• Opens on demand for groups of no less than five candidates

This course is aimed at students, school teachers and college teachers interested in acquiring theoretical and practical knowledge on teaching Spanish as a second language or foreign language to children, adolescents and adults.

Candidates must have a command of Spanish language equal to an Advanced Level as described by the framework of American Council of Teaching Foreign Languages.

Classes are conducted in Spanish or English, so that also serve as a form of language development through content related to the methodology for teaching Spanish

• Familiarize participants with the theories about language acquisition and learning a second language or foreign language.

• Present and analyze different methodologies for teaching a second or foreign language, and its particular application to the teaching of Spanish.

• Reflecting on the different contexts in which teaching takes place in Spanish: its relationship with the school curriculum, the world of work and social integration

• Provide basic tools for a good Spanish-English contrastive analysis to identify the main difficulties with non-native Spanish.

• Reflect, from contrastive analysis on the most appropriate techniques and activities for teaching and learning of certain aspects of Spanish.

• Provide participants with guidelines for the preparation of training materials and criteria for evaluating their effectiveness.

• Provide opportunities for participants pair to implement the theoretical knowledge acquired: class observations, small model lessons, etc.

• Classes are divided into two parts:

  - In the morning we will discuss theoretical aspects from lectures given by the teacher and seminars based on readings and specific contents.

  - In the afternoon the students practical work related to the concepts discussed in the morning and share and reflect on their own experience, as students and teachers of Spanish. Also during the afternoons, students have the opportunity to comment and practices (ie give brief lessons on topics or specific aspects of Spanish) in Spanish classes.

• Duration: The course covers a total of 100 hours over four weeks to five hours per day.

• Acquisition of a second or foreign language: the role of context and interaction in the acquisition and production of linguistic aspects.
  
  
• Standard for learning a second language or foreign language: communication, culture, connections, comparisons and communities.
  
  
• Spanish-English contrastive analysis: main difficulties affecting the teaching and learning.
• Methodologies, techniques and strategies for teaching Spanish.
  
  
• Strategies and activities to develop the four skills in an integrated and comprehensive.
• Planning and materials: design and implementation.

The evaluation will be based on a project that combines theory and practice to develop during the four weeks of the course and a final theory test.

Participants who complete the course receive a certificate from the University Language Centre, University of Buenos Aires, by allocating the number of hours attended.