Leah Silipo

If you have Ms. Silipo for Spanish, you're in luck. Most of the SMS Spanish teachers were honestly really bad and I can't believe how I made it through 3 years of that garbage. [I had her before the pandemic, so some of this might not hold true now] Anyway, Ms. Silipo teaches mainly through comprehensive input, which just means she talks almost exclusively in Spanish, but in a way that you can understand. You might not know all the words, but she uses a lot of body language and context clues to get the point across. Usually, most of class just consists of her doing this accompanied by a slide show or video or something, which means less actual work, but it also means YOU SHOULD PAY ATTENTION! As long as you pay attention during class, assessments should be pretty easy with minimal preparation. It's okay if you don't pay attention a couple times because you're tired or something, but since most of what you learn is just through listening to her talk, you should probably ask a friend if she went over something new. Typically, she doesn't really give out too many handouts or homework. She'll sometimes give a packet or some worksheets that goes with what you're learning in class, but nothing super extensive. Her quizzes and tests are also pretty chill as well. I didn't really study for them, but even if you're someone who needs to review a lot, she usually has a day of review before. Just make sure to read the directions, study guides, and anything else she posted online (if you really want to be safe). As long as you know the sentence structures and vocabulary, you should be fine. Just show that you were paying attention. Most of the curriculum is based off of studying a video, show or movie. She'll tell the story of the video/movie with a powerpoint (though she won't just read off the slide, she'll really go into depth) and then have you complete a couple activities related to it before an assessment. These activities are sometimes with partners, but not always, and mostly, they are pretty chill. Occasionally, they'll be kinda fun. When you have her for lunch block you'll watch El Internado, a Spanish TV show. She usually goes over what happens in the segment you'll watch before lunch, then after, you just watch the show. You also have to do a packet which is just a fill in the blank summary of the episode, but it's pretty easy. Overall, Ms. Silipo is an excellent Spanish teacher. I learned more in one year of her class than I did in all 3 years of MS. She is super nice and actually cares about her students. She doesn't really pick favorites. If you're shy, she'll respect that and not call on you as much, but make sure to participate in class. She is very reasonable and honestly a pretty cool person, so you're pretty lucky if you have her.