Berkeley Parents Network: Spanish Language Programs in Mexico

Berkeley Parents Network

Spanish Language Programs in Mexico

Berkeley Parents Network > Reviews > Classes & Lessons > Spanish Language Programs in Mexico

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Centro Bilingue de San Miguel
Spanish language program for parents & kids
Family friendly language schools in Mexico
Family Spanish Programs in Mexico
Oaxaca Mexico Language School
Language programs for a group of families

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Centro Bilingue de San Miguel

March 2007

Does anyone have experience with Centro Bilingue de San Miguel, in Mexico? My daughter, currently a sophomore, is interested a study abroad program in a Spanish speaking country. We are also looking into Experiment in International Living ....

YES: Send your children (and yourselves) to Centro Bilingue in San Miguel.

My daughters have attended Centro Bilingue de San Miguel http://www.geocities.com/centrobilingue/ and BEGGED to return. They learned a huge amount of Spanish, and have been inspired to learn more.

My older daughter has gone for 4 years in a row, starting at age 14; my younger daughter started last summer at age 15, and plans to return this summer.

We planned our family vacation so we could stop in San Miguel to meet the family that runs the school (Director is Sara Murillo). When we arrived in San Miguel, our daughters begged us to let them attend the school while my husband and I took side trips to the nearby towns.

There are classes for all age groups, activities for everyone, and a great sense of community. The school is a block from the centro (central square) in San Miguel. The teens made field trips to the local markets and to the orphanage, where they played with the young children; they have a fiesta every week, cooking lessons, and all kinds of activities. You can build the program you like (half day, full day, week, part of a week), and your child will learn and enjoy learning Spanish.

Say hello to Sara Murillo from us! Merry

We loved the Centro Bilingue's program when our family spent 3 weeks in San Miguel de Allende during the summer of 2005. Our children, then aged 9 and 11, really enjoyed the immersion day camp, while my husband and I went across the street in the adult program during the mornings, including language, history and cooking classes. The children's program is divided into age-based classes, and there was a lively group of teens, some of whom were there for the 3rd or 4th year in a row. I believe they do have homestay programs as well, although the people we happened to talk to were all there with their parents or in a group of friends with a parent supervising.

Great program, lovely people, wonderful town. Highly recommended! Here's the website: http://www.geocities.com/centrobilingue =Natasha

Spanish language program for parents & kids

Jan 2007

I'm looking for a Spanish language program in Mexico for myself, my partner and my two kids, ages 4 and 5. I've searched for programs on this list and the last posting was in 2005. We're especially interested in a summer program that will be fun for our kids but will also immerse them in Spanish. They are Guatemalan born so we're especially interested in a program in which they will be with other Mexican kids. However, our most important criteria is that they learn as much Spanish as possible. Thanks in advance for any advice. Carol

The SLI (spanish language institute) run by the Ramos family in Cuernavaca was great. But I was there as an adult and have no idea if they do kids programs... but the family that runs it is great. kevin

Family friendly language schools in Mexico

May 2006

We plan to take our family (including 2 daughters, ages 5 and 9) to Mexico for a few weeks this July. Checked the archive but wanted to see if anyone might have some more recent experiences with family friendly language schools in small Mexican towns. We have been looking mainly at Oaxaca, Guanajuato, and Cuernavaca and plan to study (though vacation style) and probably stay with a homestay family. We are open to having the kids either take fun spanish language classes and/or attend municipal camps. If anyone has had a particularly good (or bad) experience with any of the language schools, I would really love hearing about it. They all sound so good and it's hard to get a realistic idea from the websites. -- Mom dreaming in spanish

Check out the Instituto Allende in San Miguel de Allende: http://www.instituto-allende.edu.mx/ingles/summer.htm and http://www.instituto-allende.edu.mx/ingles/spanish.htm They have programs for both adults and children on the campus of their art school which also offers spanish classes. It is a beautiful colonial town with cobble stone streets. You can walk to just about anywhere that you want to go in town Melanie

Si, si! I can *highly* recommend the Centro Bilingue language school in San Miguel de Allende, where we spent 3 wonderful weeks last summer with our (then) 9 and 12 year old daughters. Their program is really superb - we met people there who were veterans of other Mexican or Costa Rican language schools, and all felt that the Centro was the best experience, in terms of the consistent quality of their teachers and their family-friendly program. Some people made this a yearly experience for their kids.

Centro Bilingue can take children as young as 4, on up through teens, who are put in small groups with children of the same age. The children's teachers were all warm, and kind, and spoke only Spanish to the kids. The days began gently, with warm up games such as ''loteria'' (bingo), and moved on to learning vocabulary, going out on walking field trips to the local mercado, coming back to a delicious lunch prepared on site (the kids also had cooking classes), some craft projects (all conducted in Spanish), more vocabulary and games. The kids had a great time and particularly enjoyed the expedition every Friday to a different local ''rancho'' where they would enjoy good food, meet some interesting animals, have a piqata, and come back to the Centro Bilingue for an end of week party, often with an amazing music or dance performance attended by the whole family, again accompanied by some great food. Other field trips included going to a paper machi factory where they painted maracas, a glass factory, a local restaurant, all of which they found very engaging.

