Lorelei is an LTS alumna who pursued a concurrent degree with UO Teach in 2019-2021.

Hi Lorelei! Congratulations on your recent graduation from LTS! Could you tell us a little about your experiences in immersion language learning and teaching before you joined LTS?

Previous to LTS, I was a camper and then a counselor at Concordia Language Villages, a full immersion program in Minnesota that serves over fourteen different language programs. I attended as a child for the German program, and later worked in both the German and the Arabic programs. Not speaking English for months on end during the summer made me fascinated with immersion learning in a way that my previous schooling in Germany and Italy didn’t. When I didn’t know something when I lived in Europe, someone would tell me the English word for it, but at CLV, the point of speaking was language exploration.

What inspired you to pursue an MA in Language Teaching Studies?

I was inspired to pursue an MA in Language Teaching Studies because despite knowing several good techniques from working at CLV, I didn’t know why or how they worked. I also was interested in teaching year-round, and I needed to integrate some English into my teaching methodology in order to integrate students who were used to mostly English-based teaching. 

What was your MA project about?

My MA project was based on using music and song to teach language, drawing mostly from songs used at CLV from our program songbook. Singing is an integral part of the day, with around an hour of formal song instruction and songs being sung in different parts of the program. I wanted to see how I could integrate something like that into a high school setting.

You decided to pursue a concurrent MA degree in the UOTeach Program (which overlapped last Summer with LTS). What prompted you to do this, and how do the two degrees complement one another for your future goals?

I decided to do a concurrent degree with UOTeach in order to get my teaching certificate to teach in public schools. Being in UOTeach allows me to take the very specific themes of LTS (namely language teaching, as UOTeach is all subjects) and apply it just to the public high school setting, as I aim to teach in public high schools.

Do you have any advice for current or prospective students of LTS?

I really enjoyed doing LTS namely because of how small the program was and how we were able to get personalized help with our varied and specific projects. I think the program is great if you have a vision of who you want to be as a language teacher and the diversity in the program is great for making connections across the globe. For current students, having a basic idea of your masters project is a good idea, but it always evolves and changes with time. What I wanted to make in September was not what I ended up proposing in Winter Term and being able to bounce ideas off other students in the cohort was invaluable.