This winter, Southern Lehigh High School hired Ms. Kyra Salamon as a long-term substitute Spanish teacher, to fill the position of Mrs. Jessica Eastburn while she is on maternity leave. Ms. Salamon recently began teaching Spanish V, Spanish II, and Honors Spanish, switching Mrs. Eastburn’s AP Spanish class with Mrs. Jennifer Jaen’s Spanish V class.
Before becoming a Spanish teacher at the high school, Ms. Salamon attended SLHS as a student, graduating only six years earlier. Although it is a major transition going from a student to a teacher, she is receptive to all of the knowledge she will gain from the new position.
“It’s weird, but in a good way, I think,” Ms. Salamon said. “It’s really interesting seeing the other side of how things work, and I am now retroactively understanding a lot of things about high schoolers and how their minds work.”
Although she lived in Spain for a few years, Ms. Salamon became inspired to teach Spanish much earlier in life. After the first day of her seventh grade Spanish class at Southern Lehigh, she discovered her love for the language and began developing her passion.
“I remember my first day of Spanish class ever because it was the first time that I remember being in a class and feeling one hundred percent confident that I understood it and that I could do it,” Ms. Salamon said. “It has always been the only subject that I have felt one hundred percent confident in for all my years of school.”
Because she knew that she was passionate about Spanish from a young age, Ms. Salamon did not hesitate to envision her future as a teacher. She created many expectations for herself which she hopes to fulfill now that she is back at Southern Lehigh High School.
“Half of adjusting [to teaching] is just responding to how teenagers act nowadays because it is different than when I was here,” Ms. Salamon said. “Adaptation has been very important and not being rigid at all in my theories regarding education.”
Ms. Salamon has many goals for her students, specifically to help them reach fluency by sharing her love and knowledge of grammar with them. Although she knows that some students will not be as receptive as others to improve their Spanish skills, she wants to impart as much knowledge as she can on those excited to learn.
Although Ms. Salamon is new to teaching Spanish, she became very accustomed to the language after living abroad in Spain for a few years. She does not know what the future holds for her as a teacher at SLHS, as Mrs. Eastburn will likely return sometime in the spring, but she hopes to make an impact on all students she encounters. Ms. Salamon hopes to act as a mentor that they can come to for advice not only relating to Spanish, but also regarding life in general.
“I only graduated six years ago, but college is a huge learning experience and living abroad is a huge learning experience,” Ms. Salamon said. “So whatever I can do in terms of giving advice, sharing knowledge, or preparing people for what their future holds is what I’m trying to convey and cultivate.”
