A teacher shares life on the border:
My class and I were reviewing homonyms, which then led to a discussion about Spanish words that students often put into their English writing because of the similarity to English words. One of the Spanish words discussed was “embarazada,” which means pregnant. We all agreed that sometimes Spanish speaking students use “embarazada” mistakenly for the English word “embarrassed.”
My class and I were reviewing homonyms, which then led to a discussion about Spanish words that students often put into their English writing because of the similarity to English words. One of the Spanish words discussed was “embarazada,” which means pregnant. We all agreed that sometimes Spanish speaking students use “embarazada” mistakenly for the English word “embarrassed.”
“Here is an example of using the Spanish word ‘embarazada’ incorrectly,” I said. “I was very embarazada when I fell.” Or course the intent of the sentence was to mean: I was very embarrassed when I fell.
The students began to laugh. I realized that this would be a great opportunity to joke around a little bit while sharing a few tidbits of my personal life to drive home the day's lesson.
“Although, you can be very ‘embarazada’ when you fall.”
“Although, you can be very ‘embarazada’ when you fall.”
My students looked at me skeptically, questioning my reasoning.
I began my story. “I was actually eight-months pregnant with twins when I went to check my mail and without even tripping on anything, I just fell right over into the street! So yes, I was very embarazada when I fell!”
I could see mouths open, smiles, and I even heard a few dramatic gasps. I continued to tell them how I couldn’t get up, so I just gave in and was hanging out, lying down in the street. I was mortified (good chance for introducing new vocabulary words) for one thing. And I was too heavy and wanted to avoid the embarrassment of trying to roll around until I could get up. So, of course, as I heard a car coming I thought, Oh, please God, don’t let the driver run me over! Please let the driver see me. (Yes, my students found that humorous.)
I told my class how a man pulled over and got out and asked if I were okay. I said yes, but when he saw me not getting up, he asked if I could.
“Yes,” I meekly replied, just wishing he would leave me alone in my shame.
“Well do it,” he said.
So I moved from my side onto my back and when my jacket fell to the side, of course, there was a huge beach ball!
The man said, “Oh ma’am!” He ran to get his son out of the car.
As I told this story, my students laughed hysterically as I re-enacted one man and one teenage boy each taking my hands, bracing themselves, and grunting (of course I was exaggerating just a little bit) as they tried to get this big belly pulled up.
By this point, my students were laughing so hard that some were wiping tears. Some were sharing pregnancy stories, and some wanted to know what happened next. We didn’t take but a few minutes to get through all of this, but it made such an impact on the class.