The director, Sara, is an amazing woman who runs this place very well - in addition to the kids' summer camp which ran 8:30-1:00 every day, there were optional adult classes, also in small groups, run at many levels, including language, history, culture, cooking. I finally managed a much more sophisticated use of the subjunctive, while my husband stopped thinking Spanish was Italian with a different accent and also learned to make great tamales with complex salsas! We both became aficionados of

In the afternoon Sara also ran classes in English for local people, including free English classes to a group of girls from a local orphanage and a battered women's shelter to give them options to work in the local tourist industry.

Not only can we highly recommend Centro Bilingue, but the town of San Miguel is an easy introduction to Mexico. We were a little afraid that it would be too gringo-ized, but at least in late June it was not too overrun. Apparently Texans descend en masse to flee the heat of Houston or wherever after the 4th of July. The town is turned over to Canadians in the winter, which might be preferable to the Texan diaspora, depending on your point of view.

The walk from Centrol Bilingue to the ''Jardin'', the downtown plaza, is a matter of a few blocks. There are many great restaurants, it's easy to find rentals, or homestays. By the way, it may be a good idea to try to find a place with a pool, or get access to one, as even up in the highlands it can be hot in summer. The rainy season was supposed to begin in June but they were in the middle of a drought...There is a ''grotto'' out of town where you can swim, and a swimming club in town we didn't get to check out.

From a kid's perspective, the possibility of frequent visits to Cafe San Augustin, which specializes in three kinds of hot chocolate (Mexican, French and Spanish style) accompanied by delicious churros, is enough to justify any amount of time in language school. The frequent parades, fiestas, and other celebrations which seem to take over the town at frequent intervals can make things a bit noisy at times, but also very interesting (we opted to stay walking distance from the school but up the hill in a relatively quiet neighborhood).

The Centro also operates optional field trips for adults and/or families in the afternoons and weekends to places of local interest. Also highly recommended. There is no need to rent a car since you can walk or taxi cheaply everywhere in SMA, and either use Centro Bilingue or one of the other local tour companies to explore other areas - we loved our trip to Queretaro - the regional museum was great and we had an unforgettable meal there. Also loved our 3 day stay in the city of Guanajuato, or more precisely, in Valenciana at a lovely B&B, Estrella de la Valenciana, which the kids wanted to move in to. There's a lot to explore in the area! The historic importance of the region (where the ''Grito'' for Independencia began) gives you a lot of insight into a complex culture with a rich history.

Feel free to contact me with questions about San Miguel or Centro Bilingue...it's a great way to begin to become better acquainted with our neighbors to the south.

Here's the website: http://www.geocities.com/centrobilingue/summer.html

Buena suerte, y buen provecho! Natasha

Family Spanish Programs in Mexico

March 2005

I am looking for a language school in Mexico that offers an excellent program for young children (as young as 6). Does anyone have any recommendations?? ellie

I spent 5 months in Guanajuato with my partner and two kids (they were then 4 and 9). We went to a language school for adults and they went to a private school that was taught in Spanish and was located on the same site. I'm happy to talk to you about this - too much to say in one email and may not apply to you depending on how long you're going for. Feel free to email or call (528-8787). Amy

We are exploring a family program called Mexico4kids. The program is for a 10-day period at the end of July. It is located in Cuernavaca, Mexico. Check out their website at www.mexico4kids.com Hope this helps! Spanish Mom

Last summer we went to Instituto Bilingue in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico with my seven year old daughter. While my husband and I were in Spanish classes, she was in Spanish camp. She loved it more than any camp she's attended in the US. The counselors are all Mexican and are very warm and attentive. Less time is spent on sitting in formal lessons than in doing fun activities with the counselors conversing with the kids in Spanish. There are crafts, field trips, cooking lessons, etc,. - and the other kids at the camp were great. Being from Berkeley, there was a little culture shock at first re. sweets which are regularly available at camp - pan dulce, pinata, etc. but once I got used to that everything else was wonderful. Additionally, the Spanish lessons that we took were top-notch. I was in an advanced class and our instructor was a professor from Oregon State who teaches at the Institue in the summer. Highly recommended, if not the cheapest program going. They have a website. mmann

Oaxaca Mexico Language School

Jan 2003

We are thinking about going to Oaxaca and attending language school. Has anyone done this, and do you have any advice? My husband speaks Spanish pretty well and may not really need classes, but I am a true novice. I have heard that it is possible to live with families (who help you to practice), but don't know if that would work if we were two people and my 1 1/2 year old daughter. Any thoughts? Stevie

Our family attended a week of classes as Instituto Cultural de Oaxaca and we all thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it. Upon arrival they administer a brief test to place you at the right level. My husband and 9-year old son tested into their second level up from beginner and my 11-year old daughter and I into the fourth level. I believe there were about 12 levels.

