Teaching Spanish, and reconnecting with it

On a mild Monday evening in the fall of 2008, I began teaching an adult education class in conversational Spanish.

A few people had registered for the course at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation at Shelter Rock in Manhasset, where I've been a member for several years. But who would actually show up? A handful of people sat down. I waited a few minutes, and by the time I started the lesson, more than 30 people had crowded into the room.

I was surprised - and a bit overwhelmed. Most of the people were in their 50s or older, when learning a foreign language is not the easiest of endeavors. Why did they want to learn (or relearn) Spanish? And why had I, in turn, decided to reconnect with the language that I had learned as a boy?

From the questionnaire I handed out, I discovered that a few students had no background in Spanish, but most had some formal study of the language in high school or college. Several students wanted to learn basic conversational skills so they could communicate more easily with the growing number of Hispanic immigrants on Long Island, or while vacationing in Spanish-speaking countries. Still others simply wanted an opportunity to socialize in Spanish - an enjoyable diversión.

My own Hispanic journey began with my mother, Leslie Adele Roel, now 84 and still living in Woodbury. She had first come alone to New York City from Havana in the early 1940s and was introduced to the city's Latin American community under the watchful eye of her aunt. She had a strong, traditional family. My mother's full Spanish name: Leslia Adela Eulalia Carmen del Sacramento González Martín de Roel. She married my father, Edmund, the Brooklyn-born son of a Mexican lawyer from Monterrey, and in the early 1950s, we moved out to the wilds of Nassau County.

I first learned Spanish from Mom, who made a point of telling her four sons, "I'm an American now, but I want you to know your heritage." At every family gathering, she would exhort us to speak Spanish to our relatives (her own mother had pushed her to speak English to American tourists in Cuba). Early on, we learned from songs, poems and nursery rhymes, like this one:

Los pollitos dicen,

"Pío! Pío! Pío!"

Cuando tienen hambre Y cuando tienen frío

(The little chicks say,

"Peep! Peep! Peep!"

When they're hungry

And when they're cold)

In middle school, we began to learn grammar and broadened our Spanish vocabulary, but we never met other Latino kids. When friends would ask me what my background was, and I would answer, "Hispanic," they would blink. As in, "What's that?"

There were times (I admit now) that I would resist speaking the language - I wanted to be a "normal" American kid. But my mother was a loving, persistent presence.

While my careers did not require a knowledge of Spanish, the language remained just below the surface of daily life, emerging in unexpected ways.

When I worked for a university fundraising campaign, I was asked to make a presentation to prominent Latino alumni in Mexico City. While working as a reporter on a Newsday story about a tragic van accident involving Central American immigrants, I was able to track down the driver by going door-to-door in a Latino neighborhood. Occasionally, I would help Mom with freelance consulting jobs, such as translations of employee manuals for companies with large numbers of Hispanic workers.

Over the past decade, of course, Latinos became the fastest-growing immigrant group in the nation, as well as on Long Island. I no longer get quizzical looks when I refer to my family's heritage. The signs in many big-box stores today are written in English and Spanish; so are cooking instructions and directions for using consumer products - a convenient, if unintended, way to help me practice Spanish and learn modismos (idioms) I never knew.

In recent years, the reassertion of Spanish in my life became more personal. My sons started taking Spanish in school (earlier than I did), and while I had not pushed them, as my mother had pushed me, I came to realize that I, too, wanted to pass along this heritage. Furthermore, as my mother has aged, I increasingly find myself talking to her in Spanish. In part, I could see that after all these years, my American mom still feels a lasting joy when we share the language of her youth.

So when Barry Nobel, a fellow member of the Shelter Rock congregation, urged me to start a course in conversational Spanish, I hesitated briefly (concerned over the time commitment), but realized it was time to complete the cycle Mom started more than 50 years ago.

Not that it would be easy. Clearly, the different levels of fluency in the class would pose a challenge. For these students, as for me, the experience would serve as a "renewal" process, recalling the lessons of our earlier years and transforming them to a richer, more seasoned time and place.

At the very least, it would be good for our health. Most medical experts now agree that the brain can continue growing new cells well into old age - and two of the strongest cell generators are physical exercise and mental exercise, such as learning new languages, art forms or musical instruments. "Learning a new language offers an excellent opportunity for older people to keep their brain healthy," says Dr. Jeffrey Borenstein, chief executive and medical director of Holliswood Hospital and host of "The Healthy Minds" public television series. Furthermore, one of the biggest elements to maintaining cognitive ability is social engagement - interacting with the world.

It was this combination of learning and social interaction that attracted Joy Brann to the Spanish class last year. When she learned Spanish in high school "it was always about conjugating verbs, but I couldn't order a cup of coffee," said Brann, 63, of East Meadow. Today, the former dean and computer software teacher at Commack High School acknowledges she doesn't always get all of what's being said in class, but appreciates the congeniality of the group.

Over the past year, the class has evolved into an eclectic format that includes grammar and usage lessons; conversations based on current themes or events; and presentations by local Spanish-speaking guests on various topics.

"I wanted Spanish conversation for myself, but I'm also interested in diversity," says Nobel, 65, of Port Washington, a retired Web developer. Nobel, who taught linguistics and English as a second language at the Universidad Inter Americano de Puerto Rico more than 30 years ago, has since become co-facilitator of the class.

Susan MacDonald, 49, of Garden City learned Spanish through a Colombian friend she has known since high school. With the mixture of native and nonnative speakers, she said, the class has become "an educational experience, not just learning a language."

Still, many of the initial students have dropped out, even as new members have joined.

"It's not easy; they don't need to do this," acknowledges the Rev. Lilia Cuervo, a Westbury resident and native Colombian who joined our class and recently was hired as associate minister at First Parish UU church in Cambridge, Mass. "It's about time for people to be interested in being a bilingual, trilingual country," she says. "It's important for business and travel. And it's important for immigrants to learn English correctly. We're all not so different. This is one way to reach out to each other, one by one."

For me, the class has become not only a way to reach out, but to reach inward, understanding how the experiences of youth can re-create our later years in resplendent, unexpected ways. The other day, my older brother, Larry, reminded me of a simple poem Mom taught us that evoked this sentiment - and the hopes she held for her children:

De un botón se hace una

rosa.

De una semilla, un árbol.

Y de un niño, se hace un

hombre.

Y de un hombre, un sabio.

(From a bud a rose is made.

From a seed, a tree.

And from a boy, a man

is made.

And from a man, a wise

man.)