What B1 Spanish Taught Me About My Students

Week one of my Spanish class in Málaga felt hard but manageable. I understood my teacher. I recognized the vocabulary. I was learning. I belonged in B1.

But in week two they moved me up to B2.

And everything unraveled.

One day we were assigned a worksheet on the subjunctive, and I stared at it with no idea where to begin. The teacher had a thicker Spanish accent, switched to vosotros (a form I had almost never used), and introduced vocabulary I couldn’t even look up because my phone wasn’t working. I knew the subjunctive endings on paper. I had written them down the week before. But no one had explained how to actually use them from the yo form. It was like everyone else had been handed instructions I never received.

As I stared at the assignment, panic rose in my chest. I could feel the heat in my face and the familiar tightness in my throat. I was confused, overwhelmed, and had no idea how to begin.

When another student commented again on my accent, everything inside me just snapped. I tried to explain—in my best Spanish—that this was too far above me. I even picked up the chair beside me pretending to throw it so she would understand how frustrated I was, half-laughing to cover the pain. But I wasn’t joking.

The teacher paused for a moment and then continued the lesson. No explanation. No check-in. No adjustment. Just the workbook.

I sat there in silence. I walked out to the bathroom, came back, and sat again. Waiting for the moment to pass.

By the end of the day, I signed up for a different school so I could repeat B1. And I felt relieved. I had a choice. If a class is too fast or a teacher doesn’t connect with me, I can switch schools. I can drop a level. I can start again.

My students don’t get that option.

When school feels too hard, they can’t just leave. They can’t switch teachers. They can’t move back down a level. They have to keep showing up whether they’re overwhelmed, embarrassed, or frozen. And they have to face that feeling again and again.

I kept thinking about my own students—the ones who whisper answers so quietly I can barely hear them. The ones who sit next to classmates who sound completely fluent. The ones who avoid speaking because someone might comment on their accent.

I often saw those moments as adolescent self-consciousness or uncertainty—maybe even lack of effort or apathy.

Now I see them differently.

Sometimes silence isn’t laziness. It’s fear.

Sometimes confusion looks like resistance.

Sometimes a student isn’t ready to move up yet.

Sometimes the problem isn’t the learner—it’s the way we teach or the systems we teach within.

There are days when the bravest thing a student can do is simply remain in the room.

Being a B1 learner didn’t just teach me Spanish. It taught me how to see my students more clearly.