Immersion experience abroad for ESL teachers to be offered in 2010

Elizabeth Smolcic, left, and Sarah Braxton, teaching English to students in Ecuador.

Kimberly McElhatten understands what it's like to communicate without using spoken language. While staying with a host family in Ecuador several years ago, she used her hands, body and facial expressions to communicate with them, since she didn't speak Spanish and they didn't speak English.

"I began to feel how I think our students feel, when they come to school not knowing the language and have simple tasks to do, but don't know how to ask to do them," McElhatten said.

The Penn State graduate went to Ecuador to complete the requirements for an English as a Second Language (ESL) teaching certificate to supplement her secondary English degree. The certificate qualifies her to teach English language learners in public school classrooms.

The same program that McElhatten completed in 2004 is now being offered for the first time this year at Penn State. There will be an information session at 5 p.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 29, in room 14 of the Life Sciences Building at University Park, on the Teaching ESL certificate program.

Designed by Elizabeth Smolcic, who is the program's director, Penn State's Teaching ESL certificate program with an international Ecuador immersion begins in January 2010, with a semester of online and weekend courses at University Park. In mid-June, participants will travel to Ecuador for a four-week teaching, cultural and language immersion experience at the Universidad de Otavalo, just north of Quito, the capital city of Ecuador.

Smolcic developed the immersive experience after having lived abroad in Ecuador with her own family for five years while she taught English there. She said not only does Ecuador have a rich ecology of rain forests and high terrain of the Andes Mountains for students to visit, but "the community provides a vibrant and cultural context in which to experience the challenges and triumphs of using and learning to teach a second language."

Most Americans haven't had to learn a foreign language in order to survive, she said. The goal of this program is not only to teach native-speaking English students pedagogical skills but also to have them experience another culture, feel empathy for the students in America who don't speak English and broaden their world view.

"A lot of us changed as a result, especially those of us who had never traveled abroad," McElhatten said of her Ecuador experience. "The power of the program is incredible and so multi-faceted. I learned valuable teaching skills in those sixth months [of the program] that I can use in the classroom here, every day."

Smolcic said the certificate program, which consists of five courses totaling 15 credits, will guide its students to develop teaching practices that promote successful learning of content and language for English language learners. She added that the five courses also meet the requirements for the ESL Program Specialist Certificate in Pennsylvania. Teachers holding a Pennsylvania Instructional I or II Certificate, teaching professionals with an interest in teaching English to second language learners and pre-service student teachers in their final years of undergraduate study should apply.

Janis Martinez, a music teacher in Central Dauphin School District, near Harrisburg, who participated in ESL certificate courses in Ecuador in 2006 said she thinks that eventually Pennsylvania is going to require that all people who work in public schools have a teaching ESL certificate.  "I know there are many certificate programs offered in person and online, but I think this program is really unique because it involves an intensive learning experience, the depths of which are more profound than had I just taken a course online. The course is geared toward English learners globally."

As a music teacher, Martinez doesn't have as much opportunity to teach ESL in her classroom as she'd like. She keeps the skills she gained from the program fresh by teaching English abroad in the summer. Martinez has returned to Central America to do volunteer teaching in Ecuador and Mexico, so she also has been able to keep her newly acquired Spanish-speaking skills fresh.

While taking part in Smolcic's program during the same year, Mollie Davis fell in love with second language teaching and decided she wanted to teach English abroad. She had been teaching English in a juvenile detention center in Pennsylvania when she heard about the program. She said her love for teaching and love for traveling influenced her to take the course.

"The trip to Ecuador was, hands down, the best trip I've ever been on," Davis said. "That's saying a lot because I've been on countless trips in 20 different countries. Being able to live with a home-stay family, learn Spanish and teach kids in a country and environment totally different from anything I was used to was such an eye opening experience. It was such a supportive environment that we all felt comfortable to take risks and grow as teachers."

When Davis finished the program, she taught sixth grade English in Istanbul, Turkey, which allowed her to travel throughout Europe and Asia. After three years there she taught in Dhaka, Bangladesh, for two years, where she took trips to China, South Africa and Brazil. She just moved to Honduras where she's teaching ninth and 10th grade English literature. She said each post has been a rewarding experience.

"The program showed me that the world is a whole lot bigger than what I had originally thought," Davis said. "Now, I don't want to miss out on the rest of the world."