Hugh Kingery

​School: Polson High School & Polson Middle School

Language Taught: Spanish

Years of Experience: 5

Education: Bachelor's Degree University of Montana

What is the most rewarding part of your career as a language teacher?  
The relationship that I develop with my students is the most rewarding part of my job. I spend so much time speaking with them, that I come to know so much about their hopes, dreams, and lives. I don't think there is another subject in the school that spends as long developing connections with the students.

What is one personal or professional goal that you have for yourself, your school or your department? 
My goal is to increase student engagement. While I have no problem keeping my high flyers on a track for success, I struggle with having one or two students in each class routinely disengaging from lessons. My developmental goal is to keep them interested in the lessons so that they will participate and learn at the same rate as the other students.

What is one of your favorite travel experiences?
I lived with a family for a month in Costa Rica and I loved getting to go through life with them.
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Do you have any advice for other world language teachers? 
Don't lose sight of the things about teaching that you love. Teaching, particularly a foreign language, is a time consuming and emotionally draining process. Between administrative pressures, student misbehavior, late nights, and early mornings it can be easy to forget why we do what we do. So, take a second every now and then and think about all of the wonderful things that have happened this year!