Amelia

From a young age I always knew that I wanted to be a teacher so that I could inspire children to see the world with wonder and curiosity.

This drove me to continue my education at Miami of Ohio University in the United States, where I received a degree in Early Childhood Education.

Along with my love of teaching, I have always had a passion for traveling and discovering new places and cultures.

For this reason, during my third year of university, I jumped at the opportunity to spend a semester in Luxembourg, to study and work in an international school with kids from all different countries and cultures.

This was the event that really showed me that, while I knew that I wanted to work with children, I specifically wanted to work with children who didn’t share a similar language or culture with me.

From there I decided that after I graduated, I wanted to go abroad and teach English outside of the United States.

During my last year of university, I started looking for a teaching position outside of the United States and was lucky enough to find the English Summer Camp that Chiara ran, in Italy.

That was my first experience of Camp Culture, and I immediately fell in love with it.

The environment and atmosphere created at camp, under Chiara’s guidance, were unique: I had never experienced them before.

For Chiara, camp had to be a space that allowed everyone to be themselves and gave them the opportunity to try new things that otherwise would have been outside of their comfort zone.

I immediately shared this approach, which came very natural to me as well.

At Camp, I discovered that there are so many ways to understand each other and make meaningful connections despite a language barrier.

Following my summer spent in Italy, I was able to continue to follow my passions by spending a year in Northern Spain teaching English to students from 3 to 5 years old.

This experience continued to help me grow as a teacher and mentor.

Through engaging lessons of play, music and art I was able to connect and grow my students’ relationship with English as well as with each other, despite the barriers of language. 

After my year in Spain, I returned to the United States and found a position as a pre-school teacher, working with kids of 4 and 5 years old.