Over summer break, several students traveled across the ocean to Spain to immerse themselves in the culture and improve their Spanish speaking skills. The students, along with some chaperones, enjoyed this rare experience.
“It was a new experience. You know, during the first week we went to Barcelona, and that was definitely interesting. Initially, I couldn’t understand much because of the thick accents, but after a week in Barcelona, we went to Madrid for a week and then another half week outside the city,” junior Adam Ranieri said.
The program was run by Spanish teacher Tamara Batcha, who started it a few years ago as a trip through a travel agency.
“On the tour with the agency, it was 11 days, and two days are spent travelling, and another two days are wasted traveling on the bus to get to all the different places. You got dropped off, got back on the bus, and transferred to a new place. We were just thinking how can we better serve the students who want to grow their language skills rather than just be an observer of the culture, and how to get really in depth with the culture,” Batcha said.
This goal was accomplished by taking a smaller group and immersing the group through language classes and host families.
“The most obvious [cultural difference] was language. Just the accent itself in Barcelona was very thick, and then in Madrid, it was the clearest Spanish I’ve ever heard. You know, food that was definitely a different one. The amount you eat and when is different. Religion was one of them, [with] a whole bunch of cathedrals everywhere from a whole bunch of different ages,” Ranieri said.
However, it seems that students shortly won’t be able to share this same experience at least for a few years, as Batcha won’t be able to run the program.
“I’m not going this year because my daughter is having a baby, and I’m going to be a grandmother in April, and I don’t want to go. So it’s not that the program ended; if there were another Spanish teacher who wanted to do it they could do it, and I would be happy to help them learn how to do it next year,” Batcha said.
