Special guest teachers from foreign countries have spent this year at Southern Lehigh us to teach their native tongues. Arabic teacher Mrs. Hannan Gawdet, hosted by our superintendent, says she has learned a lot about America.
Q: What is your impression of America now that you have stayed here for a couple months?
A: “It is a very organized country. The people here are very kind and friendly from what I have seen. If I ever have the chance to come back I definitely would.”
Q: What do you miss the most about Egypt?
A: “I miss everything about Egypt, especially its warmth. I am not use to all this cold weather. I miss the food, the sea, I miss the Call of Prayer, and I even miss the Egypt dust, as well as all of my family which is back home.”
Q: What has your stay been like so far?
A: “Staying in America is good, but what makes me stay is the school and my Arabic students and the relationships I have made with my colleagues.”
Q: Do you think you have gotten far with your Arabic students?
A: “I think that I have taught what I wanted to teach them, and I think that by the end of the year I will have reached my goal of having them retain all the information that they have learned.”
Q: What have the Arabic students learned this year?
A: “They learned how to make sentences and communicate with actual Arab people. I want the main idea to be that they know what to say and how to react in a real life situation.”
Q: What are you going to take back with you when you return home?
A: “I am going to take back with me the wonderful experience of teaching my own language. The idea that I have learned to appreciate my language and culture more now that I have taught it. I never thought people needed to know about about my language or culture until I saw the fascination in my students and it makes me proud to be Arab, that is what I am going to take back.”
Q: What was the hardest part about teaching students?
A: “Some of my students were taking Arabic, but I do not feel like they were with it all the way. The other hard part was getting my students to study; they wanted the language to come easily with limited work, but that is not how learning a language works.”
