Presenters
Our all-star line up.
Meet the Team
Scott Benedict
I have been teaching with comprehensible input since 2001. I have taught high school for 12 years and have taught at an IB middle school for the past 8 years outside of Sacramento, CA. I have been presenting both in-person and online since 2008 having given hundreds of webinars, and presented dozens of workshops and conferences including Agen, NTPRS, iFLT, The Multicultural Conference, Comprehensible Online, among others. I have also presented for a variety of school districts across the US. I am the creator of the first completely online CI conference Comprehensible Online for 3 years and have recently started the COMPREHENDED! Conference.
Annabelle Williamson
Annabelle Williamson was christened “La Maestra Loca” by her students long ago, but what she is really crazy about is building a positive, inclusive, success-oriented language community that promotes equity and anti-racist education. Annabelle’s love of students, people, languages, and of life is contagious, while her deep understanding of the nuts and bolts of teaching for communicative competence will leave you eager and inspired to return to your classrooms and start implementing all of her strategies for equitable engagement! She’s currently in her eleventh year as an educator, teaching Elementary School Spanish in New Orleans at Morris Jeff Community School. Annabelle has her Master's degree in education with an emphasis on linguistically and culturally diverse education.
Bertha Delgadillo
Bertha Delgadillo is a high school Spanish teacher to novice, intermediate, and heritage Spanish learners in Savannah, Georgia. Originally from Tampico, Tamaulipas, Mexico & a National Board Certified teacher, Bertha currently shares best practices & professional development for World Language teachers through her blog & active Facebook Page & YouTube Channel “Profesora Delgadillo.” Bertha also serves as the leader of the GA HS Spanish Teacher PLC by providing actionable monthly professional development. Additionally, Bertha facilitates training & observations for new teachers at her school district. She has also presented & facilitated workshops for SCOLT, WL GADoe, Conference in the Cloud, World Language Teacher Summit and numerous districts in the country. She enjoys empowering teachers to continue to stay connected to their passion for world language teaching through sharing practical engagement & student agency strategies all while placing students at the center of the learning experience.
Claudia Elliott
Claudia Elliott is a Spanish teacher in Jacksonville, Florida. She has been teaching Spanish since 2005 and is currently teaching Spanish 1, Spanish 3 IB, and AP Spanish Language and Culture. Claudia is very passionate to implement acquisition-driven instruction in her class while building a strong community with her students. Claudia is the 2021-2022 FFL TOY, and 2022 SCOLT TOY. Claudia also is the host of Growing With Proficiency The Podcast.
Courtney Jackson
Courtney has been teaching Spanish for.7 years, 4 years of High School Spanish 1 - 4 & she's now in her 3rd year teaching Middle School level 1 - 3 in Denver Public Schools. Outside of being a teacher, she's an avid passport stamp collector, runner, & mom to Loveland the Lab. Her passion is helping teachers create sustainable routines & methods in the classroom.
Jill Wiley
Jill Wiley taught French, English, and ENL for 19 years in Indiana public schools before moving to Norway with her partner and 3 children. Today, she is living her dream teaching part-time at an international school and building a business in which she works with demoralized and burned-out teachers to find their joy. She enjoys language learning and teaching, entrepreneurship, and the gorgeous landscapes of southwest Norway.
John Sifert
John Sifert has been a Spanish teacher in Iowa and Texas for the past 25 years. His focus in the classroom is to provide comprehensible input through stories, novels, and song. He is also passionate about teaching students about life-long skills such as perseverance, respect, and kindness. John has presented at ACTFL, IWLA, CI Iowa, KSWLA, Comprehended!, and CI Reboot.
John also creates a variety of classroom materials and is the author of La isla más peligrosa, La decisión más peligrosa, Seis nombres, L'isola più pericolosa del mondo, with several other novels in the works.
Nothing is more important than family, so when not focused on language acquisition, John spends all his free time with his wife and 5 children in the tiny, (but amazing) town of Belmond, Iowa.
"World language teachers teach the world more than language."
Maureen Lamb
Maureen Lamb is the Latin Teacher and Dean of Academic Technology and Innovative Pedagogy at the Ethel Walker School in Simsbury, CT. She also works as a Google Certified Trainer and education consultant, and she teaches graduate courses in Language and Latin pedagogy and instructional technology for Idioma Education and Consulting. She has been recognized for her work as the CT Language Teacher of the Year, NECTFL Mead Fellow, CANE Weincke Award, the ACL Elizabeth Watkins Award, and the ACTFL/IALLT for Excellence in World Language Instruction Using Technology (K-12). She is dedicated to creating an inclusive classroom environment, to using technology to enhance the student experience, and to making Classics comprehensible.
Piedad Gutierrez
Piedad is an educator at heart who has been a university professor of Latin American history; a Spanish teacher from high school to 3rd grade; a trainer of world language teachers in the USA, Colombia, Argentina and Uruguay; an author of history of coffee growing regions and a developer of curricula for teaching Spanish; and during the past 2 years, an English as a New Language advocate and mentor. As much as Piedad enjoys teaching, she truly loves learning, and keeps exploring complementary subjects to the pedagogy of history and languages, such as cognitive sciences and neurolinguistics. Since Feb 2021 Piedad has been actively involved in the Healing-Centered Education: A restorative Paradigm. She has taken courses and practicum with the Acosta Institute in New York City with the intention of becoming a consultant in the topic and a healer in a broader sense. Since we are more than we do or where we are, Piedad is a loving grandmother of three precious children from her only son. Piedad enjoys outdoor and indoor activities such as gardening, paddle boarding, hiking, boating, crocheting, sewing, jewelry making, yoga, reiki, meditation, and most of all reading.
Svetlana Nuss
Svetlana V. Nuss
Dr. Nuss is a philologist by education and a multi-language literacy enthusiast at heart. As a teacher educator, author, researcher, and language acquisition specialist, she
• improves instructional practices for morphologically rich languages like Russian
• teaches online graduate courses for the College of Education Bilingual Literacy & TESOL Certification program at Grand Canyon University
• helps school districts establish and develop EL coaching programs to support classroom teachers in making content accessible to linguistically diverse learners
• grows equity by building the capacity of teachers to engage impactful Multilingual Lerner instructional practices
• supervises pre-service and in-service teacher candidates/interns
Learning and teaching in the context of English and Russian as foreign and additional languages, philology, and Instructed Second Language Acquisition are her passions. Svetlana is dedicated to the success of her students and colleagues and loves learning with them!
Dr. Nuss believes in supporting the profession and serves, inter alia, the following national and international language education and research communities:
• Editor, Routledge Russian Language Pedagogy and Research series
• WIDA ELA Advisory Committee, 2021—present; appointed by the State of Alaska
• FNSBSD STARTALK Russian Language Advantage Program Director; 2022—present
• State of Alaska English Learner Advisory Committee; 2018—present
• Alaskans for Language Acquisition (AFLA), board member; 2019—2022
• Alaska State Literacy Association (ASLA), board member; 2018—present
Copyright © COMPREHENDED! All Rights Reserved.