The task of teaching Spanish as a foreign language
My career as a teacher started no more than a few months ago. I instinctively thought that it was something that I was going to enjoy and so I did a course to be an English teacher, my second language. The experience that I have had up until now has been fantastic.
The reason why I did this course was so that I had the possibility of becoming a Spanish teacher in a foreign country and to continue living the experience that was enjoying so much. I must say that this course has surprised me greatly as it is just as good as the course I did in English. It seems to me that both approaches are the path to follow, communicative and making the student the heart of the learning process.
If you have experienced having been taught with the traditional method you would know that something about this method does not work. It was not participatory nor encouraged interaction nor entailed a real use of language. For me it surprises me that after having spent years using this system I could not make myself understand it and my knowledge of writing and reading was limited. With the philosophy of this course the students not only learn more but the classes are much more but the classes are much more pleasant and fun. Learning can be fun. This was unimaginable with the traditional method.
In my short experience as a teacher I have also observed that learning can take place when we do not intervene. If the instructions are good, the students will know what they have to do and they will use the language, interacting among one another. If they are absorbed by the task and using language then you know that they are doing a good job. I believe that it is necessary to persevere when this happens and try to interrupt it as little as possible. Limit our interventions to a minimum. Us teachers we are not the protagonists, our students are. Teaching starts and ends with them, with us in the middle catalysing the process. I believe that it is very rewarding for us and for them, and very effective.