Future Foreign Language Teachers Learn at State Conference

Amy Farrar, French; Kirstie Cantwell, Spanish; and Rachel Story, Spanish, pre-M.A.T. students.

William Davis, German; Christine Faubel, Spanish; Jessica Prewitt, Spanish; and Freddie Bowles

Ricky Adamson, doctoral student in curriculum and instruction

Six University of Arkansas students participated in sessions April 19-20 at the Arkansas Foreign Language Teachers Association annual conference in Hot Springs. All of the students plan careers in teaching a foreign language at the secondary level.

Kristie Cantwell, Amy Farrar and Rachel Story, who are pre-Master of Arts in Teaching program undergraduates, and William Davis, Christine Faubel and Jessica Prewitt, who are M.A.T. interns, participated in three hours of total immersion April 19 in their content languages of French, German and Spanish. The sessions were sponsored by Arkansas chapters of the content professional associations – the American Association of Teachers of French, the American Association of Teachers of German and the American Association of Teachers of Spanish and Portuguese.

Students also attended several concurrent sessions on the teaching of world languages on April 20. Ricky Adamson, a doctoral student in curriculum and instruction, also attended and presented on vocabulary acquisition and communicative competency using board games in the target languages. All participants are students of Freddie A. Bowles, assistant professor of foreign language education and executive secretary of the Arkansas Foreign Language Teachers Association. Bowles also co-presented with Jessica Fay Sliger, a University of Arkansas alumnus of the M.A.T. program.

The association recognized Bowles for her work mentoring new teachers into the profession through a grant she received from the Central States Conference on the Teaching of Foreign Languages. Prewitt was also recognized for receiving a $2,000 travel grant from the organization.