Language Learning

[April 15, 2015] Wednesday

We met (via Skype) with Elder Jamison Peterson from the MTC in Provo. He outlined the materials and resources that will be available to us to learn and refresh our Spanish. 

For us Senior Missionary types (who probably need more help than the young missionaries), they provide a Learning Coach, a Language Tutor, and a "Study Buddy". We will meet with them via Skype each week. In between, they have some very thorough lessons for us to study, grammar and vocabulary resources specific to our responsibilities, and numerous vignettes in Spanish for us to listen to and learn to hear the language. 

The Learning Coach reviews good learning practices, and helps us understand what our best approach to learning is. Given that we've been out of school for nearly 40 years, that will be a great help. The Language Tutor speaks Spanish, and helps with vocabulary, grammar, etc. The Study Buddy is a native Spanish speaker, and the expectation is that no English is spoken (except for clarifying unknown words.) They help you understand how to communicate in specific situations, what vocabulary you might need, and just help you practice.

They also provide an immersion experience that we will try and take advantage of early in June. We spend a day with native speakers at a chapel down near the MTC in Provo. We'll have a pretty good idea after that as to whether we'll starve in Bolivia for the first few weeks!

Lots of fun!