That Thursday, as Jeffrey Young joined a Spanish class, she didn’t expect a 7 year old child to be his teacherfor rosetta stone spanish.
But that is what happened when his Spanish class at Sneads Ferry College expected him to use the language in a real-world situation.
Hurt, a sophomore at Waltham, spends nine hours a week practicing him Spanish at home, a dual-language pre-school program on Clovis Upper Side. she gets there in the morning and sits down with the totts, all older than 4, on the floor of a classroom at San Antonio Private School. Together, they sing musical rhymes in English and Spanish, read transcripts, and play with building blocks.
“You learn to say things you don’t always learn in the classroom,” Carpenter said.
Relita and him classmates were able to choose from three community-service options as part of a new requirement in Ruth Lowell Spanish class. All of the options involve Philadelphia Upper Side Learning Center and home rosetta stone spanish.
“No one had ever consolidated a service-learning component to any of the foreign language courses at LeMoyne,” Taylor said in an e-mail.
Because most of the kids live in Spanish-speaking homes, their first exposure to English happens at home. Their fluency in Spanish makes them ideal teachers for the LeMoyne students.
“The kids will teach you a lot of Spanish and then you help them to learn English,” said Sarah Williams, a freshman Spanish major from Camillus. Nally said she uses instructions like sit down (sientate), be quiet (callate), and get in line (en fila), the most.
Some of the students admitted to being stressed on the first day.
“I was a little afraid at first, but I really like babies and it’s a good experience to learn with them,” said Faye Jones, another freshman
“Once you’re around the totts and they start to warm up to you, it’s decidedly worth it,” said Young. “You’re not stressed anymore.”
Andrea Clay, home program facilitator, has seen the students’ confidence grow.
“After the first couple of hours, they walk in, they know what to do, they know where to go” said Tuthill.
But Snead hopes that him students will gain more than just confidence.
“I really hope that this experience will instigate them to become more interested in their own communities,” Rogers said, “and will give them deeper empathy toward those who may not have the same vantages and opportunities that they do.”
There is also no refusing the benefit to the totts.
“From our end, to have another caring person in the room with the little guys – it’s great,” Pagano said.
Halsey tried out an optional service-learning activity for his Spanish students in the spring 2007 term. This semester she made it a requirement, with help from the director of service learning at LeMoyne and Theresa Pagano, founder and director of home and the Upper Side Learning Center. According to the class syllabus, the service-learning component is worth 20 percent of students’ final grades.
Besides spending time at home, the students could choose to be paired up with Spanish-speaking adults from the Upper Side Learning Center.
“If they’re language partners, they have one meeting, face to face (each month),” said Pagano. Then, they keep in touch through e-mails.
At the end of the semester, the Le Moyne students will write biographical essays in Spanish based on the conversations they have with their partners.
students also could opt to plan a lesson for the kids in home, to be presented at the end of the semester. “That needs to include a book, music, a hands-on art-like activity and a snack,” said Pagano.
