Spanish teachers blend language, faith

School district goes abroad to find instructors

Eva Helguera

By RAMON GONZALEZ
WCR Staff Writer
Edmonton

"Buenos dias señorita.” Greetings like this, meaning “Good morning Miss,” have become common at many schools with the advent a few years ago of Spanish academies and Spanish bilingual programs.

At Edmonton Catholic, four schools offer such programs: Grandin, John Paul I, Escuela Father Leo Green and Escuela St. Kevin. Students enrolled in Spanish programs in these schools are taught half of the day in Spanish and the other half in English. Their teachers come from countries such as Chile, Argentina, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Mexico.

Now two schools have gone to Spain for additional staff. With support from Alberta Learning and the Spanish Embassy in Canada, escuelas Grandin and John Paul I recently hired a teacher each from Spain. Both teachers are Catholic.

Madrid native

Paloma Soler, a 32-year-old teacher from Madrid, arrived in Edmonton Aug. 20 and is teaching at the John Paul I Spanish Academy. The school has 250 students, including 109 in the Spanish program. Some are native Spanish speakers; others are English speakers whose parents want them to learn Spanish.

Paloma Soler

Spaniard Eva Helguera, 34, who taught Spanish in the Edmonton public school system for the past three years, began teaching in Grandin’s Spanish bilingual program Sept. 2. The school has 427 students and almost half are native Spanish speakers. The school also offers French.

John Paul I principal Genevieve Kelemen hired Soler because she has a good command of the English language and can teach in both languages. She even picked up the new teacher at the airport.

Soler has taught in Madrid and Galicia for several years and learned English by spending her summer holidays in England. She was teaching at a Jesuit school in Galicia when she learned about the Edmonton opportunity.

The school principal, a Jesuit, is interested in having bilingual staff and encouraged Soler to apply.

“He told me this could be a good opportunity for me to improve my English and my (teaching) skills,” she said. “They plan to use me in the future as a bilingual teacher.”

At John Paul I, Soler teaches half the day in Spanish and the other half in English.

A new experience

“I love it, but it’s different,” she said, noting that in Spain she used to teach English to non-English speakers. “It’s not the same to teach students who don’t understand you than to teach students who do understand you and realize that you make mistakes grammatically and in vocabulary.”

Kelemen is happy to have Soler as part of her staff.

“Just going in and listening to her speaking to the students and speaking to the parents around — she is just bringing so many interesting aspects of the Spanish culture to our school,” she said. “We are looking forward to having her share for the rest of the year all the different things that they do in Spain.”

John Paul I has five Spanish-speaking teachers and one aide in its academy. Grandin School has 10 Spanish-speaking teachers.

Eva Helguera is a traveller. She left Spain in 1996 to complete a doctorate in Hebrew at UCLA and then continued her studies in Israel. She taught Spanish bilingual in Chicago before the Edmonton Public Schools hired her in 2005.

Welcoming school

When she learned the Catholic system was looking for Spanish teachers she decided to change ships. She is happy she did. “Grandin School has opened its arms to me and has made sure that I feel I’m part of the community.”

Helguera currently teaches Grade 5 at Grandin. And she doesn’t just teach Spanish but all the subject areas, including French, mathematics, English language arts, social studies, sciences. Like Soler, she teaches half of the day in Spanish, the other half in English.

Principal Reny Clericuzio is happy to have Helguera on staff. “We at Grandin are very happy to have a teacher from Spain; we believe that it enhances the learning for our children,” he said. “Eva brings not only that excellent role model of language but she also brings the faith component.”

Helguera believes she is making an important contribution as well. “I think I bring a different perspective from the Spanish world because I come from Spain and not a South American country, “she said. “Probably I have a more traditional approach to teaching and learning.”

What about faith development?

“I believe in the integration of faith and religion into everything in the classroom,” Helguera added. “I believe in the integration of all subjects and helping the students to grow up as human beings not only as students.”

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