Hola, I am María Ángeles, but since I moved to the UK (Northern Ireland, Scotland and England) 10 years ago I am just María 😜 or Miss Bueno. Pick the one that you prefer!
About me
I am the person behind all this whole adventure (or madness 🤭) beyond the screen. To be honest I really think that teaching is a crazy adventure❤️.
Here ⬇️ 7 (my favourite number) words to tell you a bit more about me -In Spanish-
VIAJAR✈️ : Conocer lugares (lejanos o cercanos), culturas, gente maravillosa, aprender otros idiomas, desconectar, liberarte de prejuicios.
SONREIR😬: Herencia de la estrella que más brilla. Sonreir es enfrentar el día a día con alegría, optimismo y fuerza. ¡Es algo invencible!
NATURALEZA🌳: Cuidar mi cuerpo, alma y mente. Pasear cerca del mar, las montañas, una escapada a un pueblecito remoto, las flores.
FOTOS📸: Captar el momento y volver mil veces más a ese paisaje navideño, a ese paseo familiar, a ese sabor, a ese café calentito en🍁
EDUCACIÓN👩🏫: Nos lleva a cualquier parte. La base de todo. Intento día a día marcar la diferencia en la enseñanza de idiomas.
EXTREMADURA💚🤍🖤: Mi origen, mi aprendizaje, mis valores, mi refugio, mi familia, mi hogar. Amor por Hornachos, mi pueblo.
BELFAST💕 : La ciudad que me dió la oportunidad de enamorarme de mi lengua, mi profesión y de mi marido. El empuje de lo que es hoy @myspanishnow
¿Why @MySpanishNow?
MySpanishNow was born of the necessity of helping people around the UK to learn and/or improve their Spanish from home.
We want to help you to communicate with your Spanish family and friends, without feeling frustrated, embarrassed or unable to express your feelings.
If you have a family dinner or a wedding, your parents-in-law are coming from Spain to visit you and you don’t even know how to welcome them or if you want to meet new people but the language is a barrier 😩. Don’t worry, I know exactly how you feel! I had that same exact feeling when I met my parents-in-law for the first time – they are Portuguese!!
The powerful power of learning and teaching languages
How did it all start?
It all started in Northern Ireland, where I lived for nearly 4 years. In Belfast (as I have said before) discovered my passion for teaching my own language – culture and traditions – as well as it was where I found the love, my husband.
MySpanishNow is the dream that arose from a beautiful mix of professional and personal circumstances that helped me and help me to grow every day.
Circumstance number 1 – During my first years in Belfast I worked as a Spanish Assistant preparing kids for their A-Levels exams. This was an enriching experience because in this position I could see that many students needed to have more conversational lessons, more speaking. They needed to practise and that’s when I started to realise that this necessity could be extensible to more people.
That’s why my lessons are 100% conversational and one-to-one. Personalised lessons that allow you to practise more and more in order to make you feel confident day-by-day with your Spanish.
Circumstance number 2 – My husband is Portuguese and still I remember the first time his parents come to Belfast. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to speak Portuguese at this time. My parents-in-law were asking me questions that I was not able to answer or at least not as good as I would like. I wanted to express myself, say how good the food was, and explain more about the city, but no words came to my mind. The same happened when I was invited to a wedding in Portugal and I struggled to socialise with my husband’s friends.
From these two different experiences, I feel the necessity of helping others, because I know in first person how frustrating it can be to not be able to communicate with others – specially with those who are important to you and you really want to create a family bond 😅
Belfast gave me everything, both professionally and personally! 🍀
Circumstance number 3 – At the end of 2019, I moved to Scotland where I was working in a high school but in 2020, COVID arrived, and that’s when I realised that my project of creating a school to help others to learn Spanish could be online.
This would be perfect to reach people with the same interests all over the world, even those in remote areas could learn Spanish in MySpanishNow thanks to the technology and all the tools we have around today.
My dream has come true 🎉
And with all that in mind, MySpanishNow has become a reality. At this moment, I live in England, where I prepare kids for their GCSE in a Secondary school as a Spanish Teacher. I hope both face-to-face and online make a difference and spread my love for the Spanish language all around the world 💻 and many more dreams come true 🤞.