Xiaohongshu
Hi, I'm Antonio Neves or “Tony” if you know me. I am in my second year of Medicine at UCL and I like to say I am a mix of Spanish and Portuguese.
This past year has been tough for everyone, I was caught completely off guard while in a trip back to Spain and had to quarantine there for more than 2 months without leaving my house, while I was fortunate to be able to stay with my family in my old room it definitely disturbed my studies and the lack of some left behind books meant some topics were harder to understand.
While I was in Spain, I saw how many of my mates were doing incredible things to help the NHS, this made me think about how I could use much of my new found time to follow in their footsteps and help other people. I saw online and signed up to give weekly Spanish classes and help to prepare some learning materials for an AgeUK centre in Chelsea.
In the beginning I was quite scared of giving the classes as my Spanish is not perfect and I had never used any online tools to work as a teacher. I thought that the distance from the students would mean lack of engagement and me struggling to conduct the class. But after receiving some guidance from my coordinator and giving a couple of classes I quickly grew to love Thursday mornings as I knew I would be able to hear Nina, Rosa or any of the other seniors cracking jokes and learning Spanish with a smile.
COVID actually lead me to start volunteering regularly! I had given classes before but never in an online setting so COVID made me transition. Online classes are sometimes tough for older people to understand, as they have to learn about zoom or how to use their email to clear any doubts about the “pasado”. But my students have been even better at technology than I am, and the fact that they can connect from anywhere as helped us keep a very regular attendance over this past year.
I would advice people to get themselves “out there” (even when COVID doesn’t let us leave our houses) and try things that seem challenging but will fulfil you and bring happiness to other people.
Some sentences from the students
Nina:
“Hola!
Antonio es muy buen maestro con mucha paciencia para lidiar con nosotros grupo difícil ?
Antonio is a very good teacher with a lot of patience to deal with a difficult group.”
Monique
“I really love the Spanish class teaches by you and really appreciate the effort and interesting lesson you provide for us each time we attend your class.”
The patience and understanding for giving us an opportunity to learn a second language is quite remarkable as I know it is not very easy .
Rosa:
“Antonio is very helpful and he always makes the class fun.”
Written by Antonio Neves, Medical School