Cinco de Mayo con tamales y música conmovedora

Yesterday I celebrated Cinco de Mayo by cooking tamales with my students. This is the third year in a row that I have done this. The last two years I taught middle school Spanish to a reluctant audience. Spanish was required for all students and "Why do we have to learn Mexican!" was heard on more than one occasion from parents and students alike. Echoing the sentiments of the country at large, many of my students had no interest in adopting a foreign language but they cheered at the prospect of adopting a delicious new cuisine.

This photo is by Joe Marinaro.

Cooking with students (especially middle school students) can be very rewarding. I have noticed that some of the most poorly-behaved students in the regular classroom setting are the most mature and responsible in the kitchen. (It turns out that they are the ones cooking mac and cheese for their younger siblings while mom is working the late shift at McDonald's.) Tamales are a great food to cook with a class because there is so much to do and the more pairs of hands, the better. When I taught middle school worked out a wonderfully developmentally-appropriate system. The 6th graders shredded the meat with their fingers first thing in the morning, the 8th graders worked on the more complicated steps like seasoning the meat and mixing the batter, and then the seventh graders would dutifully wrap all of the tamales up in corn husks.

I follow this recipe. The first time I ever made tamales was with my students my first year of teaching. I know, such an idiot! BUT, that should attest to the quality of the recipe. The recipe suggests cooking the meat on the first day and then preparing the tamales the following day. I broke it down one step further and boiled all the meat at my house the night before cooking we cooked in class. Then at school we prepared the meat and the tamales (each class working on a different step throughout the day). Then the following day I steamed the big pot of tamales early in the morning and we ate them in class. (Obviously, or not, the steaming time will be longer if you are starting with refrigerated tamales.) Another option, which I did for this Cinco de Mayo, is cooking the tamales right after they are prepared. I let them cool and then I stored them in the refrigerator overnight. It's possible to either steam them or microwave them before serving them in class.

My middle school had a science lab with four stoves and lab tables but you really only need one burner or possibly even just a microwave. The only actual cociendo that you have to do with the kids is warming the seasoning and the broth. You also need to secure enough refrigerator space for storing tamales and meat between classes and overnight before you cook them. The hardest part for me has been organizing enough tables, cookie sheets, cutting boards, and bowls so that you can divide up the ingredients and spread them out. Then the kids can work in groups of two to four and have enough space.

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I usually show some kind of short video on Cinco de Mayo and the Battle at Puebla and explain how it's not Independence Day yadda, yadda. And then with middle school we eat and play a review game that the kids like. With older kids, or higher level middle schoolers, I like to teach the song Los hijos de Hernandez by Los Tigres del Norte. It's about Mexicans who "take the place" of anglos in different ways. Like many of Los Tigres' songs that recount the experiences of the Mexican working class, Los hijos de Hernandez uses very straightforward language to paint an empathetic portrait of Mexican immigrants that is difficult to deny. And in light of recent political posturing on immigration, we could use a little empathy and understanding. It is also really appropriate for Cinco de Mayo because it demonstrates the military link between the US and Mexico that has existed since the Battle of Puebla in 1862. 

Here's a CLOZE activity for the song with some new vocabulary. I really like CLOZE activities because it gives me a reason to play the song enough times for students to start to like it and think it's catchy. Then I explain the new vocabulary, any major grammar (i.e. if it ends in aba or ía it is past tense), I ask them to predict the general theme of the song, and then we go through translating the song and discussing what kind of statement the artist is trying to make. You can download this document by clicking EXPORT.




I'd love to read any comments on this topic. Do you have any special Cinco de Mayo activities that have passed the test of time? Or maybe you have an idea or resource that you haven't had the chance to try yet? Have you had success cooking with language classes? What are the most difficult obstacles that you've had to deal with?

Any other good music related to Cinco de Mayo? Being out of the country, it's difficult to know the degree to which the recent events in Arizona have impacted students' ideas in different parts of the country. How do you think your students would react to the themes in Los hijos de Hernandez?