Montevideo: Una Estudiante Otra Vez DOWNLOAD PDF

I felt stupid.

Sitting in a small classroom, with classmates I’d just met, avoiding eye contact with a teacher I couldn’t understand, I felt stupid.

I’d started this venture feeling smart, motivated, and confident. I was eager to master new skills, and my past educational experiences indicated that my hard work would bring success.

But no.

I’d arrived in Montevideo, Uruguay, just a week earlier, part of a sabbatical plan that combined learning Spanish with various writing projects. I was still settling into my apartment, still finding my way to the laundry, still unable to make my comfort-food brownies because I didn’t yet realize that the Spanish word for “butter” varies among Spanish-speaking countries.

I’d gone to an informal gathering of teachers and students a few days before classes began, excited to meet my partners in this new venture. But instead of connecting, I’d felt like an outsider: too old, too foreign, too new to this culture. The teachers talked only to each other.  The other students had already formed groups by the time I arrived.

Now, sitting in class, I felt stupid. I wasn’t brand new to Spanish, so I’d expected at least the first day of class to be easy. But on Day 1 we were practicing commands, my least favorite verb form. “Give me the book. Give it to me.”  I couldn’t follow the pattern for conjugating the verbs and attaching a string of pronouns – “¡Dámelo!”  Culturally, I didn’t believe I should be giving commands in my second language to people I didn’t know in a country I’d been in only briefly.

My teacher was obviously bright, but not so obviously interested in me, or my mastery of his native language, or my understanding of his native culture. In another awkward class a few weeks later, we translated and analyzed a song that was currently popular among teens. The words and their meaning were impenetrable. I did like the music, but we didn’t talk about that.

My classmates, mostly Germans, always seemed vastly more knowledgeable than I felt, in part because they spoke my language flawlessly and were thus mastering their third language while I stumbled over my second.

Where was my confidence? My motivation? Why had being a student again seemed like a good idea for an experienced teacher like me?

I felt so stupid.

Author’s Note: Being a student again deepened my empathy for new law students.  My experience mirrored theirs – arriving in a new city, seeking relationships during orientation, feeling overwhelmed in classes, struggling to transfer prior knowledge, and learning the culture of law school.  My sabbatical experience increased my commitment to easing their transition.