COINCIDENCE AND LANGUAGE LEARNING

Since I’m equally a storyteller and a teacher, today I’d like to share with you a tale of sorts about the power of coincidence in life and the process of learning a new language. All this was triggered by the publication of these grants by the regional government. Needless to say that I strongly encourage you to participate, as I have already said in most of my classes this week.

These grants are a great opportunity to boost your level of English. When I was about your age, I had the chance to be a part of the Comenius program, an exchange scholarship by which a group of students from my year hosted German pupils and, in turn, allowed us to spend a week in Munich with their families. Here’s when the coincidence comes into play.

At that time, I never thought I would become a language teacher in the future, and yet here we are. To this day the Comenius experience played a major role in the improvement of my skills in English. I don’t know how I happened, but after that week I magically managed to have a conversation with great ease. Some people say you actually begin to master a new language when you dream in it, which is what happened to me during that trip and afterwards.

Funnily enough, I never got interested in the reason why the program was called Comenius, but a few years ago I did a little research. Ioannes Amos Comenius was a Czech pedagogue —and much more than that— who is considered the father of modern education. His works (e.g. Orbis Pictus) became international best-selling school textbooks and, especially among them, Janua linguarum reserata (The Gate of the Latin Tongue Unlocked), the first widespread teaching manual of Latin for children, pages of which you can see below. And as you can see, here I am, teaching foreign languages.

After all this time, all the pieces seem you have fallen into place since all these things do seem to be connected somehow... My colleague from the Latin department and I are seemingly conversing through these blog posts so, as I’m sure he would tell you, audentes fortuna iuvat: fortune favours the bold. Be bold, be brave to experience new things and participate in this (or any, for that matter) exchange program, your future self will forever thank you.

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Xa que son contacontos tanto como profesor, hoxe querería compartir convosco unha historieta acerca do poder das coincidencias na vida e o proceso de aprendizaxe dunha nova lingua. Todo isto vén pola publicación destas bolsas da Xunta de Galicia. Non é necesario que incida en que vos animo a que participades, como xa vos teño dito na maioría das nosas clases esta semana.

Estas bolsas son unha gran oportunidade para mellorar o voso nivel de inglés. Cando tiña máis ou menos a vosa idade, tiven ocasión de formar parte do programa Comenius, un intercambio no que algúns dos alumnos da miña clase acollemos a un grupo de estudantes da Alemaña, para posteriormente pasarmos unha semana en Múnic coas súas familias. E aquí é onde comeza a coincidencia.

Naquel momento, nunca tiña pensado que no futuro acabaría sendo profesor de linguas e aquí me encontro anos despois. A día de hoxe, a experiencia Comenius tivo unha papel capital na miña mellora en inglés. Aínda non sei moi ben como aconteceu, pero despois desa semana conseguira maxicamente ser capaz de manter unha conversa con grande facilidade. Hai que di que un comeza a dominar un idioma cando se soña nesa lingua, que foi xustamente o que experimentei nesa viaxe e até despois.

Curiosamente, nunca me interesara no motivo de por que o programa se chamaba Comenius, pero hai uns anos investiguei o asunto. Ioannes Amos Comenius foi un pedagogo checo e, de feito, moito máis que iso, considerado o pai da educación moderna. Os seus libros de texto (por exemplo, Orbis Pictus) convertéronse en éxitos de vendas, especialmente entre eles o Janua linguarum reserata (A porta das linguas despechada), o primeiro manual de ampla circulación para ensinar latín ao estudantado da época. As imaxes que vedes enriba deste texto proveñen das dúas obras citadas.

Despois de todo este tempo, todas estas pezas parecen cobrar sentido e semellan gardar algún tipo de conexión... Poderíamos dicir que o meu colega do departamento de latín e mais eu estamos a establecer un diálogo cos nosos posts, así que, como estou seguro de que vos diría, audentes fortuna iuvat: a sorte premia aos audaces. Ousade, sede valentes para probar cousas novas e participade neste programa de intercambio ou, se o preferides, en calquera outra actividade do estilo. O voso eu futuro agradecerávolo por sempre.