Teaching Spanish grammar to English students<

Teaching Spanish grammar to English students

First of all, I want to thank Instituto Hemingway and my online teacher, Alfredo Orive for all the support and assessment along this course. It was very useful in different ways.

First, it made me reflect on my second native language and how I should focus my view towards teaching it. I have only taught English and the theoretical components of teaching it are not that different from those used in teaching Spanish.

However, I came to realize that the big difference lies in the curricular component and how students are affected by it. By curricular elements I mean the different stages a student goes through while she or he is learning the Spanish language. The communicative method works the same in both Spanish and English teaching, but the way to approach grammar and vocabulary do vary. The way we teach English tenses to Spanish students and the other way round may be similar in theory (different teaching methods); nevertheless, students’ reaction, behaviors or struggles are going to make the difference. And this course helped me deal with those struggles foreign students may have when learning Spanish.

Thus, this course gave me some techniques so I use them when teaching certain grammatical points such as tenses. Also it found this course a helpful warning because it provided me with some common struggles students have when they learn the language.