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The Spanish Center, Inc. is a place where people of all ages can come together and experience the joy of learning to speak the Spanish language and learn about the culture of the Spanish speaking world.

I do!  My name is Emily Perez.  I received an M.A. in Spanish from the University of Virginia.  I have taught Spanish in college and high school classrooms, and I have had many students of all ages come for private courses at my home.  I have traveled to Spain, Mexico, and Peru.  I have done extensive research in the best teaching methods for optimal language learning.  Teaching Spanish is my passion!

 Each course will meet for a minimum of one session per week.  Depending on the ages and levels of the students involved, the courses may include a combination of the following teaching methods:

• Games involving action and movement
• Interactive storytelling
• Role-playing with skits
• Singing
• Puppet play
• Group discussion about topics of interest

The primary goal of the Spanish Center, Inc. is for all students to become comfortable with hearing and responding to spoken Spanish.  At the introductory levels, the primary emphasis will be on providing comprehensible input.  This means that the student will be given a full immersion into the language, using simple stories and games that the student can completely understand.

Students will frequently be given directions in Spanish which they will easily understand and then respond with the appropriate action.  This language-learning method is called Total Physical Response (TPR), and it mimics the method by which we all learned our first language as babies and toddlers.  Before a toddler begins to speak in sentences, he or she spends thousands of hours listening to the language and, at first, responding with actions instead of words.  (“Where’s Mommy?” provokes an excited point in the right direction.) Initial speech is halting and often nearly incomprehensible, but is at the same time a sign of an amazing cognitive breakthrough, which is warmly applauded by the child’s parents, as well it should be.  Only after years of speaking do we begin to expect children to speak without blaring grammatical errors.  As a strong believer in TPR, I feel that the second language learner should be treated with the same respect and encouragement.  Error correction in the early levels will be kept to a minimum.  I may repeat the statement correctly or rephrase it, but I will not brand any attempt at spoken language as a “wrong” one. 

Just as there is a very broad range of ages during which toddlers begin to speak in complete sentences, some second language learners are ready to begin speaking before others.  Trying to force students who are not yet ready to speak will result in frustration at best, and rejection of second language learning at worst.  Students who are ready to speak will be given many opportunities to do so during class time.  Those who are not ready will still be able to learn a great deal by hearing and responding physically to directions.   Just being able to understand large chunks of a second language is an amazing cognitive feat.  All progress will be applauded! 

Learning a language takes time!  (Remember those “thousands of hours” of hearing the language the toddler got?)  Because our time together is limited, I will try to incorporate as much new vocabulary as possible into each course.  However, my goal is for students to master what is learned rather than to get a sweeping exposure to many words and structures that would likely soon be forgotten.  Therefore, it can be realistically expected that the average student will:

• Experience the satisfaction of completely understanding and responding to spoken Spanish in the classroom.
• Acquire a familiarity and comfort with Spanish that will hopefully increase the chance of fluency later if the student continues to pursue Spanish learning through classes and/or travel abroad.
• Increase awareness of different cultures in the world and right here in our community.
• Have fun while learning!

Please feel free to call me with any questions!  Thank you for your interest!

 703-774-5339

thespanishcenter@gmail.com