Description

The programs for groups of university students are tailor-made intensive courses on Spanish and the Spanish culture, which are led by a professor from the students’ home university.

They can last between two weeks and nine months and can be organized throughout the whole year. They allow students to earn academic credit from their home university.

Recipients

Students from any university in the world who want to live an intensive Spanish learning experience and want to enjoy a true cultural journey with their classmates and their study reference group. This program offers a full life experience in Soria, one of the oldest and most special cities in Spain.

Main elements of the program

The teachers or leaders of these programs can design and customize the program that best suits the needs of their students. They can choose from a wide range of language and culture courses, workshops and activities. They can design their own program by choosing:

• Spanish courses: “Language in action”;
• Cultural courses and workshops: “Culture in action”;
• “Service learning” and volunteer activities, which are included in our project: “Spanish in the community and volunteering”;
• Nature activities;
• Sports and leisure activities;
• Cultural visits (cities, monuments, museums and festivals).

All our programs:

1. Combine language learning and culture (art, music, literature) through creative, playful and meaningful activities.
2. Integrate nature in the learning processes. Some language and culture classes, in addition to activities and trips, take place at the center’s yard and the natural surroundings of the city. We use the natural environment as a classroom and we progressively integrate outdoor teaching into our programs.
3. Include work in the classroom and allow exploring the environment through nature, leisure and sport activities, and cultural visits; and they guarantee participation in the life of the community (if activities of the program “Spanish in the community and volunteering” are chosen).
4. Are based on the personalized attention to each student’s learning process.

Wide range of language and culture courses

These are some of the courses available:

“Language in action” courses:

• Spanish language and culture courses;
• Oral language courses;
• Health course;
• Business course;
• Oral comprehension and expression courses based on the work with the oral language corpus CorDial, created by professor Carlota Nicolás, from the University of Florence;
• Spanish writing course with the writer J.A. González Sainz;
• Spanish translation course (English>Spanish, French>Spanish, Italian>Spanish, etc.) with specialized teachers;
• Linguistics courses taught by professors;
• Specialized course: the Spanish of wine.

“Culture in action” courses and workshops:

• Course on Spanish painting;
• Course on Spanish cinema;
• Course on the main Spanish museums;
• Course on cultural and social anthropology;
• Environmental course with specialists and entrepreneurs who work in our community;
• Course on Romanesque art with visits to Romanesque churches restored within the framework of the “Romanesque Soria” project of the Duques de Soria Foundation;
• Course on sustainability of rural areas with entrepreneurs of the ecological and agricultural sector;
• Radio workshop;
• Press workshop;
• Natural photography workshop;
• Cooking workshop;
• Cooking workshop at the hospitality school;
• Film workshop.

When weather conditions are favorable, these activities take place outdoors once a week. We are advocates of green pedagogy.

A wide variety of nature, leisure and sports activities

CIAM has a wide range of activities to complement the language and culture courses of our programs. We help students learn with a detailed plan, both inside and outside the classroom. These activities are always focused on learning and include a number of tasks that students have to complete.

Some of the most popular activities in our programs are the following:

Nature, history and culture

• Nature, history, literature and cinema;

• Literary landscapes: interpretive walk throughout poetic Soria;

• Cultural geography: the creation of a literary space;

• The birds of the area: trip to Tierras Altas, the north of Soria, to observe birds and learn about them;
• Interpretive hiking: Douro River and its nature, Douro River and Numancia;
• Visit to a beehive to learn about bees and their environment.

Leisure and sports activities

• Adventure park in a forest;
• Zipline park in Vinuesa;
• Visit to the green areas of Soria;
• Yoga on the banks of the Douro River for groups;
• Pilates for groups;
• Swimming;
• Paddle tennis;
• Championships of cards, checkers, chess and other games.

Cities, monuments, museums, festivals

• Madrid and the Prado Museum;
• Trip to the Abbey of Santo Domingo de Silos, and Burgos;
• Segovia and the Roman aqueduct;
• San Sebastián.

Spanish in the community and volunteering, a complementary option to guarantee the immersion of the student in the life, work and culture of the city

In order to combine the Spanish language and culture courses with an authentic immersion of the students in the life, work and culture of Soria, CIAM offers the activities of “Spanish in the community and volunteering.” It is a complementary program of experiences that guarantees the immersion of the students in the life of the community and / or their participation in volunteer activities.

Through this program CIAM arranges activities and projects for the students, in which they take part as observers and cultural researchers. Throughout the process, students share their work with their tutor.

Some examples of the activities included in the program are described below.

Spanish in the community

The language of leisure

Spanish in the city’s festivities (Fiestas de San Juan): The last week of June, before the first summer course, students can enjoy the most important festival in Soria, which is renowned all across the country.

Spanish in the municipal band: Students have the possibility to rehearse and eventually play with the Soria Music Band. It is an immersive sound experience.

