Gabby

I have been teaching English for 18 years using my own private-lesson method, which focuses on practicing real-life situations. During this time, I have identified some common mistakes typically made by Spanish-speaking students, such as translating phrases literally and being unfamiliar with English-specific structures.
To help my students overcome these difficulties, I encourage them to study complete sentences rather than individual words and to study actively rather than passively. This means that instead of simply learning grammatical rules, they need to learn how to apply grammar in different contexts.

Most of my students come to me with the same problem: they feel frustrated because they are unable to express themselves in everyday situations. In order to improve their conversational skills and achieve greater fluency, it is essential for students to stop translating from Spanish into English.

Sometimes, however, this is not easy. Words and phrases do not come to mind quickly enough, and speech does not flow as naturally as they would like, especially when there is no time to think.

In my classes, I use a wide variety of activities designed to help students develop their command of morphosyntactic structures, fixed and idiomatic expressions, and specific vocabulary related to areas such as healthcare, education, art, and many others.

There is an English saying: “Repetition is the mother of all skill.” It is a very true saying, and my students can certainly confirm this. Through repetition-based exercises (drilling activities), my students have been able to internalize the language more effectively and leave behind the translation-based approach, which has never been productive.