Our Team Final – Spanish with Carla

Carla Diaz

Spanish Trainer

Carla Diaz was born in Venezuela and is the creator of Spanish With Carla. After studying petroleum engineering, she briefly worked in the oil industry before moving to Colombia due to political unrest in her home country.

During this new life chapter, she left her old career behind, explored new opportunities, and took on different jobs to stay afloat. Inspired by someone’s suggestion to teach Spanish to foreigners, she decided to give it a go. Equipped with a number of Spanish books and the determination to learn all the intricacies of teaching, she became a self-trained Spanish as a foreign language teacher.

With the help of the internet, Carla found her first students and created Spanish with Carla. Over the years, she has successfully helped hundreds of students learn Spanish. In the summer of 2019, she traveled to Barcelona, Spain to participate in the Wone Internship Placement and teach two introductory Spanish classes to students from Hong Kong.

It’s been five years since Carla first started teaching Spanish to students worldwide. Due to the company’s exponential growth last year alone, she hired additional teachers and transformed her small business into the Spicy Spanish language school. Whether teaching on her own or as part of Spicy Spanish, Carla enjoys witnessing her students progress and helping them reach their language goals.

Melisa Arredondo Montoya

Spanish Trainer

Melisa Arredondo Montoya, known by her students as a paisita at heart, was born and raised in Medellin, Colombia, and obtained a bachelor's degree in Spanish at the University of Antioquia. She has been a Spanish teacher for four years and previously taught in schools such as Nueva Lengua Spanish, Valley Spanish School, and Toucan Spanish School, before joining Spanish with Carla.

In her teaching, she incorporates creative ways such as pictures or examples from everyday life, to explain grammar in the most comprehensive and easily digestible way. She always tries to adapt to the needs, rhythms, and interests of each student and has obtained a diploma in the pedagogy and didactics of Spanish as a foreign language at the Caro y Cuervo Institute in Bogotá to help her with this. In addition, she has started a master's degree in reading and writing at the EAFIT University to better prepare for her work and to stay updated on the latest trends in teaching and learning.

Melisa enjoys having genuine conversations and is passionate about learning, cultural issues, animals, languages, and the seventh art. She is thankful for the opportunity to teach Spanish as it has allowed her to meet many wonderful students and friends while getting to know the world through their cultures and words.

Stephanie Gil

Spanish Trainer

A Colombian native, Stephanie started giving foreigners private Spanish lessons in 2017 while completing a bachelor’s degree in English-Spanish at the Pontificia Bolivariana University. Previously, she worked as a tv and radio producer, as a production assistant at the Cosmovisión channel, and on the movie En Coma.

Stephanie is passionate about her Colombian culture and heritage and enjoys writing, reading, teaching, and community service. In 2017, she joined a CSR initiative at Prensa Escuela, a program of the newspaper El Colombiano. She also loves learning languages and has studied English, basic German, as well as Latin and Greek as part of a language and culture study group at her university.

From 2018 to 2019, Stephanie worked as a Spanish and English teacher in public and private schools in her hometown Padre Manyanet and Carlos Vieco Ortiz. During this time, she also obtained a diploma in teaching Spanish as a foreign language at her alma mater. She was grateful for being able to combine two jobs she loved: teaching Spanish at Toucan Spanish School to students from all over the world while spending her weekends as a Spanish and English teacher at Commune 13 where she supported the studies of the community’s young residents.

Since 2019, she has taught Spanish as a foreign language in different schools, including Toucan Spanish School, Valley Spanish School, and Spanish with Carla. Over the years, she has gained tremendous experience in online and face-to-face teaching. In the next few months, she plans to start a master's degree in the didactics of Spanish as a second or foreign language to help supplement her current teaching methods.

Vanessa Chavez

Spanish Trainer

Vanessa Chavez Mena obtained a degree in Spanish at the University of Antioquia and has worked as a private Spanish teacher at the Benkos Bioho pre-university and Preu PCN since 2013.

Between 2018-2020 she taught Spanish to foreigners at the Toucan Spanish School where she had many positive and memorable experiences. Today, she fondly shares these experiences at Spanish with Carla and is committed to continually improving her teaching and advancing in her career.

In her teaching, Vanessa applies different methodologies using songs, interviews, books, texts, and language exchanges with native speakers to enhance the classroom experience. She is available to teach during the week and on weekends and her flexible schedule is agreed upon with each student individually.

Mauren Araya

Spanish Trainer

Mauren is a Spanish tutor from Costa Rica, with more than two years of experience. She is focused on providing the student with an enjoyable, dynamic and safe experience when learning a new language.

She considers herself a self-taught person. Her personality allows her to always be willing to learn and be guided to improve her own knowledge. And continue passing that knowledge to the students. Mauren has been working with Spicy Spanish for about six months.

She can’t wait to help you to improve your Spanish.

Daniela Gaitán

Spanish Trainer

Daniela is from Bogotá, Colombia. She is a marketing and business student in the University of Palermo. Her first language is Spanish and her second language is English, which she learned after living in Canada for two years. She loves languages, that’s why soon she will be learning French as well.

She is not only passionate about languages. She also loves learning about different cultures. She loves to travel, learn from others and the other way around.

She really enjoys teaching others her native language, her culture and what it represents. She’s been teaching Spanish and English for a year now. And it would be a pleasure for her to help you reach your goals in Spanish.