How can we help students learn a foreign language in our school?
Meet Diya, Jia, Pankhudi, Ruhaani and Toshani (Grade 8th)
Team Amor Por El Español, ICO Finalist
Diya, Jia, Pankhudi, Ruhaani and Toshani, 13-years old students, always wanted to learn a new language. Although, there was a teacher in their school who taught French, but that was only for senior grades. When they spoke to their classmates about this, they learnt that more students in their batch shared this interest.
We conducted a survey to find out how many students in the middle school would be keen on learning a new language. The results showed that 42% of students were interested in learning a new language, and the most prefered language choice was Spanish.
Idea
We started by forming a Whatsapp study group with the interested students, where all of us shared free online learning resources and tutorials to help everyone learn Spanish.
However, this didn’t work as only a handful of students made efforts to learn on their own.
The feedback we received from students was that they preferred if someone could teach them the language. So we thought of learning Spanish ourselves, and then conducting classes to teach others.
Solution Implemented
To learn the language, they started watching online tutorials and read some books. Within a couple of weeks, they compiled a series of lesson plans for the students and conducted their first few classes.
The response they got from the students was positive. The students also gave them feedback, which they incorporated in every lesson plan and made them better with every class. They have now also started giving out worksheets at the end of their class to help the students revise and practice Spanish at home.
In the beginning, we faced some difficulty in learning the language. But we all worked as a team and helped each other and were finally able to compile a series of lesson plans for the students.
Impact Created
In a period of 3 months, they have conducted 20 classes. The students have learnt the basics of Spanish and have started communicating in simple sentences.
To make their Spanish Club sustainable, they are working towards setting up a process to select more students who can teach others.
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