Culture Go Go

I decided to volunteer with M.F.A as I've always wanted to move to Madrid, and since they deal exclusively with families from the Comunidad de Madrid it caught my eye. Initially I wasn't looking to volunteer, I was looking for work in Madrid when I found the M.F.A website, and thought that volunteering with them would be a great way for me to get a foot in the door, as well as some work experience. I've always wanted to live in Madrid and be an English teacher, so this was killing two birds with one stone!

I live with a Spanish family and teach their two kids, aged 9 and 10, who both go to a bilingual school, where they are taught English, Science and Art in English. When they come back from school, I help them with their homework and we do some pre-prepared activities and games which I prepare in the mornings whilst they are at school. The idea is for them to be speaking English as much as possible, so even after my "scheduled time" with them is over, I try to incorporate as much English as possible into everything. My "Spanish mum" also speaks quite good English, so we tend to speak in Spanglish, and my "Spanish dad" doesn't know a word of English, so we stick to Spanish. Even though I technically have the weekends free to do what I want, we tend to do things as a "family", such as visit other cities (we spent the October bank holiday weekend in Marbella), go for something to eat, and go to the cinema, for example.

Myfamilyabroad.com provides English speaking volunteers the opportunity to take part in a fun and affordable volunteer program in Madrid, Spain. Volunteers are carefully placed with a welcoming Spanish family where they receive free food and accommodation in return for helping them with their English in a fun and interactive way. It gives the volunteer a great insight into Spanish culture and invaluable experience to enhance their CV.

I’m Francesca one of the co-founders of myfamilyabroad.com. I deal mainly with the Spanish families; I visit them at their home, build their profile, take some photos and videos and generally get to know them. I also take part in the Welcome Reception and Training with the Language Assistants. It’s great because I get to meet everyone taking part in the programs!

A six-month trip to Madrid turned into a life here! And during that time we came up with the idea of myfamilyabroad.com when we noticed that many Spanish families had a real drive and desire to learn English but they wanted to do it in a fun way with a native speaker.

We also wanted to share our passion for Spain with others and allow young volunteers to experience the real Spanish culture in a unique way. So we thought a great way to do this would be to set up an exchange program that exchanges food and accommodation for help with English.