New Field Primary School, Chicago IL
Enroll in intensive language classes with a homestay in San Pedro, Guatemala, to communicate more effectively with students and their families, many of whom have recently moved from Spanish-speaking countries.
The overarching purpose of my trip was to improve myself as a bilingual educator. Here I am taking a brief photo break during one of the 80 hours of Spanish classes I completed while in San Pedro La Laguna.
I volunteered at Asociación Somos Hijos del Lago, a non profit that provides individual speech therapy, physical therapy, music therapy, psycology, and other servies to kids with disabilities from communities around Lake Atitlan
The psychologist from Somos Hijos del Lago and I teamed up to present on disabilities and inclusion in the public schools of San Pedro la Laguna
I lived with a host family in San Pedro la Laguna for four weeks. This was key to learning about the Tz'utujil culture in depth. We cooked together, wove together, and went to the market together. They also invited me to some events around town.
To further embrace the culture, I took a backstrap weaving class. I continued my work after class and completed a scarf after 5 days of hard work.
After leaving San Pedro la Laguna, I had one last adventure; climbing the Acatenango and Fuego Volcanos! It was a huge challenge, with about 10 hours of mostly steep uphill hiking and sleeping at over 12,000 feet.
A powerful learning experience was my homestay with a Guatemalan family. Immersed in daily life, I practiced Spanish in a natural setting, gaining insights into local values and expectations for education. Another impactful experience was volunteering at Somos Hijos del Lago, where I learned specalized vocabulary and strategies for supporting children with disabilities, enhancing my ability to engage meaningfully with Latino families and contribute to more equitable educational practices.
My first day of Spanish class knocked down my confidence with the language a bit. My teacher had me translate some complex stories so she could find what kind of errors I tended to make, and I realized I was confused about some topics I thought I had previously mastered. However, I had 80 hours of Spanish class, plus time volunteering and with my host family to intentionally work on this, and left a more confident yet humbled speaker, knowing there is still more work to be done.
My first day volunteering at Somos Hijos del Lago, I mentioned to the director that I had passed by the San Pedro Ministry of Education and that I introduced myself to the staff there. I was able to partner with our psychologist to create and present on disability and inclusion to six different classes at a public school in San Pedro La Laguna. Somos Hijos del Lago plans to continue to use the presentation and materials I created to continue to present at the other public schools in town.
This fellowship was another step in my journey to continue to improve my command of the Spanish language. This improvement will help me better serve my students by being able to teach students with disabilities in Spanish as part of my school's bilingual education program alongside their bilingual peers. As my school's MTSS (intervention) lead, this year I plan to offer more research-based reading and math interventions in Spanish for our students who speak Spanish as their first language.
I will incorporate what I learned to create high-quality reading intervention lessons that teach young Spanish speakers how to read in Spanish. I learned that the way children are typically taught phonics in Spanish is very different from how we are taught in English due to the phonetic differences between the two languages. I will incorporate more syllable-based reading instruction along with authentic leveled texts to improve our reading intervention instruction for bilingual students.
As a special education teacher and MTSS (intervention) lead, communication with parents is crucial. My fellowship improved my ability to collaborate with parents on their children's needs and goals in both English and Spanish. I will serve on my school's bilingual commitee, and advocate for quality bilingual education in all aspects of our school, including in special education, intervention supports, and after school and summer programming.