In 2017 I decided to take a huge leap into the MAFLT program at Michigan State University. I already had a M.S. in Education from Walden University, but I had never enrolled in a program completely dedicated to the teaching of Foreign Languages (FL). Since I had entered the teaching world through a non-traditional path in 2004, I figured it was time to truly find out what the best practices for teaching FL were. At the time I had a 5-year-old son and a 10-year-old daughter at home and I also wanted to be a good example of a life-long learner for them as well as for my students.
I started the program in Teaching FL with Technology as I figured it would not be as challenging for me to do because of my background. I did not want to scare myself into quitting if I had started with a more challenging course. Technology is already such an intricate part of my instruction, but I knew there was more I could do with it. In that course I was reminded of the importance of having a purpose for the technology and not just using it because it’s shiny and new. If communication is the goal, it should remain that way through the technology. I have always worked on curating a vast collection of technology tools to use and I discovered some new ones that I added as a page in my portfolio. I made sure to organize the resources by communication skill so it would be easier to see the purpose of each.
I would say the most challenging course for me was Language Concepts I completed in the Fall of 2018. Without a background in linguistics, I was so lost! It felt more like a calculus class than a language teaching class, but I learned so much. The tool that I found most valuable in that course was VoyantTools.net. That resource is amazing and so helpful for finding the frequent vocabulary words in any authentic text I might find online, so I know what to pre-teach my students. I have shared that tool with many colleagues and they seem to be as excited about it as I was.
When I began the program in 2017 I was just a Spanish teacher in a department of 6 with no inkling of ever being thrust into a leadership position. In 2019 my Department Chair retired, and after talking to the rest of the group, we all decided that I would be the best fit for the position. I used that transition in my career to design my Experiential Module around leadership and creating a supervisory plan for others in my position. It was a grueling year to be finishing the MAFLT program and getting my feet wet as Department Chair during the pandemic and eventual transition to remote learning. I mistakenly thought that teaching remotely would be the perfect opportunity to finish out the program strong, but I definitely misjudged the amount of time that would be spent at home on my computer just putting out little fires and communicating with students online. Through my EM, I learned a lot about what good leadership looks like and I realized some things I need to work on. Most notably being able to have tough conversations with colleagues who do not share my experience and philosophy of teaching.
The online learning community at MSU is unique. I really enjoy seeing some of the same names in each of my classes and working together. I know that the director of the program is stretched thin with her commitments to the university, but having that constant person leading the majority of my classes really helped with understanding expectations. Even when I had a different professor for the assessment course, he was able to use what she had created in the past and it definitely helped with my understanding. I am so grateful that she was as available a she was when I know she was running in a million different directions.
As this chapter of my life closes, I am so incredibly proud of the hard work I have put in and I am in awe of everything I have learned. My husband saw how much I struggled with work/life balance these past two years and asked me if I had learned anything. I can honestly say that this was the best decision for my future in teaching and leadership. Even though I wish I could have done this earlier, I’m glad that I will still be able to use what I have learned for years to come.