Nuestro Viaje

A huge change for me when I switched to my current school in the fall of 2011 was being entire Spanish department.  Not only was I teaching Spanish IV for the first time but I faced the challenge of being the only foreign language teacher these students would know in high school (barring moving in and out of the district).  If my style of teaching didn't match a learning style, it was going to be a rough time with this new language.

That fall I met a group with varying attitudes towards the new teacher: uncertain seniors, bounced-around juniors, largely-unaffected sophomores, and blank freshmen, teenagers who had no previous experience with a Spanish teacher.  Those three classes of young learners pared down over the next few years to fourteen.  Fourteen young men and women I said good-bye to today, the first time that I could look at a group that only knew me as their foreign language teacher.

The relationships that I have formed with some of these students are special.  I will always remember this group because of how they are my first graduating class that I knew as freshmen.  I wanted to do a little something special for them so last night I went through the photos I could find that I had taken throughout the years in class and in Spanish club and made a Google slideshow.

We started class today by having them think about a good memory from class.  Then I showed them the slideshow and loved listening to the laughter and comments as they saw themselves (and their hair!) from freshman year to senior year.  Afterwards, we shared our memories for a little bit before one last round of Uno.

I will miss you all.  Thank you for the last four years.