Spanish immersion for teenagers

Our Spanish immersion program for teenagers is an excellent educative tool for students to tremendously improve their Spanish skills in a short period of time. With our immersion program of one-on-one instruction, five hours a day, five days a week, the students can master in just three weeks what they typically would learn in a high Spanish program in one year.

Students who are studying more than three weeks in Guatemala might be able to skip one year in high school* because our Spanish curriculum has been successfully aligned with the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages' standards. 99% of the schools in the USA use the ACTFL's standards to align their foreign language curriculum. This is beneficial to the students because we know your Spanish level and decide what you will need in order to master the next year of Spanish classes in your high school.
When a student skips one year, parents can save thousands of dollars because the student can take a higher Spanish class at the college level.
Furthermore, the teenagers enrolled in the classes have unlimited access to the culture aspect of the language by living with a Guatemalan family (maximum of three students per family), and participating in our daily social and cultural activities such as volunteer work, meeting students from other schools, etc. Students who participate in our community volunteer programs will obtain credits for their work, which is often required of their high school.

Besides the rigorous academic component of our Spanish program, the students can have fun participating in our excursions and field trips during the weekends. We take students to climb volcanoes, visit villages, lakes, hot spring waters in the mountains, recreational parks, play soccer and meet other high schools students.
The high school students can participate in our program individually or if there is space, they can enroll in high school groups from different high schools in the USA. For more details please visit casaxelaju.com/yumkax
For those students who are arriving individually, Casa Xelaju can meet the student at the Guatemala airport and provide all the transportation from Guatemala City to his/her family in Quetzaltenango, Guatemala. To make communication easy between parents and students, we have two USA telephones operating in Guatemala (avoiding the international call fees and the often interrupted phone service) and unlimited free high-speed internet service for our students.
Casa Xelaju has been working with teenagers for more than 12 years. Our teachers are capable, creative, fun and dedicated when teaching the language to younger students. All of them are high school teachers certified by the Guatemala's Secretary of Education.
Casa Xelaju's high school Spanish program is fully accredited by the Guatemala's Secretary of Education.

*Please contact your Spanish teacher for more details.




Document updated: May, 2006

Photos of: Stephanie Wegner