Spanish Class is an Official Waste of Time
It’s almost the end of Spanish I for me, in 3 months all the pain, all the suffering shall end. Why? Because instead of continuing for Spanish II, I’m skippin’ to Spanish III! Spanish I is so boring, we watched this stupid movie, it was old and not entertaining, and it took like 4 class periods and we weren’t allowed to do other things, it was lame. Then we had to write a paper about it. When I printed it out the fucking, good for nothing print ate most of the words (it’s been doign that recently) and the teacher rejected it! Saying that it wasn’t done! Yeah you couldn’t read the top half very well, BUT YOU COULD TELL IF YOU TRIED YOU KNEW IT WAS TYPED! He gave me a fucking Zero! I don’t know what his deal is, not my fault that I’m good when it comes to foreign language and that I’m surpassing everyone in the class (obviously not the teacher, but duh!) He always grades me on a ridiculous level! Now, I’m not a model student, but I do my homework always know the right answer and all that stuff that shows that I know what I’m talking about! Usually I know the vocabulary before we even go over it, and my knowledge of verbs surpasses all of the kids in my class. Then again, none of them take it seriously, NONE OF THEM. I just take it seriously because I need it to talk to mi hermana en Chile, so without it, I can’t talk to the only one on the planet who had the same mother and father as I did. We wasted a whole class talking about solving the immigration problem, it was POINTLESS we can’t do anything, and it has NOTHING to do with the Hispanic/Latino Culture or the Language, ’cause let’s face it, there are 0ther illegal people from other countries, so what if we notice the Hispanic/Latino culture more? It’s just ’cause they stand out in this society, most of them have darker complexions. But Europeans with a paler complexion could totally go longer without being noticed. RAWR! I don’t get where he gets off giving me a Zero! He’s sexist, and I’m not saying that just because he gave me a zero for homework that I had done, but he’s always been like that, hinting heavily that a woman belongs at home with the children. Which is ridiculous! Hello! Living in an expensive part of town means TWO people should be working, and unless she’s married to two men (which I’m pretty sure is ILLEGAL) then she’d have to work to, I mean, to get food, pay the rent or mortgage or whatever you pay for your house, then electricity, then water, then furniture, and pets or kids if you have any, hygiene (fem. stuff, deodorant, etc.) and luxuries (’cause we all have them in my part of town) you know, cell phones, internet, new computers, new laptops, magazines, makeup/nail polish, etc. I swear, I’m going to save alot of money up north and then move down south and live like a rich girl ;P Please forgive my ignorance when it comes to the South, everything is cheaper down there…wow, and this all started with “Spanish Class is an Official Waste of Time” Thank you lack of focus, my credits to school… and all their discussions that start with Shakespeare and end up with the conclusion that the sun, indeed, is truly a bran muffin…
Melissa MB Wilkins said,
April 26, 2008 at 4:36 pm
I am horrified! Of course, I can’t say I’m surprised, but I am constantly running into stories like this, particularly at the high school level. It makes me SO glad that I had a WONDERFUL French teacher in High School that really focused on the language and helping us be able to speak in French. It was part of the reason that I decided to major in French when I was trying to decide what subject I wanted to teach, and why I placed into Senior Level French when I took the college placement exam. Almost all of the other kids with me in college could read and write the language, but felt VERY uncomfortable speaking it. After I had my degree and teaching certificate in French, I started working towards my certificate in Spanish. I really enjoyed it, and eventually started teaching 100% Spanish instead of 1/2 day of each language (there aren’t many schools around here that do both in elementary school, and though I started out as a Middle School teacher, the opportunity opened at an elementary and I’ve been at that level ever since). I considered going back for a master’s degree in Spanish, only to find out that the world of Academia would rather I do nothing but study Spanish literature. Well, that’s all FINE if you are going to do that your whole life, or you are teaching AP Spanish in a high school and are doing a lot of literature with your students, but what about SPEAKING THE LANGUAGE? What about classes in cultures of different Hispanic countries and the language differences between them? What about learning different styles of correspondance? How about computer vocabulary? More daily slang? You can’t find ANY WHERE that emphasizes these things. You have to learn it all on your own. There isn’t a master’s degree anywhere around here that I have found that will teach me Spanish skills to help me be a better Spanish teacher. For that, I’m on my own. That’s sad.
This is part of why I think so many Spanish teachers seem to stink at actually teaching the language. Me? I could easily have been a classroom teacher, and almost decided to be a science teacher at the middle grades or high school level instead of a language teacher. I truly believe learning should be fun, and that you have to teach with the abilities and interests of your students in mind. This is why I work hard to make learning fun and useful for my students, why I level instruction (my advanced speakers that come in with prior knowledge from immersion schools or from homes in which Spanish is spoken don’t need to sit through 20 mintues of work on the primary colors if they already know them… they can go off and work on advanced colors like “cream” “tan” “beige” “sky blue” and other things that they may not know, and why I pay hundreds of dollars a year to provide them with leveled reading material to meet their instructional needs). I was NOT taught how to do any of this. While I was studying Cervantes in Spanish and the History of Education in Education school, the people studying general early education were learning how to manage reading groups and student portfolios, how to motivate students, etc. My training was a completely disconnected from what I REALLY needed to be learning! Now, if your teacher was trained like me (or in the years preceding), he/she probably was taught TONS about classical Spanish, and little to nothing about how to teach it. If your teacher was trained for the upper grades (I was trained for a K-12 certificate, but you used to have to pick between an upper grades and lower grades certificate route). He/she probably received no training on how to provide differentiated instruction for students at different ability levels. I have noticed that my students that go on to study at the high school level almost always receive nothing but whole-class lecture and practice, whereas with me they were used to a whole-class review and practice followed by “break out” groups in which they could continue their studies at their own levels. I would have one group learning 1-10 while others were doing math with numbers into the thousands at the same time.
So I understand, believe me! I think there are fundamental problems with the upper-grades education system in general, and in the training and methods of foreign language instructors in general. Unfortunately, you are one of the many students suffering because of it.
I sincerely hope that you receive the challenge you need in Spanish III, and that you find the resources online you need to develop the level of proficiency you desire.