GCSE Spanish Vocabulary: Technology, Environment and Where You Live

Every paper of the reformed GCSE in Spanish (first exams in 2026) is built from a defined vocabulary list of about 1,200 word families at Foundation tier and a further 500 at Higher tier. This material covers two topics of the third theme, Communication and the world around us: media and technology, and the environment and where people live, as they are organised, for example, in AQA's specification. Other boards use different topic titles, but the words themselves come up everywhere: a reading text about screen time, a listening extract about recycling, a photo of a busy street, a writing task about your town.

The quiz tests each word in a short Spanish sentence: time in front of the screen, uploading photos, keeping a password safe, cyberbullying, reading the news, too many adverts, recycling plastic and paper, air pollution in cities, saving energy, living in the countryside, noise in your neighbourhood. The last question asks for the Spanish word for rubbish among other words from the topic. Two questions use Higher-tier words and are marked. The explanations point out words that look like English ones but mean something else, such as noticias (news), campo (countryside) and subir (to upload).

The twenty-five flashcards give the Spanish, with its article, and the English: screens and computers, the internet and social media, uploading and downloading, messages, posting online, passwords, bullying and danger, news, newspapers, adverts and television, the environment, pollution, recycling, rubbish, energy, turning things off, climate and the planet, protecting, plastic, neighbourhood, countryside, village and town, noise, traffic and trees. Higher-only words are marked.

The written sheet practises the vocabulary actively: recall in both directions, a translation each way, a gap-fill, a paragraph about how you use technology with an advantage and a danger, a paragraph about where you live and what you do for the environment, and an explanation of four words that are easily confused with English ones. Model answers show a correct version and the points a marker would check.

Learn the cards both ways, then check with the quiz that you recognise the words in context, and use the written sheet to build answers you can reuse in the photo card conversation and the writing paper.

• Recognise and use the GCSE Spanish vocabulary for screens, the internet, social media and the news
• Talk about the advantages and dangers of technology, including cyberbullying (Higher)
• Use the vocabulary of pollution, recycling, rubbish and saving energy
• Describe where you live: neighbourhood, town, countryside, noise and traffic
• Avoid confusing noticias, campo, subir and anuncio with English look-alikes

Practice material written by Zestly, based on the DfE GCSE modern foreign languages subject content (2022) and on the Theme 3 topics Media and technology and The environment and where people live, and the Spanish vocabulary list in AQA's GCSE Spanish specification (8692, version 1.0, Appendix 2), used here as an example. The sentences are original.