This year returning students were surprised to discover that as much as half of the original Spanish department had been replaced.

With three new teachers in the Spanish department, the question of the effectiveness in last year’s teaching style, “immersion” has left some of the new teachers without a benefit of the doubt.

“I understand the approach, there’s an argument to be made there. But we don’t have time to gradually absorb the language when you start at 14 or one or two years in his school,”  Spanish I teacher Kelly Tagle said. “I have to provide a balance of 90 minutes of language, talking, newscast, etc., to support my students. Hopefully, I present something in the moment and you think something like, ‘Wow that was the present tense, and that makes sense.’”

Alongside immersion, the district has begun to implement and favor a more technological approach to the learning environment. For some of the teachers in the Spanish department, and students alike, this can come with both positives and negatives in the learning environment.

“I would say the struggle, and this is probably universal, is with tech. You can access tons of stuff online,” Tagle said. “But while that is there, there’s such a dearth of info. My struggle is finding the time to dig around and find the resources, it’s great when we do it; but it takes time.”

To new and veteran teachers alike, the incorporation of technology into the classroom environment has been a struggle.

“Here at Bowie they’re trying to go paperless. When I started here, I had to learn a lot of applications and programs that we use in the classroom with the students, it was a little bit overwhelming, and I think that’s how many teachers feel now, that they have to learn that,” Spanish I-IV teacher Sandra Salgado said. “Like with the COWS they weren’t always working right, and we were always waiting with them because they’re so slow. Sometimes we didn’t have the whole 30 [laptops] in the classroom when we needed 31; it was always very hectic/stressful.”

Regardless of the new changes in the curriculum, the Spanish teachers are continuing to do what they’ve always done best, which is helping students through the journey of learning a language.

“I just want my students to enjoy learning, but I’m still pretty strict with my students. I want them to take ownership of their class, to take responsibility of their class, and to take ownership, but at the same time I want them to have a good time. My goal is just to continue doing the best for my students. Helping them learn a language, helping them enjoy it,” Spanish II teacher Felipe Mendoza said. “I want them to appreciate the language and the culture that will come with it. I want my students to find the value in learning a language, so when they go to college, they pick up learning the language, and I don’t care whether it’s Spanish, French, Chinese, whatever, because in the end it’s just going to make them more marketable when it comes to future employment.”

New Spanish teachers, such as Tagle, have endured difficult teaching moments with students.

“It was Spanish II, they had a movie, and there was a rubric, and I had this one kid who tried to depict the song, the Devil Went Down to Georgia. We were laughing and it was hilarious, but I can’t give an A for being hilarious.”

With much of the staff being replaced, veteran Spanish teachers are meeting with new colleagues.

“We did lose four teachers this year, and we did lose our department head, who moved on to do other things, and I lost my three very good colleagues,”  Mendoza said. “You know, I think that we have a pretty tight knit group. We kind of feed off of each other.”

As for immersion, there are many different approaches to implementing this into the classroom, with several of the Spanish teachers choosing different approaches to this unique way of teaching.

“I do some immersion with my stamp activities, and I do always want my students to take ownership in the language,”  Mendoza said. “I try to do maybe 90% immersion, but I think that it’s a very good way to learn any type of language. Sometimes you’ve just got to get thrown into it; sink or swim.”

Some veteran teachers here at Bowie, such as Spanish I-V teacher Salgado, who’s been in the department for three years, believes that immersion is an essential part in learning a new language.

“It’s a style of teaching any target language,” Salgado said. “It’s innovation for teaching a new language. I don’t have anything against it, and I really think immersion is something that every student should be exposed to. It really depends on the student; if they have that desire to learn. It really takes a lot of initiative on the student; more so than in the teacher.”