My opinion on the Spanish as a Foreign Language Course for teachers
When I began to look for information about courses for Spanish teachers for foreigners I surprisingly found that there was not a single face-to-face course offered in my city.This really attracted my attention, since I live in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, where there is a huge immigrant population from other countries, with so many different nationalities and with quite an important volume of tourists, It seemed to me that the logical thing was to have one.
I therefore decided to look on the internet. Soon after looking I
had decided that the course I carried out should be accredited by the
Instituto Cervantes, the public body created by Spain in 1991 to promote
and teach Spanish and co-official languages and to increase people’s
awareness of Spanish and Spanish American culture.
I read many
reviews before deciding to go ahead and sign up to the course offered by
Instituto Hemingway, and it was these reviews that encouraged me to
this. Therefore, I do not want to let the opportunity to help other
teachers that like me, want to move toward teaching Spanish to
foreigners.
Online courses are usually unfriendly and boring
with little communicative opportunities making it difficult to finish
them. In this case, Alfredo Orive made sure that all of these
stereotypes were not the case. His friendliness, his approachability and
his permanent readiness to provide assistance, encourage you to
continue advancing. His comments on the exercises are always
constructive criticism with suggestions on how to improve.
I am
delighted to have chosen this course because it has not only given me
knowledge about teaching Spanish that I did not know but it has also
provided confirmation that when we are approachable and welcoming
teachers, our students learn more and their learning is improved. As
Einstein said “Setting an example is not the main means of influencing
others, it is the only means”.
Thank you Alfredo Orive and thank you Instituto Hemingway.