Following on from yesterday’s post, another poem from my new book Los Mejores Versos de Gloria Fuertes.

I was drawn to this one firstly by the brevity and then for the repetition, both things that work well for younger learners!

I also like the theme – peace. Whilst it’s not International Day of Peace until September 21st I don’t think you need a special day to celebrate these things!

If you wanted to use this poem in class, you could ask children to consider their own PAZ poem – what words would they choose for each letter? Perhaps three verbs like pensar, actuar, zanjar conflicto (think, act and resolve conflict) or nouns likes paciencia, acción y un zapatazo a la guerra (patience, action and a kick to war) As you can see, z is a tricky letter so you might want to allow words that contain a Z and write it as an acrostic. For example, you could have:
Paciencia
communidAd
esperanZa

Alternatively you could challenge children with another word like AMOR or VIDA, or even their own name, choosing words in Spanish that apply to them.
I might write
Libros
Idiomas
Sol
Amistad

I collected some resources for Día de la Paz on Pinterest including the following images that might go well with this poem or could equally be used alone.

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And of course there’s this famous song Que canten los niños:

How might you use the poem? Do share your ideas in the comments!

An approximate translation:
Just three letters
Three letters, nothing more.
Just three letters
That forever you will learn.
Just three letters to write PAZ (peace).
The P, the A, the Z; just three letters.
Just three letters,
Three letters, nothing more:
To sing peace,
To make peace.

The P of pueblo (the people)
The A of amar (love)
and the Z of zafiro (sapphire) or zagal (young boy)
‘zafiro’ for the blue world; ‘zagal’ for a child like you.
You don’t have to be wise or need bayonets,
If you only learn these three letters well;
Use them when you’re older and there’ll be peace in the world.

Tags: GloriaFuertesicupeacepoetryprimarylanguagesspanishspeaking