teen Tech Week. The national initiative focuses on building teens’ digital literacy, particularly by encouraging them to take advantage of educational and recreation technology at their local libraries.

To celebrate the impending Teen Tech Week, we’re launching our Teen Voices Spanish course! Intended for learners in grades 6+, the course follows the lives of the Garcia and Gómez families as they face typical situations like school days, chores and responsibilities, job shadowing, and organizing events. Conversations amongst the family members tie together the 20 units, each of which also includes a challenging reading passage and the Spanish language and Latin American culture.

In the “Dinner Time!” unit, for example, Alberto Garcia invites the new exchange student out to dinner, but has trouble paying the bill. (Ay Dios mio!) Students follow their conversation, learning new idioms for ordering food, polite expressions, and the use of indirect object pronouns like “te pago”. In the cultural reading section, learners will discover how the typical eating schedule in Latin American countries differs from that in the United States.

The online platform includes a full suite of learning activities that build computer skills alongside Spanish skills. While mastering vocabulary and internalizing grammar rules, students can practice recording audio and typing on a virtual Spanish keyboard. Companion vocabulary lists for both the conversations and cultural readings will also be available in a mobile app, exposing students to e-learning on different platforms.

Both homeschooled and traditionally-schooled learners will enjoy 80+ hours of content focused on the everyday lives of typical teens, packed with vocabulary they will actually want to use. Also included is a workbook for additional grammatical, cultural, and lexical practice. Teachers have access to an answer key for the workbook as well as an instructor guide that outlines how to conveniently implement the 20 unit course in any school or schedule.

Ready to start learning? Vamos! Find a library near you who offers Transparent Language Online.

None close by? Print this info card and bring it to your local librarians to let them know you’re interested, or sign up for the free trial!