As you may already know, I teach Spanish in an IB (International Baccalaureate) school which means I am fortunate to teach Spanish B to some grade 11 students (16-17 years old). Spanish B is part of the Diploma Programme which is designed for students in the 16 to 19 age range. It is for students with some previous learning of Spanish. The main focus of the course is on language acquisition and development of language skills. These language skills are developed through the study and literary texts, and are related to the culture(s) concerned. The material should be chosen to enable students to develop mastery of language skills and intercultural understanding. It should not be intended solely for the study of specific subject matter or content. The language B syllabus approaches the learning of language through meaning and students cover core and optional topics.

One of the core topic we have covered so far is Social Relationships. For this topic I chose to focus on family relationships through the study of a book about the dictatorship in Argentina.

The book is entitled "La memoria de los seres perdidos" by Jordi Sierra I Fabra. It is about Estela who is born in Argentina and lives in Barcelona. She is  a happy young woman in love, and with a good family. Suddenly someone appears on the scene, from her past in Argentina, and disturbs 'the happy picture'… Estela finds out she is one of the daughter of the thousands of dissidents who disappeared during the Argentinean dictatorship in the 1970s. 
We spent several lessons reading the book and discussing it as the book (the Easy Reader version) comes up with questions for each chapter. As well as improving reading skills, the book provided numerous opportunities to develop speaking, writing and listening skills:

Writing a diary entry: students had to pretend they were Estela and had to write several diary entries on how she felt about finding out the truth about her real parents.

Having a conversation: students had to imagine a conversation between Estela's real aunt and her adoptive parents. What was the point of view of the auntie? What were the point of views of the adoptive parents who were part of the dictatorship?
They also watched a short documentary on YouTube about the "Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo".

After watching it, they had to pretend they were one of them and they were asking where their missing children were. They had to be desperate and to convey their feelings.

Watching testimonies: students watched another documentary where different people testify about what they have endured and still endure from the dictatorship.

This is the first year I teach Spanish B and I thought this topic was very interesting for my students, although quite challenging. The level of Spanish is now much more demanding than the IGCSE level and some of my students found it hard to understand the book. However, I do feel they are now proud to have managed to read it and to be able to discuss such topics. They also learnt a great deal about the Argentinean history and it links well with their History curriculum based on dictatorships. I really do recommend reading this book which is suspenseful and at the same time quite brutal.

What about you? Which interesting topics do you cover with your higher level language students?