Living The English Experience

Each year a new opportunity is presented to make everything better ... each grape at 12 o'clock on the night of December 31 becomes a bit of hope to change and the desire to fulfill those commitments. A new year in the School, means being able to reach the goals that could not be reached the previous year, to fulfill the expectations that are generated whenever a new school year begins.

Living the experience of English in the Divine Savior, means entering an environment that will open the doors to a world full of opportunities. Learning English well takes a lot of time. You must work very hard to become a competent person in the language. Learning a language at school is not like learning the rules in math; it will never be enough to know the grammar rules, you have to live it. For me, the only way to increase the level of English is with activities that take place outside of the classroom.

To be able to learn a language well you have to be constantly exposed to that language, not enough, with 9 hours per week at school. Seeing English as if it were one more subject in school makes young people graduate without confidence and without skills so that they can develop in an adequate way what they moderately learned. What is needed is for a series of homework assignments and activities to be developed so that students are more exposed to English outside of the classroom. And nowadays it is very easy to be exposed to this language thanks to technology: there is greater access to the internet, specialized websites, movies, books and video games to be in contact with English.

The most important factor for learning English is motivation. If students learn English with a clear purpose for their lives and look to the future what they want to achieve with this learning, they will clearly reach a good command of the language thanks to this motivation. Many young people have no idea what English can do for their lives, there are more chances of getting a job. But if the student as such does not insist on his own account and doesn’t see that this language can bring great benefits, he will not make an effort, that is the determination to speak a second language. English will be necessary to work, to travel and a lot of activities, so it is important to speak, even if you go to a country where another language is spoken, surely with English you will communicate without any problem.

That is why from the English area, we have been working on programs such as immersion programs that help enrich the English proficiency for our students; attending a classroom in another country for 6 weeks will not only serve to speak a second language but to exchange life experiences with students from different parts of the world. Guided tours in English for the tourist sites of the city, also strengthen the learning of the language as well as knowing the culture and traditions of our city as a foreign tourist.

The world is full of opportunities, but if you speak English, those opportunities are endless!

By Jorge Luis Cantillo Escolar

By Jorge Luis Cantillo Escolar