Baby steps

Yesterday went pretty well. I had two classes in the morning yesterday; one English class and one science class. The English class was pretty standard. We did a couple quick exercises, talked about Halloween and then I let my small group of kids just ask me what words they wanted to know. The science class was a little more difficult. I didn’t have the mural prepared ahead of time because I was so confused about what they wanted. The teacher Maria del Mar, handed me the teaching manual and left the class. I had no, no, no freaking clue about what I was supposed to be teaching them or what I should do. I didn’t know what they had already learned or what the day’s objectives were. I felt so panicked. I scraped by until Maria got back with pictures of plants, animals and hongos (fungus like mushrooms). We were supposed to be classifying things by their kingdom (animal, plant or fungus). I went to work on the mural and the kids colored their pictures. My hour was up by the time the pictures and mural were ready, but I left the mural in their class to use next time. I really just felt so insecure about all this science stuff. Supposedly the goal is to have me flat out teach these classes, not just assist. I think people here are missing the big picture that I’m not actually a trained teacher. Arts Administration, Spanish, Medical Interpretation, Photography...I've studied any of these programs, but not teaching, and CERTAINLY not science! I headed home when I was done with classes and relaxed there until I had to go back to the school for the adult class at 4:30. I worked with Marta’s class first this time. We just did a question and answer time. I can’t remember if I’ve mentioned this before, but this adult class is all teachers from the area. Most are either teachers at the high school here in Siles or teachers in la Puerta (about 15 minutes from here). It went decently, although I did end up with one student in tears. She said it was just a combination of her being sick and frustrated at how often she couldn’t understand me. I tried to reassure her that when I studied in Murcia they told me I probably wouldn’t understand anything in any of my classes for at least 3 weeks…and it was true…and I had been studying Spanish for 5+ years! It was pretty low key. I worked with them for an hour, and then switched over to the other group. They were working on grammar exercises. It’s really interesting to listen to English be taught. I just have never really had to think about the rules and patterns of the English language because I’ve grown up with it.

After class I had decided that I wasn’t going to go back to my apartment. I was going to walk around, then get a coffee at La Mezquita…but I was going to be out and about so they was at least the potential to run into someone I already knew, or meet someone knew. Luckily, it paid off…big time. I ran into a group of my students and their moms (including Steffi, Jade, Noah and Luna) with a group of the teachers going out for an early trick-or-treating session. We all hung out together for awhile, and Antonio (one of the teachers) went into the store, bought some candy and the kids trick-or-treated him standing there in the street. Then all the teachers went and grabbed a coffee together. This totally made my entire day. It felt so good to be part of the group. I chatted with the teachers, and talked with Antonio and Maria del Mar about my troubles with the science classes. We worked on some ideas and they reassured me that this week was just a trial run to get everyone adjusted…they knew it was hard because I didn’t know the material. It made me feel a lot better about the whole situation. I also showed them the flashcards that I had been preparing for the adult class. I’m making these conversation cards that have a theme/topic at the top of the card, then some questions to get conversation started, then possible words to use on the back of the card. They really liked that idea, and it snowballed into a bunch of other ideas for the science classes. One of the moms that we had been with earlier also brought homemade chocolate bizchoco into the café for us. I treasure these times so much, that I get to spend time with people and really feel like I’m starting to connect with them. I only hope that these times become more and more frequent. After we were done getting coffee the teachers decided that we should dress up tomorrow at school for at least a little while since they were going to be celebrating Halloween. We went to the store and browsed costume ideas. We also all swapped phone numbers now that I have a functioning Spanish phone. Antonio and Maria del Mar expressed interesting in getting together to do intercambios, and I really hope we do. I told them it doesn't even have to be a paid private lesson. We can just get together and have coffee and speak half in English, half in Spanish but we'll see what happens with that.







At the end of the night I headed back to my apartment, relaxed, finished getting caught up on Grey’s Anatomy and Private Practice and went to bed feeling very good about the evening.