If you’ve been following along, you know estar + prepositions + city vocabulary is one of my FAVORITE units to teach in Spanish 1. It’s the perfect combo of concrete vocabulary (kids can literally point to a hospital or a park) and a grammar structure they’ll use forever. I love to use this unit to remind students that things like prepositions and locations are super useful, especially if they’re traveling in a Spanish-speaking country.
But here’s the thing… I used to piece this unit together from a million different places. Now? I just open my En la Ciudad bundle and everything I need for a full 1-2 week unit is right there. No prep, no scrambling, no reinventing the wheel every single year.
Today I’m walking you through exactly how I use this bundle from day one all the way to the final project. Let’s get into it!
Why I Teach Estar + Prepositions + City Vocab Together
Students NEED a reason to use prepositions, and “where is the library in relation to the school” is about as real-world as it gets. Pairing city vocabulary (el banco, la biblioteca, el parque) with prepositions (al lado de, cerca de, entre) gives students something to actually talk about instead of just memorizing a list of words. It’s functional Spanish from day one.
Day 1: Conversation Cards + Vocabulary Practice
At this point in the year, my students already know estar conjugations soI like to open the unit with the Conversation Cards as a quick bell ringer. It’s nothing formal, just a peek at some of the vocabulary and prepositions they’ll be diving into. I also let them use their vocab sheet for any unfamiliar words that aren’t cognates. On the first day, I use the version with sentence stems so they can focus on speaking instead of panicking about what to say. It’s a low pressure way to plant the seed before the real teaching starts.
Then we get into En La Ciudad Map Activity #1 as the main event. Students get a city map and immediately start identifying locations and answering questions using estar. The visual support does SO much heavy lifting here – kids can see the pharmacy, so they don’t need me to translate farmacia for them.
Day 2: Review + New Map
We start with the Crossword & Word Search as a warm up review of yesterday’s vocabulary. It’s genuinely no prep and a perfect activity for the start of class. I like that this crossword has simple clues in Spanish, instead of just translating words.
Then it’s time for Map Activity #2. I never do two map activities back to back – spacing them out keeps the practice feeling fresh instead of feeling repetitive. This map activity has two versions, so I like to assign the one with sentence writing practice so it gives me a natural checkpoint to see who needs more support before we move on.
Day 3: Reading + Speaking
This is a big one, so we keep it to two solid activities. First, the Reading & Task Cards. I hang the cards around the room (hello, movement!) and students rotate, reading short passages and answering comprehension questions along the way. This is where I really start to see students reading Spanish independently instead of translating word by word.
Once we’ve read our way through, we flip to speaking with the Conversation Cards again, this time as a true partner activity. Students partner up and actually SPEAK using the vocabulary and prepositions they’ve been practicing all week. Reading right into speaking on the same day helps that vocabulary move from “recognize it” to “use it.”
Day 4: Third Map + Mid-Unit Check
By day 4, students have had a day away from a map activity, so bringing back Map Activity #3 feels new again instead of repetitive. I like the ending activity of version #2 in this worksheet. It gives students short sentences and clues of vocabulary words based on the map and they need to identify what it is. Take a look at this example:
👉Estoy muy lejos de la estación de correos. Estoy entre la estación de bomberos y la carnicería. Estoy cerca de la peluquería. ¿Dónde estoy?
To close out the day, I give one of the 4 Vocab Quiz options as a quick check for understanding. Having 4 different versions means I can use one for a quiz grade and save the others for retakes or absent students – no more scrambling to make a new version from scratch the night before!
Day 5: The Map Project
I always end this unit with the Map Project, where students design their OWN city map using estar, prepositions, and city vocabulary. This is hands down one of my favorite projects to grade because I get to see every student’s personality come through – some go minimalist, some design an entire fantasy city complete with a dulcería on every corner, and some are…well… not so good but I always appreciate their attempt. It’s the perfect way to wrap up the unit, and it doubles as a fantastic sub plan if you need a day off right after (no judgment, we’ve all been there). The final versions make a perfect bulletin board, too!
Why I Love Teaching This Unit as a Bundle
Everything is designed to work together, build on itself, and hit reading, writing, speaking, AND critical thinking before the unit is even over.
If you’re teaching locations and estar for the first time this year, or you just want to freshen up a unit that’s gotten a little stale, I can’t recommend this one enough.
Here’s my honest take: buying these as a bundle instead of piecing them together individually SAVES you money (20%, to be exact) AND saves you the mental math of “wait, did I already do this activity with this class?”
Final Thoughts
This unit is proof that grammar and vocabulary don’t have to be boring – when kids have a reason to talk about real places, they WANT to participate. Pair concrete vocabulary with a genuinely useful grammar structure, give them multiple ways to practice it (reading, speaking, writing, moving around the room), and by the end of the unit they’re not just memorizing prepositions, they’re using them.
Grab the full En la Ciudad bundle here and let me know how it goes in your classroom!
Stay in touch! Let me know what you thought about this blog post. Send me an email at hola@senorasol.com – I would love to hear from you! 🤩❤️