Bilingual Connection
About
Hola:) Welcome to my page. My name is Marjorie. I am a writer and retired educator from Costa Rica. I graduated from the College of Education at Louisiana State University with a major in Spanish as a second language teaching. I devoted 17 years to teaching in different classroom settings and cross-cultural services.
My Spanish program embraces modern language acquisition methodologies, primarily the Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) approach, which emphasizes active, meaningful interaction in real-life situations rather than rote memorization. This means you will spend less time on traditional grammar drills and more time using Spanish to get things done, building your fluency and confidence in oral communication from day one.
Our sessions will become a dynamic environment where you actively engage in authentic conversations and task-based activities with me, creating an immersive experience that facilitates natural language development.
Examples of activities you can expect in your lesson plan include:
—Role-playing scenarios: Engaging in simulated real-world situations, such as ordering food at a restaurant, asking for directions, or going shopping in a mini mercado.
—Information gap activities: Working together where I will have unique information you need to complete a task (e.g., describing a picture that cannot see, or giving details about your weekend plans through targeted questions).
—"Find Someone Who...": A game where I ask you questions in Spanish to find someone who fits specific criteria (e.g., Tiene una mascota ( She or he has a pet).
—Weekend Chats: Regular conversational routines where you discuss your upcoming or past weekend activities with friends (or partners) practicing different verb tenses in a personal context.
—"Who Am I?" game: I show you a card with a famous Hispanic person or object and ask you yes/no questions to identity the identity of the character on the picture.
—Authentic materials use: Interacting with real Spanish-language materials like menus, advertisements, or short articles, and discussing them orally to improve comprehension and vocabulary in context.