I am a native speaker of English and the first time I was engaged with another language was in my 6th grade Spanish class. I have experienced a lot of language approaches that my teacher used with us, but the one that I recall the most was the grammar-translation method where students were conscious of the grammatical rules of the target language. I learned the best with this method because of the deductive way of teaching. First, my teacher gave me the grammar rules, I memorized them, and then finally, translated them from English to Spanish. I also did this with all of the vocabulary I learned. Every week the students would pair up and go over the Spanish words on index cards and have the English word written on the back. Although this learning approach had a lot to do with memorizing, I successfully learned the material. In all, vocabulary and grammar were emphasized the most. There was not a lot of attention on reading and writing up until high school.
In high school, I was accepted to AP Spanish grammar. The beginning of class, my teacher reviewed the grammar rules with our class and by the end of that lesson, we were learning vocabulary through literature. Moreover, the method that my teacher used with us was called the audio-lingual method. This is where language cannot be separated from culture. We slowly stepped away from the literature and started translating pictures with no words while speaking Spanish to help with our communicative skills as well as our pronunciation.
The most comfortable approach would have to be the grammar-translation method because that is how I got started on learning the language, actually successfully learning Spanish. I like this idea because it uses the idea of both the L1 and the L2, one dimension of Stern's framework; that the L1-L2 is a connection, concerning the first language in learning the second. This method worked for me. But, I am not saying that it will work for every one of my students. All students learn differently, maybe even by ten different approaches. It all depends on the student. Therefore, I do not believe there is one best method that fits for all of my students.
I had a very similar situation while learning Spanish. A lot of grammar translation was used, and I think this may have had to do with the fact that the majority of my Spanish teachers were not native Spanish speakers. I would like to learn how to get away from this method, although it worked for you and I, because I feel that more interaction and use of the actual language could be used in the classroom. I also think that getting away from grammar translation could capture more students' attention and hold it. The people like you and I who liked foreign language are generally the exception to the rule, and I would like to make learning language fun for my future students so that I can help language spread as much as possible.
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