Highlights of Being a Language Assistant

I was lucky enough to spend a semester abroad in Barcelona 2 years ago, an experience that proved to be quite eye-opening, challenging, and exciting. After improving my Spanish to a competent level, I knew I would need to come back and live in Spain again. If I got so much out of a 6-month study abroad program, surely I would not regret extending it to a year for work. There are plenty of highlights to being a language assistant, both inside and outside of work.

My favorite non-work-related highlight is definitely the opportunity to speak Spanish both at home and out on the street. Now that I've passed into near-fluency, speaking Spanish is an exciting part of my day as I'm always learning more words and phrases to diversify my speech and fortify my ability to express myself. I feel so lucky to have the opportunity to constantly be practicing, because in the US it's not such a simple process. I've taken years of Spanish classes, but I never learned more Spanish than when I lived in Spain for a few months.

At work, the biggest highlight is my teachers' willingness to give me a lot of responsibility. I feel like I'm learning valuable teaching skills and being challenged every day to stay organized and plan ahead while also remaining adaptable and approachable for my students. Most of my teachers give me a lot of free reign to teach the class how I want and I'm grateful for the opportunity to define my own role in the system. I don't know that all language assistants have this much freedom and autonomy when it comes to teaching, and I'm grateful to be constantly stimulated and active in the classroom.

I would also say that it's quite rewarding to work with such motivated, intelligent, funny and friendly students. I had some reservations about working with teenagers but it has turned out to be truly enjoyable seeing their enthusiasm, or simply talking with them both inside and outside of class. I feel very lucky to had been accepted by them in what was otherwise a quite foreign situation.

My Global Classrooms students especially improved a great deal with their writing and speaking skills, something that they themselves noticed. One student, Valle, said, "I think that for myself I've gotten more comfortable talking in front of people, I don't get nervous anymore. As well I think that being able to debate and write an important paper like that has made a huge difference." This was backed up by Irene and Lucía, who said they improved their linking words and paraphrasing skills. Witnessing this progression and improvement has been another high point in my experience so far.