Salamanca School

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X-Mas Dinner with Mester

Friday, December 17th, 2010

The time has come…. Like every year, Ramon our boss from Mester invited all students, teachers and office stuff for a traditional christmas dinner!

We are going to miss Natalia & Karin soooo much

This is the menu:

Typical Spanish dinner

Cod, ice cream with nuts and dried meat were the most valued dishes

It will take place this evening at 9 pm in Mater Asturias!

It is a great opportunity having a last dinner with all friends from school before our 2 weeks christmas holidays will start. After studing and working a lot everybody can now enjoy her/his freetime without thinking about duties.

The Christmas dinner

waiting for the Holidays

For all invited people will be available a great three course meal as well as wine… Let us all together enjoy our dinner!

See you soon!

¡Que aproveche!

Make and play your radio speaker course!

Monday, November 8th, 2010

In our Spanish school you are going to learn not only as much Spanish as possible, but we also make it possible for you to learn things which will be helpful for your job and your future. Learn Spanish in our school to improve your language skills as well as your knowledge about Spanish culture.

If you want to do the radio course, apply at reception desk before 17th November

Learning Radio with your Spanish course

The proof for it is our radio workshop which took place two weeks ago at our Spanish School

Many thanks to Daniel and Radio Espacio., They left us the complete radio program from Mester students at our disposal, which was broadcasted at frequency 89.5 fm on 27th October.

Now you can enjoy it if you click in the play button.

Teaching with new multimedia technology and digital boards

Monday, June 14th, 2010

Elements

At Mester Academy we strive to stay at the cutting edge of teaching, employing the latest technologies and teaching methods to ensure our Spanish students are given the best classes they can be given.

One of  our most recent advances at the Academy is the installation of a number of digital boards in the classrooms. These teaching aids provide the teachers with a larger selection of resources than  ever before, guaranteeing the classes are as dynamic and interesting as possible.

Incredibly easy to use and set up, the boards can be calibrated and made ready to use within a couple of minutes.  A “pencil”, which works the same way as a PC mouse, is used when setting the board up: it marks out the 9 points between which the images will be projected and then later, writes or “clicks” on the options of whatever programme is chosen by the user.   The movements of the pencil are detected by device fitted in the corner of the board and the image comes from a projector.  These are the only three pieces which comprise the board, making it ideal for quick set-up and storage.

The elements of the digital board

Standard Uses

The applications are many and varied.  From Internet to Spotify to all the usual Office applications, the boards can even be used as a normal PC.  This enormous range of uses benefits both the students, who enjoy the classes more given the interaction aspect the boards add to the lessons, and the teachers, to who the boards give the opportunity to keep their lessons fresh and interesting. What is more, the teachers are able to save the classes given, as though the board was a usual PC, and so come back to them in the future or pass what’s been dealt with in class on to the students for home-study.

Different uses of the digital board

Other Uses

Examples of novel uses include the download of modern Spanish songs to exemplify a certain verb tense, style of vocabulary or syntactic use, the projection of recent newspaper articles for class discussion and the showing of film clips as a means to show students anything from “real Spanish life” to interaction and dialogue between native speakers.

The many ways in which the board can be used

Conclusion

The installation of these boards is evidence of the Mester Academy’s dedication to teaching, something to bear in mind when picking a Spanish school in Spain.  The opportunities for interaction which the board promotes ensure the students will be using, as well as studying, their new found language skills every single day – the only way to consolidate and accelerate foreign language learning.

Learning week videos – from Salamanca!

Thursday, May 13th, 2010

A couple of our regulars to the Spanish school in Salamanca have made a couple of videos all about the language learning experience here!

Marcello and Angelo are from Italy and regularly bring over groups of students from their university to learn about tourism in Spain, as well as the necessary Spanish!  Their trips always include visits to local hotels, as well as talks from people very relevant in the industry.  They were nice enough to take some film footage of their experience here, including the beautiful architecture of Salamanca (the golden stones, the Plaza Mayor, the Casa de las Conchas, the University buildings, the Roman Bridge, the cathedrals…the list is endless!), the Mester Spanish school (great for if you’re interested in a course here!), the hotels (where the students learnt about the tourism industry and business in Spain) and the other excursions they did (the museum in Alberca for example!).

The group trips from university are always a great success at Mester – the students have varied days, meaning they’re always entertained and learning new things, with something to look forward to the next day!  We design the programmes working alongside the course supervisors of the university to ensure it is completely apt and appropriate to what they are studying.

As well as giving them the chance to learn about the certain relevant aspects of Spanish culture (business, work, travel…) and the specialist vocabulary, they see people in careers which they might possibly think of for themselves in the future – a first hand experience of career guidance!  This opportunity helps students to focus on their future, giving them real motivation for when they are back at home studying.  It also stimulates their imagination, prompting them  to consider jobs they may not have thought of before.

It’s also a great bonding experience for the group and will certainly be a highlight of their university course, as well as a chance for them to meet friends and make contacts from all over the world – taking part in the activity programme of the school, exploring the city, going on excursions, talking to locals… The activity programme organised by the school, as well as the cultural events in Salamanca, help this bonding process – there really is choice for everyone!  From cookery classes to guitar lessons to excursions to other cities to typical Spanish meals, film nights, art conferences, history talks, sports competitions and tapas tours throughout the city, the students don’t have a second to be bored in!  Whats-more, all this interaction and social activity boosts the Spanish learnt in the classroom no end and helps the students become capable of using their Spanish in a social environment, a very important aspect in becoming fluent and comfortable with a language.

Should you be interested in a group trip to learn Spanish in Spain, don’t hesitate in contacting us – we’ll coordinate with you and tailor the course to meet your needs.  Also – don’t forget to add us as a friend on Mester to keep up with all the news, see the photos and videos and make contacts!

Bringing Spanish teaching into the age of technology!

Friday, April 16th, 2010

Taking a Spanish course in Spain can never be a bad thing – it’s a chance to open your eyes to a different culture, meet new and interesting people, see a bit of the world, gain independence and, above all else, learn a second language, something which will make it so much easier for you to do all these other things in the future!

Digital Board in class!

However, how you learn Spanish matters a lot.  Sometimes it’s a hard road – grammar, accent, word patterns… It takes perserverance and though for the good majority of the time you’ll be having fun picking up your second language (talking with new friends over coffee, enjoying foreign film, reading local newspapers…), as with all skills, to be successful, an element of graft is necessary. And this graft is made so much easier with new dynamic teaching methods, with the use of technology for example.

Spanish teaching with digital board!

At Mester Spanish Academy we’ve taken this on board and as a result, improved our classrooms with the additions of digital boards – allowing teachers to bring in new teaching resources and materials and impart their classes in a much more flexible, interactive way.

Spanish class using technology

The digital boards allow much more class participation, meaning the students have plenty of opportunity to involve themselves in the class, speak Spanish and contribute towards the class.

Digital boards have many uses – they are projected onto a wall and can be “written upon”, have a tactile screen and can present a variety of documents and programmes.

And it’s not just the students who see a direct benefit.  Having an interested class makes so much difference to a teacher, seeing results and how the students are keen to participate.  Furthermore, as a side-benefit, the fact that not so much paper has to be used in class – for handouts, question sheets, etc – means the environment sees benefits too!  It really is the way forward for teaching.

Using digital board

So, even though any Spanish course in Spain is a great decision both personally and professionally, to really see your money’s worth and to take 100% advantage of the opportunity, pick a course which uses the most up to date teaching methods, what actively encourages student participation and what is leading the way and pushing boundaries in its field.