Spanish in sports: Students can be part of a team, depending on their interests. They can choose between soccer, basketball and other team sports. Team work prepares for future professional life. Almost everything in life involves working in a group.

The language of mass media

• Spanish and the radio: Students attend live local and national radio broadcasts. They can even participate!
• Spanish and television: Students attend the recordings of local programs. They are behind the scenes in the recording studios, interviewing reporters and program hosts.
• Spanish and the press: Students spend time with local journalists in their daily work. They can also work as journalists themselves or reporters of their country in Soria while practicing and improving their Spanish.
• Spanish and web design: Students witness and learn from the work of a digital designer, who is a technological artist.

The language of jobs

• Spanish with a rural doctor: Students have the chance to put themselves in a health worker’s shoes in their daily work, while learning about our health system and empathizing with the patients of rural areas.
• Spanish in the Museo Numatino and its excavations (archeology): Becoming an archaeologist for a few weeks is a cultural and anthropological journey that students love.
• Spanish in education: During the fall, winter and spring, students can be with a teacher or a professor during classes and participate, for example, during English classes. In the summer, students can participate in activities and camps with children, where they will be able to do micro-teaching sessions.
• Spanish in the local administration: Students also have the opportunity to observe the work of technicians in local environmental programs and heritage restoration projects, among others.
• Spanish and its legal language: Students will be able to closely follow the work of a lawyer.
• Spanish at the hospital: Students can also observe the work of a health worker at the hospital. Now more than ever, health care is essential.

The rural Spanish

• Spanish with a forest ranger: Students can observe the daily work of a forest ranger in order to explore the Spanish language as they explore the forests of the area.
• Spanish at a ranch: Students might choose to be with a rancher while he does his job. They will learn about life cycles through Spanish.
• Spanish with a rural veterinarian: Students can be with a veterinarian in his daily work in the rural environment. It will fill their hearts!
• Spanish in the natural parks: This involves accompanying, in their daily work, an engineer responsible for the natural parks of the area: the Parque del Cañón del Río Lobos and La Fuentona, among others. A landscape that will remain with them forever.
• Spanish and alternative energy sources: Students might want to go with technicians to wind or solar parks and learn about their job. It will help them breathe and learn about green energy in our community.

Spanish in volunteering

• Programs with the Red Cross: Programs to help minors, women, drug addicts… It is about feeling the purpose and value of what is done for others.
• Programs with NGOs. Cives Mundi community development programs. This NGO collaborates with programs in developing countries.
• Spanish in a nursing home: Students spend time with the elderly and practice Spanish at the same time.

Methodology

The sessions that take place in the courses, workshops, and activities of nature, leisure and sports, including cultural trips, are organized following dynamics and activities that involve the participants experientially. Reflection and inquiry about the work done are the essential tools used to build knowledge and guide their learning experiences. Language and culture classes include outdoor sessions once a week. In the program “Spanish in the community and volunteering” students use ethnographic observation tools and write a learning diary.

The teachers

The teachers of our language and culture courses are in charge of planning and developing the classes of our programs. You can check their professional profiles here. The specialized courses are developed by CIAM collaborating professors, many of whom are professors from some of the universities with which we have established agreements and partnerships.

Certificate

At the end of the program and after taking assessment tests, students will receive a certificate that will state the number of hours of training and participation in the activities, the objectives and contents of the courses taken and the final grade obtained.

Enrollment

Enrollment takes place through the program director at the students’ home university.

Important info

The program includes:

• Enrollment in our courses;
• Accommodation in the student dormitory or with a family, in a full board basis (3 meals a day);
• General orientation upon arrival and orientation prior to trips and other complementary activities;
• Handbook of the cultural programs of the city and the area;
• Tandem program of Spanish / English language exchanges.
• Certificate of attendance;
• Accident and health insurance;
• Availability of self-printing service for teachers and students;
• Wi-Fi in the facilities of the center;
• Free access to the center’s video library, the dormitory and the public library.
• Free access to the computer room;
• Free access to the gym of the dormitory;
• Use of the administrative resources and program management of the center;
• Emergency telephone number 24 hours a day.

The program does not include:

• Plane tickets;
• Pick-up service to the airport;
• Textbooks for class.

Students can stay in our dormitory or with families. The dormitory offers meals in a full board basis, Wi-Fi, a TV room, a gym and a laundry.

The group must have a minimum of 10 students. In August, in order to stay in our dormitory groups must have 20 students.

CIAM offers free accommodation and full board in our dormitory to accompanying teachers (1 teacher for free for every 10 students).

Price

Please, do not hesitate to write to us for further information about our prices: redes@ciantoniomachado.com.

Successful experiences

A number of international universities have participated in our programs, including the University of Padua, the University of Udine and Campus CIELS.