Teaching Spanish online tips for Spanish teachers during the pandemic in 2020

Hi!

This is Spanish Guacamaya and I just wanted to talk a little bit about teaching Spanish online. 

I have been teaching Spanish for a while now, I started at the age of 21 teaching Spanish in an immersion academy in my own country in South America and now I am teaching Spanish in the United States. When I came here, all the students were using computers (something not very common in Ecuador). So, the moment I saw that I thought to myself: Since all my students are using computers, how can I make my life easier while teaching here? and how can I make their life easier? I discovered then, that computers are a great friend, even when distance learning is not taking place!

I researched a lot about how to use computers in the classroom and I found something called flipped classroom and blended learning (I say it like this because I did not study to be a teacher, but a manager of hotels and vacations, in other words I graduated in tourism). Blended learning and the flipped classroom helped me understand distance learning even before this pandemic going on in 2020. So, by the time it came, I was already ready to face it. I will offer you now I few tips if you are a Spanish teacher and you do not know how to handle distance learning. It can also apply to other subjects:

1) Do not see online learning like the worst thing that could have happened to the world. Look at it like an opportunity to learn something new. I know it is easier said than done but the world is giving big steps in technology and if you read finance blogs or technology articles, you will see how reality will change in a few years and you will need to be skilled with computers and different ways to use technology. 

2) Encourage your students to accept this new way of learning. Changes bring resistance and a lot of students may not like distance learning due to the complications of learning how to understand your new system of delivering knowledge. Encourage them to learn this new way of learning and assure them that you will be there to help them all the way.

3)Invest in learning how to deliver information online. Invest in a course of how to create a web page, how to edit videos, software to record your screen and books of how to design instruction in a new learning environment. This will not only enhance your resume but will give you more confidence in how to teach online and will keep you with sharped skills when that near future knocks on your door.

The future in in your hands!