Students, aged 2-60 years old, across Nottingham have been continuing with their revision and learning thanks to the help of their dedicated language teacher.
Nicola Warren who lives in Lambley, but teaches in Ruddington, Lambley, Calverton, Lowdham and Burton Joyce, has been working flat out 6 days a week to ensure pupils are not left behind when it comes to their linguistic learning. As schools, nurseries, colleges, and universities suddenly closed, many students were left wondering how they would continue with their studies.
Nicola says “It was and still is a very worrying time for everyone, particularly with the uncertainty of how educational settings will re-open safely. Some of my students felt a sense of panic as many are due to sit A Levels and GCSEs this year and next year.
“I felt heart-broken as they had already put in so much hard work, so I felt it my duty to do all I could to help them through these testing times. So with the wonders of the internet I turned my weekly group classes online using Zoom and Facebook Live. All my pupils jumped on board with the changes and haven’t look back since”.
Nicola previously worked as a secondary school teacher but always dreamed of setting up her own language school. Her passion for languages was first ignited at secondary school where she studied both French and German, she loved how different languages all sounded so very different.
She continued with her language learning at A Level and she successfully achieved A Levels in French, German, Spanish and Economics. She opted not to go to university at 18, but instead studied later on in life and learnt Portuguese and, for her degree in her 40s, graduated in French and Spanish. Nicola now runs her highly successful language school “The Language Tree” and has done so for the last 5 years.
“With my younger students we enjoy a group session of 30 minutes following the award winning La Jolie Ronde Programme where the focus is based around fun French or Spanish learning through songs, stories, dancing and role plays. These group sessions are a great way for this age group to catch up with friends plus other family members can join in.
“My GCSE and university students tend to prefer a different approach as the aim is more on speaking, listening, reading and writing skills so I offer one to one online classes here. My adult learners are also extremely important so again I offer one to one classes, mainly because many are at varying levels of competency and with a wide range of reasons for learning, many of whom ‘wishing they had continued with languages when they were younger’.
“Feedback for all areas of my online teaching has been amazing, many who have been struggling with daily routine say my online teaching has given them a great structure to their week”, she added.
For more information about Nicola’s Online classes, call 07837 676 287 or email nicolawarren67@outlook.com.