Portrait of a language partner

Shannon Breedlove is a vivacious young woman who loves world travel and salsa dancing. She is also an ELI language partner who has taught English in Korea and Spanish at the University of Delaware. When Breedlove found out by word of mouth that ELI matches international and American students for informal conversation exchanges, she “just signed up.”

		Language partner Shannon Breedlove

The ELI language partner program provides an opportunity for ELI students to improve their conversational English while also learning more about American culture. American language partners benefit because they get a chance to meet someone from a different culture and perhaps practice a foreign language they may be studying.

Breedlove and her new language partner Carlos from Chile usually meet on Friday afternoons for coffee at Brew Ha Ha for an hour or two. “The first half of the meeting we speak in English and the second half we speak in Spanish,” Breedlove explains, “but we aren’t so strict about it because we also want it to be fun and informal. We want to develop a friendship, too. It’s not just study time.We talked about maybe going to Philadelphia to go salsa dancing on Thursday night. Right now we are just getting to know each other.”

As a native of Delaware, Breedlove enjoys playing the role of hostess to students from overseas. Her previous language partners from Ecuador, Spain, Colombia, Chile and Korea have appreciated her hospitality and the fact that she has a car! She, in turn, has had ample opportunity to keep her Spanish up to date and enjoy friendships with her language partners, sometimes over long periods of time. To sign up for the language partner program, send an email to elilanguagepartner@yahoo.com.