Español y Bacon

This is a guest post by 10th grader Celine. 

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"Can you say, 'Mi nombre es?'"  

"Mi nuumarururebri es."

"Good! Now can you say, 'Mi nombre es [insert name]?'"

"Um, um... Mi nombre es bacon." 

Ah, the sweet sounds of learning. This year, high school Spanish intermediate classes have begun to teach the Level 1 students from the Neighborhood School, an independent elementary school right up the street in Jamaica Plain. Working with their director, Tricia Morrow, we have arranged visits to the school every other week to share our love for Spanish and use our knowledge to teach younger children.

The project began this past month, and it will last until the end of the school year. In preparation for these lessons, my Spanish class discusses which topics, activities, and roles each of us will be responsible for. On the first day, we decided to teach "Mi nombre es," or “My name is,” and types of "comida favorita," or “favorite foods.”

As you can see from the short transcript example above, it takes time to learn a language! Our students’ pronunciations were mumbled and they found some phrases confusing, but by the next visit, everyone could say their names clearly and called out their favorite foods loudly and with confidence. We've only taught the little ones twice, but we hope they’ll enjoy learning Spanish and bring the two schools closer. Besides, we don’t think “bacon” is such a bad name after all.