“You always speak Spanish in class,” a student said to me in an accusatory tone. “Jessica [the instructor who substituted for me while I was on medical leave] never spoke Spanish. And she didn’t ask us to speak Spanish.”
What I wanted to respond was, “Ah, Jessica really gave you your money’s worth in this course. It makes total sense to pay for a course in Spanish where no Spanish is ever spoken. So sorry for doing something as ridiculous as actually speaking the language you are trying to learn.”
But that would not be collegial.
Clarissa's Blog 
There are times collegiality is overrated, Clarissa.
LikeLike
Yes, I can’t argue here. 🙂
LikeLike
I hate Jessica.
LikeLike
Why Jessica was hired?
LikeLike
Let’s say it was for not entirely educational reasons. 🙂
LikeLike
It would not be collegial to tell more about it… 😉
LikeLike
It might be prudent to be a little more… vague in speaking about colleagues, since it would not be that difficult for the determined to find out the real life identity of ‘Jessica’.
LikeLike
It is shocking to me to find that FL courses are now given in English, but they seem to be. I was never taught a modern language in English and I have taken courses in eight of them. But that was long ago. Now I am forced to it since they come into the second year not having learned enough Spanish for a basic hello, how are you conversation. I am required to teach them to do a certain kind of written exercise in the subjunctive, and other things like that, and since they cannot understand or say the first word in Spanish, the method for completing the exercise must be explained in English. Actually moving from the exercise to real life conversation is, of course, impossible and is apparently not a goal of the program … no matter what anyone says about our commitment to ACTFL and so on.
LikeLike