Valeria
The love for learning and understanding the world has always been present in my life. Later, this love has grown into my profession – I’ve become a teacher of the Dutch language. More than 8 years already I’ve been sharing this love with my students at university, school, and courses.
As for my expertise, from 2019 to 2022, I headed the Department of the Dutch language and literature at Kyiv National Linguistic University in Kyiv, Ukraine. At university I taught a variety of disciplines: from ‘Practical grammar of the Dutch language’ to ‘Theory and practice of translation’, giving my students an in-depth understanding of Dutch.
Moreover, I compiled the specialty program ‘Dutch and a second foreign language: linguistics and translation studies’ for bachelor and master students in the university.
In 2022, I started working as a teacher of Dutch as a second language at Johan de Witt Scholengroep in The Hague, the Netherlands. This job allows me to work with teenagers from all over the world. At the ISK department, our students learn Dutch to continue their further education at a regular school.
Due to the different backgrounds, religions and ages of these students, my teaching methods need to be understood by everyone. Apart from a solid methodology, they are informed by pedagogical and psychological insights. Through my broader interest in pedagogy and psychology, I manage to combine theory with practice.
Almost a decade of experience led to the creation of Makkelijk Nederlands, an accessible platform offering Dutch language courses. Together with сo-creator Olga and our team, we want to show that the process of learning a foreign language can be easy, exciting, and fast.
Hobbies: foreign languages, history, photography, and cycling.