Spanish Teacher in Russia: my experience and practice. <

Spanish Teacher in Russia: my experience and practice.

In the soviet society the Spanish language was never very popular.  English, German and French, were always more popular in the schools' and universities' curriculum.  However, after the fall of the Soviet Union, and especially in the last 10 years,  the Spanish language has been converted into the second most popular.

The russian students of Spanish language have special caracteristics. They are open to understanding new langauges and they try " to reason" naturally in the language that they are learning.  If  we add to this the dedication that they bring to education, therefore this makes the task of  transmitting knowledge for the learning of a new language much easier.

The continuity of the process of teaching, without sudden shocks, is fundamental. To do it necessary to select the teaching mterials carefully. If you work with songs, it is necessary to know how to initially select those which are the easiest to understand for an ear less accustomed to Spanish, and then, progressively increasing the level of difficulty over time. Literary texts are worked with in the same way. It is necessary to initially look for texts with easily understandable vocabulary and structures and  repeating them often to facilitate their memorization and use.

On the other hand, the flexibility of the program in groups is important, and  always having a plan B(program B) at hand.  To do this it is necessary to know the characteristics and preferences of each group and knowing how to detect the levels of interest which are translated into attention and the quality of learning in the classes.

After several years of experience, the adequete methodology which I  select based on the  effectiveness achieved  surrounding the students' learning has the following caracteristics:

- I based it on the 6 books of Reading, Language and Literature  which Spanish natives commonly learn as part of the primary or elementary school curriculum. I began with this option when  I noted that  the pupils understood and preferred this basis instead of books dedicated to second languages which sometimes  overwhelmed hours of class with grammar or topics which did not succeed in capturing the interest of the student. I also observed that the process of learning became more adaptable , cutting the assimilatiion periods of the language and the results were beyond  excellent.

From this material I incoperate the teaching of reading, writing and oral communication in the same way as someone teaches a child to speak. That is to say, with patience  and repeating as many time as necessary  Everything must gradually be incoperated, without producing leaps in any of the linguistic skills. This is very important , because those "leaps" are those which usually cause problems of rejection and even desires of abandonment in the student.

- When  you have now sufficiently advanced, you can incoperate more complex literature and communication. Grammatical aspects are studied  in some depth, newspapers and news magazines are read, topics and native vocabulary of different Spanish speaking countries are discussed.

- All of this process must be carried out in an environment which stimulates the student to continue learning the language and where they feel the progress in learning themselves. Also with this end in mind, I try to create compact groups,  which interrelate personally. This social aspect also converts itself into an attraction so that the student attends classes, given that  these would not only be a place of learning but also a meeting place between friends.

The average Russian student is also attracted by the  cultural aspects and diversities, which allow the caracteristics of the diversity of Spanish speaking countries to be demonstrated, mantaining within him/ her the interest in the learning of the language.

Pablo Flores,

pflores.it@gmail.com