What I learned about teaching during my Erasmus+ stay in Bratislava

Eugenia María González Betancor is the director of the EOI a Distancia de Canarias – a public language school based in the Canary Islands that offers flexible, mostly online instruction for adult learners. It provides courses in English, French and German from A2 to C2 levels, combining autonomous learning with guided support from qualified teachers. Its model is designed to make high-quality language education accessible to people who cannot attend regular in-person classes, while maintaining a strong focus on communicative competence and official certification.

Eugenia visited us in Bratislava last month and spent one week in our school job shadowing within the Erasmus+ program. What did she learn? And what did she like about Bratislava? Read in our interview below.

What motivated you to come here? How did you find out about Bratislava and our school?

Barbara (in charge of Erasmus+ projects at the Bridge) had been in contact with another language school like mine. So then I looked up the Bridge online and I said, I think that’s the thing that I need. Because, in my school, we just teach online, so it’s very difficult to find a place that has the same values or the same objectives as us.

What’s the biggest difference between our school and your school?

First of all, you’re a private school while mine is a state school, that’s the main thing. This carries a lot of other differences, but I think they’re minor, in fact, because if my goal is education, so I think all these differences shouldn’t be so important. And I’m lucky because my school is run by the government, and we usually get enough support.

What kind of students do you have?

We only teach adults. The language schools in Spain supported by the state teach adults mainly. But when you are 14, you can also join the lessons if your second language at high school is not the one that you want to study.

Do you teach just English?

No, in my school we teach English for teachers, but then we teach German and French as well.

Is there a big demand for foreign languages in Spain?

There is, yes. We’ve got a lot of competitors. There are a lot of private institutions that are offering their services like shorter courses, or intensive courses. And this makes a difference even if students have to pay a lot for it and then they go for the internationally recognised exams. And we don’t have these exams, just the national one.

What about teachers? Is it difficult to find good ones?

No, not really. Especially in language schools, the teachers are very qualified. And we are hired by the government, so it’s not a problem, really. The state supports language schools financially; the staff, the buildings, everything is paid for by the government. Some of your colleagues told me we are lucky. It’s not an issue for us to work just as teachers. We can also make a living from it.

Do you also cooperate with other language schools?

Yes. We have regular meetings with the administration, with the government, and then, we also like knowing what the other schools do. And we’ve got conferences once every two years.

What have you done at the Bridge this week?

I’ve done a lot really, because I’ve joined four online lessons. Then I’ve had some meetings with the staff and it was very nice yesterday as well when I had lunch with you. And I’ve taken a lot of notes.

Do you think you can implement some things in your school?

Sure. What I found really interesting was talking to Radka, who gave me a lot of interesting suggestions for our website. It is something that I hadn’t really thought about much. How to create that connection to the school even if the students are not ours.  Sometimes when we teach online, and teachers of English in particular have so much material to use,  we always like trying to innovate with digital tools. But then sometimes we lose focus  and what we have to do is to go back to asking “what’s the goal”? To teach students, to help students learn English. So maybe we tend to look at the fireworks and when I saw how you taught here at the Bridge, I thought; “look, of course they’re doing it digitally, but they don’t need any artifices”.  I think we have to get back to that sometimes.

What did you see in town?

Obviously the Danube. Yeah. I’m an island girl, so going to see some water is absolutely necessary. I’ve been walking mainly in Old Town and went to the castle. And then I just wanted to see and to smell the city. Of course, there are tourists, and of course I’ve heard a lot of Spanish. But I wanted to get a little more immersed in what ordinary people do, so I like going to coffee shops to see what people do. What language they speak when they talk together. A Slavic language, of course, and I can’t differentiate between them, but I know that I’ve been sitting in places without tourists. I’ve tasted the local food. I haven’t been to any museums, or galleries, but I wanted to see the architecture because I find it so interesting to see all those different eras. I like that mixture and I think the city is very eclectic.

Would you like to come back?

Absolutely. I was thinking a little about this when I was walking around this morning. Sometimes when I go to a new city, I say, “I’d live here”. Sometimes I say, “This is not my place”. I would like to get to know more of the city here. It is something completely different from what I know.

Let us change the subject a bit again. How do you define a good teacher?

That’s a good question. A good teacher is someone who knows what their student needs and is able to connect and help the student meet their goals.

Are you a teacher yourself?

I am. In Spain, the principals come from the teaching staff. I’ve been teaching for 30 years now. Some years I haven’t taught directly because I’ve had other responsibilities, and now I’m the director of the school, but I’m also teaching.

What do you like about teaching?

That suddenly time stops. I think when you do your work properly and when you like your job, you aren’t thinking of the time. When I prepare the lessons, and the syllabus and I find something that I think will get my students engaged, then I’m looking forward to the session to see if it works. And if I see them happy, I like that very much. When students can learn naturally also in the classroom and you, the teacher, create an atmosphere to help students learn better.

Thank you for your time and hope to see you around in Bratislava again.

Edited by: Kamila Jančíková / Vanessa Kimličková

Photos: Eugenia and the Bridge