"A Million Miles Away" Complete Movie Unit for Heritage / L2 Spanish Class

The 2023 movie "A Million Miles Away" (Spanish: "A Millones de Kilómetros") from Prime Video has perfectly captured the unique and inspiring autobiographical story of José Hernández: first migrant farm worker in space. Originally delivered in a beautiful mixture of English and Spanish, this interdisciplinary and captivating film tells the story of how he became an astronaut with NASA and leaves you with a warm, fuzzy feeling as the credits roll.

This 8-day unit introduces students to three inter-connected topics: José Hernández's upbringing and professional career, migrant farm workers with the Bracero Program, and the desire to chase your dreams no matter how impossible they may seem. Don't have time to devote 2 weeks to the theme, but still want your students to glean as much as they can from the unit? In the teacher guide, I've also detailed how these activities can be meaningfully and individually introduced to your classes without losing out on valuable learning and discussion!

This collection of materials and resources goes so far beyond a traditional "comprehension question and answer" movie packet - your students will be engaged from beginning to end!

What's included in this resource?

- A complete teacher guide, walking you through each activity within the 8-day unit

- Movie viewing guide, with 15 comprehension questions and 7 analysis questions (included in both English and Spanish, answer key included!)

- A webquest about José Hernández's life, answer key included (great substitute for students who are absent!)

- Five Rancho Corrido songs from the movie, covering an array of topics, with reflection questions (each song is high school appropriate)

- Biographies and videos, with comprehension questions

- Webquest on Michoacán, México

- Webquest on the Bracero Program

- Movie analysis activities (metaphors / motifs)

- SEL project based on the movie

Please note: Due to the reflective and exploratory nature of this resource, it is not possible to provide an answer key for anything other than the movie questions and the webquest about José Hernández. Those answer keys are included in this resource.