They do arrange home stays, which most of the college and graduate school age students elected to take advantage of. The other students were from many countries, which added to the experience for us. We stayed in a hotel because we wanted our kids to be able to swim at a pool after class and we wanted to try and avoid getting sick (we didn't).

My son and husband ended up in a private tutorial for the week with an absolutely lovely indian woman who had a doctorate. They played games in Spanish and decided to have a lot of their classes outdoors in the beautiful garden at the Institute. My son cried when the week was over and he had to say goodbye to her. My daughter and I were in a larger class of about 8 students with a rather formal teacher. The instruction method was quite different from what my daughter was used to - her school was using TPR. Instead, this was grammar based. Less interesting, but she still enjoyed it and learned a lot. The daily schedule involved classes from around 9:00-12:00 followed by one hour of discussion outdoors. Then home for siesta, and return at 4:00 for two more hours of a cultutal enrichment activity (in Spanish of course). My son and I did cooking - again a private tutorial with a woman who took us to the market to buy ingredients then we cooked together in the Institute's kitchen. My husband and daughter did weaving with a woman who brought her three year old daughter each afternoon. They also offer a program where you are matched with a local who wants to improve his or her english for an hour of additional discussion each day.

We had great fun exploring the town of Oaxaca (stunningly beautiful), Monte Alban, and the restaurants. Everything is walkable. There were very few Americans there, so we felt as if we were truly in another land Not at all touristy. Definitely look into it! Debbie

We loved our month at the Instituto Cultural de Oaxaca. It is the largest language school in Oaxaca, and the real benefit to that is that there are lots of levels so you can find just the right fit for your ability. The day there is organized with small classroom instruction in the morning (until 1pm) and then in the afternoon you can do different workshop classes (cooking, pottery, weaving, dancing, etc) that are all taught in Spanish. They also pair you with a local conversation partner who usually wants to have some practice Speaking English, and you do a 50-50 Spanish-English conversation hour every afternoon. The end result was a full day (9-5 or 9-6) speaking Spanish with a couple of breaks. We really found that our language abilities grew in leaps and bounds while there.

The school can place you with a family or in an apartment (we opted for the apartment.) Most people I knew who stayed with families found it to be fine, although I don't know that they stayed there long enough to really build a relationship with them. But it would of course be a great way to reinforce the language practice.

The Insituto is a 10 or 15 minute walk from the Zocalo (main plaza) and most of the housing placements were quite close to the center of town. Good luck! And if you'd like to know more about it, please feel welcome to email me. Kathleen

I spent last summer with my two kids in Oaxaca. We did not stay with a family, although that would certainly have enhanced the language learning. Oaxaca was beautiful and interesting and our summer was terrific. The biggest issues were (a) finding and connecting with other kids and (b) finding places where the kids could run and yell and play. Regarding (a), I was surprised how hard it was to find local kids. I think staying in the center of town placed too far away from where most families live. And for some reason there were just very few travellers with children. Regarding (b), the Mexican zocalos and parques tend to be paved and landscaped. Very few parks the way we think of them. They sometimes found Oaxaca a bit physically stifling and urban. Our solutions were the hotel pool (small but effective), day trips to villages and ruins by bus, and going to several small and funky but fun water slide parks outside of town.

The language schools seemed fine but, perhaps again because there weren't many kids enrolled when we were there, they felt it was too much like school. The school we went to (ICC), spoke ONLY in Spanish, which they (9 and 6 yrs old) found confusing and alienating. Kevin

I recently took two weeks of Spanish classes at Solexico Oaxaca and was really pleased. It is a small school with small clases that are about 5 hours per day. There are many schools in Oaxaca that are geared more for college age people who spend their whole day at the school taking Oaxaca pottery classes and things like that. Solexico is more of a serious language only place though you can learn a ton about the culture in the conversation classes. I think it is much better for adults who want time after class with family. Their website is www.solexico.com gabriela

Language programs for a group of families

March 2002

I am looking for advice about Spanish language programs in Mexico (or Guatemala) that would be good for families. I am hoping to take a group of families (with kids ages 7-16) over winter holiday break. Thanks for any advice (or experiences). I am especially interested in hearing about programs in Cuernavaca, but tell me about anything you know about! Thanks. ellie

My daughter and a friend, who were fourteen at the time, studied Spanish in Cuernavaca, Mexico, last summer. They were part of a program organized by Language Link (www.langlink.com, info[at]langlink.com, (800)552-2051). The program was well organized and the kids enjoyed the experience, but they did not think the teachers were great. I would be glad to provide additional information.

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