New Year, New Plan

Welcome all! This is the first time I've ever written a blog, so please hang with me as I try to figure this whole thing out. I wanted to start this blog at the beginning of my first year of teaching, but I have no idea where the first four months went! I've gotten a little more settled into my classroom now and feel ready to tackle this challenge.


I think you should know a little bit about who I am so that you may better understand my future posts. I am a first year teacher at an elementary school. I teach Spanish, grades 3-5. I live in the city of Chicago, but don't work anywhere close to my apartment, so I take the Metra an hour each way, with walking on either side. I'm a newlywed, whose husband is also a teacher (high school - science) but this is his last year teaching since he's applying to med school. I can't begin to tell you how valuable he has been for my first year of teaching. I studied education at the University of Michigan, but my husband fell into the career path through Teach for America. He and I teach in two wildly different environments, different subjects, and have wildly different views on the profession of teaching. I see it as a lifelong journey for myself, while he sees it as a break after college as he applies to med schools. His experiences have definitely informed my teaching though, and I am grateful for all the tips and advice he gives me. Without his knowledge of what it feels like to struggle as a first year teacher, this year would be much, much harder for me. So although it's not the career path for him, I am grateful that teaching was a part of his life for a little bit. So is he and he's told me many times, "Never will I underestimate what it takes to be a teacher. Not that I ever thought it was easy, but anytime that you come home exhausted, with more work still to do, I will do everything possible to help you." Isn't he the best!? That's why I married him :)


Now for the juicy stuff... the reason I am starting this blog. After discovering that I am a World Language teacher, many people want to tell me about their language experience. I love to listen to these stories, although often times it breaks my heart. I hear stories about people sitting in class, listening to a teacher drone on and on about grammar. Or about the classes where all they did was to memorize vocabulary lists and do activities out of an outdated textbook. Sometimes, people were forced to translate Spanish to English, English to Spanish and this was all they did. Or my favorite... the audio-lingual method. Students listened to, and then memorized specific sets of dialogue. While they may have perfected this small part of language, this style of teaching leaves no room for improvisation. So when it comes time to speak to a native speaker, if that native speaker doesn't know the other part of the dialogue, the student will be forever lost in the conversation. There are many other ineffective ways of teaching a language. This is not to say of course, that these methods did not produce some learning of the language. However, this is not the most effective, or let's face it, fun, way to learn to speak another language. My experience has varied with my teachers. I've learned through a variety of the previously mentioned methods, but also with more interactive styles. For the most part, I had a very pleasant and worthwhile experience, which is why Spanish has stayed such a big part of my life. When I decided to become a world language teacher, I vowed to teach in a way that is as effective and engaging as possible, using some of how I was taught, combining that with how I was taught to teach, and all of the research I am currently doing to stay up-to-date on new methods. With all that in mind, this is why I started this blog. I want to document my research and findings, get feedback, and bounce ideas off my peers, all in hopes of becoming the best teacher I can possibly be. I want to show what it's like to be on the other side of the Spanish classroom.