Whether you’re a parent watching your child struggle with reading and writing, or an adult learner working to strengthen your English, you’ve come to the right place. Authentica Learning offers personalized, one-on-one tutoring that goes beyond textbooks — because real progress comes from engaging with language the way it actually works in the world – whole books, documentaries, lectures, essays, letters, panel discussions, podcasts, high quality video clips.
What does Authentica mean?
In the world of language learning, Authentica (or realia) refers to materials sourced from the real world, in contrast to carefully-structured and scaffolded textbooks. Realia for adult English language learning is excerpts from magazines, videos, transcripts, podcasts, newspapers, white papers, schedules, contracts, maps, graphs, diagrams, menus, contracts, infographics. When it comes to language acquisition, textbooks are prescriptive ~ how language should be ~ whereas studying real life materials is descriptive – how language actually works. For English learners wanting to get past the intermediate plateau, tackling real world written and audio/video content is a rewarding path forward and upward. For younger readers and writers, the same principle applies: authentic books from various genres are essential — but so is bite-sized instruction that is explicit, systematic, and cumulative. Literature informs and inspires while structured instruction builds the foundation that makes reading fluent and enjoyable, and empowers success in content area academics.
History
Authentica has been a registered Ontario business since 2013, built on a simple belief that real-world materials (books, articles, documentaries, literature, primary documents) teach language knowledge and help build skills better than working with textbooks alone – for life, for school, for exams, for the workplace.
Teacher
I hold an advanced Cambridge teaching qualification and worked for seven years as an IELTS Speaking and Writing Examiner. I have been an Ontario-certified English Language Teacher (OCELT) for 15 years. I have two decades of teaching experience in ESL language classrooms and online, with learners from age 2 to 72 whose native languages include French, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Russian, Hebrew, Czech, Polish, Belorussian, Mandarin, Cantonese, Korean, Japanese, Arabic. English Language teaching has been interspersed with contracts at non-profits in the Greater Toronto Area in newcomer-serving roles; job development, program administration and supply teaching in a federally-funded LINC program. My cross-cultural experience includes visits to China, Thailand and working for nine years in Japan and South Korea in private and public school K-12 classrooms, and in a college and a university. I’ve visited the UK, the US and Australia. When I was working in Japan, I studied Japanese for several years and passed Level 3 of the Japan Language Proficiency Test. When I was in Korea, I acquired broken Korean; enough to do the tasks of daily life with locals who didn’t speak English. Everyone should have a second or third language in order to appreciate that one’s own language is just one worldview among many others.
Ready to get started? Request a trial lesson. Contact me today.