Language has always occupied an important place in my life. Even as a little girl in Colombia and throughout my entire student journey, I always took great pride in well-written and well-spoken language. Then, in college and my early 20’s, I dedicated myself to learning English and becoming fully bilingual. Later, when I joined the working world, I always found myself somehow connected to language. First, working in International schools, then teaching English in Colombia, and most recently, running a Spanish immersion program in California. I even spent some time in Southern California as a mediator. Language played a big role in this position, in order to understand both parties’ culture, background, and needs to help them resolve their disagreements.
All these experiences walked me little by little towards Immerse. First, in the most literal and direct way, I found out the beauty and relevance of immersion in order to acquire a new language. After all, while technically learning English in a college classroom, it wasn’t until I was immersed in the United States, that I truly became fluent. Secondly, and in a much deeper sense, I realized that every environment and group I worked with was a very unique community where I needed to truly immerse myself in order to know them, understand where they were coming from, identify their needs, their strengths, values, and their way of communicating. When I gave myself the chance to be fully immersed in each group, I could understand the environment and the people within it much better and could do my part in a much more effective and meaningful way.
And this takes me to the place I am standing now. Having directed a Montessori Spanish Immersion program for the last seven years, I believe I figured out the magic recipe to do it successfully. This is largely because I was able to experience how each school, each classroom, each family, even each child is a different little world to understand and get immersed in. Looking at it from this perspective made me love my job and strive to do it well. But even so, after seven years, I began to feel something was missing. I felt that for every teacher, parent, child and admin member I helped guide, there were so many more that may be having the same questions and challenges. I was reaching thirty families successfully, but what if I could reach many more! This is why I decided to step out of the classroom and make myself available to those who are interested, passionate and committed to children’s education and development, whether they are in the role of parent, teacher or school owner. Your school, your family, your child, and yourself are each a unique world with its own language, needs, skills and challenges that can work independently, freely and harmoniously.
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