Mrs. Velez is one of the many new teachers to Armuchee High School this year, teaching Spanish 1. She has taught this class for many years before coming to Armuchee. She teaches students the basics about the Spanish language, like greetings, introducing yourself, hobbies, and simple things like the alphabet and numbers. She is very passionate about her job as well as her students.
Her mom is also a teacher, which is mainly what inspired her, so she also took a class in high school for teaching. Mrs. Velez’s biggest goal as a teacher is to help students know their culture and language through other languages. Bayleigh Fortenberry, freshman, said, “She explains very well and gives us assignments to help us learn.” She wants to help students be informed about the importance of knowing and learning about other languages and cultures. She also believes that it is also important to learn Spanish because students can use the information in the real world, for example, having conversations with other people who may only speak Spanish.
Mrs. Velez’s style of teaching is giving students digital assignments daily, which helps students memorize the information. Students can go back and look at their work to study on their chromebook. Sometimes, she plans fun activities and games for her students to do. This gives them a chance to have some fun and also learn at the same time. She also plays songs everyday for her classes to memorize. Adalyn Smith, freshman, said, “I like the way she teaches because I have learned a lot of Spanish in a short period of time.”
Mrs. Velez loves learning all about her students. Mrs. Velez cares about each and every one of her students and loves to hear about them. She said, “My favorite part about teaching is getting to know students and having conversations with everyone.” Not only does she like to talk to them about her class, but she also likes to have conversations about things unrelated to school. Mrs. Velez wants to know what her students do besides go to school, like sports or hobbies. She enjoys hearing from all of her students and about their life outside of school, so that she can learn about their personalities and get to know them better, as well as their overall character.
Mrs. Velez is excited about teaching at Armuchee this year, and wants to know everything about our school. When interviewed, she said, “I am looking forward to learning about Armuchee and getting to know new people.” She is eager to learn all about our community. So far, she has enjoyed teaching a lot and hopes to get to know a lot more people.
