How It Works

Cantarama is a classroom music tournament that brings Spanish to life through songs, creativity, and community. Each year, students around the world listen, vote, and celebrate Hispanic culture — all while having fun.

Objectives

Celebrate Hispanic culture and language through music.
Introduce students to new artists and songs in Spanish.
Build excitement for language learning by connecting classrooms across the globe.
Encourage creativity and self-expression through student contests.

For the 2026-2027 school year, Cantarama is hosting a battle of the genres themed bracket.

4 Salsa songs will compete against 4 bachata songs, 4 rock songs, and 4 songs representing regional mexican music.

To participate in the bracket prediction contest, students can preview the songs and make predictions before Feb. 1st.

Here's a 3 minute overview of Cantarama:

Video too fast? Here's a slideshow to view at your own pace.

Love it? Join us! Subscribe to get access to all the resources and help fund the prizes!

Concursos (contests) Cantarama

Overview of the individual and class contests & prizes.

This video is from 2025-2026. I changed the T-shirt design contest to an "act / dance the lyrics" contest. I will update a video soon.

How to vote & discuss results

See how to vote & get ideas for how to extend the results and discuss in multiple tenses

Example lesson from my Spanish 1 class

Here is a video from my Spanish 1 class discussing a previous battle.

Normally I don't talk about the vote itself for this long, but it was a really intense (back and forth) vote, so I was milking it.

I felt okay using past tense / present progressive because they understand the concept for the tournament and we do it a little each week.

I love that it provides consistent numbers practice.

PS I didn't realize I am so loud when I teach. I'll try and check myself for next year ;)

How to videos:

4 ways to run a bracket contest

You don't have to run a bracket, but it can be fun!

The last idea is the easiest!

This video and examples are from 2025-2026 so the dates of the national bracket and song examples need to be updated, but the ideas are still good!

Timing & ideas for teaching

How would this look in a normal week?

What to say to the haters

There's a lot we can learn even from songs we don't like

BATALLA CANTARAMA: The Bracket Challenge

The songs will be selected by the end of summer 2026.
The 2027 tournament kicks off February 1st and runs until May 14th.
Each week, two songs battle head-to-head.
Voting opens Monday–Friday.

Students / classes can make their own bracket predictions or just vote and follow along.

Details / Rules:

Students listen to the weekly songs in class (or at home) and vote for their favorite to advance.
Each student may vote once per battle.
Teachers can decide whether to show the official music video or a lyric-only version.
Voting is hosted securely on the Cantarama site.
Check out the practice vote to see it for yourself

Battle of the genres (US Letter (Landscape)) (2).png

Ways to participate / levels of engagement

Every classroom is different — so Cantarama is flexible!

Pick the track that works best for you and your students

🌊 Dip Your Toes In

Put the playlist on in the background during the week.
Pick a “Música Miércoles” (or any day you choose!) to play the weekly battle songs.
Use it as a warm-up, brain break, or quick conversation starter.

🎵 Sing Along

Incorporate the lesson activities for each song to dive deeper into the lyrics and culture.
Build connections by discussing the themes of the music in Spanish or learning about the artists.
Maybe focus on something different each round (example: first round, just listen and give opinion, second round songs learn about the artists or take a deeper look at the lyrics, etc)

🏆 Bracket Masters

Have students fill out their own brackets and compete in the national contest.
Run a mini-tournament within your own class or between multiple classes.
Offer small prizes! (In the past, I’ve tracked points in Google Forms, and reached out to a local restaurant who donated gift cards to winners in each class! It never hurts to ask! I also threw a party for the class with the highest average. They bought in big time! Discussing points and averages and voting results was another sneaky way for them to work on numbers!

📅 Long Game

Teach the songs throughout the year so students are already familiar with them by spring.
By the time the bracket begins, your class will be experts in the songs and extra invested.

✨ Bonus Track: Comunidad Cantarama

No matter which level you choose, join Comunidad Cantarama! By subscribing, you get early acess to resources and during the contest you'll get a weekly slideshow done for you! In addition, your students can enter creative contests (art, writing, video, performance) and have their work featured, with prizes from Latino-owned businesses.

Student Contests 🎨🎤🎶

When teachers join Concursos Cantarama, their students get access to a series of fun, creative contests that run alongside the bracket. These are optional, but they’re a great way to deepen engagement and give students chances to shine.

The Student Contests for the songs:

Smash Doodle – Pick a song a visually represent it, focusing on certain lyrics and vocab, etc.
Visual Dictionary – Student-made illustrations of key vocabulary
Roxxem Challenge – Compete to see who studies the songs most using the Roxxem platform.
Cover Song – Perform your own version of one of the Cantarama songs.
Karaoke Cover – Sing along with the instrumental track and make it your own.
Dance the lyrics– represent lines from the song with actions / gestures

Class Contests

Sing and Act out the lyrics – Classes work together to produce a creative performance one of the songs.
Roxxem Class Contest

Prizes

Finalists are featured on the members-only site for the entire Cantarama community to see and help vote for the winners
Winners receive prizes from Latino-owned businesses, celebrating culture and giving back to the community.

How to Participate:

Contests are open only to teachers who join Concursos Cantarama.
Membership is $25 per year (or $20 with a subscription), which helps fund the prizes, the site, and donates to a music non-profit in Dominican Republic, the Bachata Academy
This includes access to the contests, lesson materials, and exclusive subscriber resources.