My first day as a teacher!

I went to bed super early last night…6:30pm…then slept for 13 hours. Needless to say I feel more rested today. However, I really wish my bed was more comfortable. I wonder if I could find some sort of mattress topper or something. I’ll have to do some creative thinking so my back doesn’t break in half by the time June comes around. I got up, got ready and headed to my first day of teaching. My first lesson was with the 5th graders. Sebas is the English teacher, and he explained to me what we were going to be doing. He does the main lessons, and then gives me smaller groups of kids to really work on listening and speaking. He was joking around about the fact that from now on he is going to be the last pick English teacher because all of them want to go with me instead. Sebas took most of the class to the English classroom, and left me with 4 kids in their normal classroom…Vincente, Miguel Jose, Estrella and Mari Angel. We listened to a CD clip of an English person talking about school uniforms, and then I read the same clip. Next I had each of the kids read a section. After that there was a workbook we went through. Finally we listened one more time. It was hard to get the kids to sit and focus, but they had warned me that the group of 5th graders this year has been a challenge. They don’t tend to behave very well. For me it was mostly hard to get them to focus on what we needed to do, because they just wanted to learn about me and ask me questions. We didn’t end up going through the powerpoint I created because we needed to do other things, but based on how my time with the kids went I think it would have been worth our while to do a Q and A session with me instead. An hour actually went by very quickly. In the future I think we’re hoping to get 2 groups in with me every class, but we’ll see. It’s a learning experience for us all.

After that first class I had a break. I went home to tweak my powerpoint since I now had a better idea of where the kids’ vocabulary was at.

At noon I went back to school to work with Inés and the 1st graders. 25 of them. Crazy. I realize that’s a pretty normal number of students in a classroom in the U.S., but after working with 4 kids, 25 was insane. Luckily I didn’t have them all to myself. Inés and I co-taught. They are up and down and screaming and just generally insane. Haha. Inés says it’s like that a lot. I have a feeling that student/teacher interactions and ideas about discipline in the classroom are very different between Spain and the U.S. I know there were times my classes growing up would get rowdy, but never on a consistent basis like it was today. With Inés we sang songs, danced and colored pictures of bats for Halloween. I went around and chatted a little bit with each of the kids about colors. They knew all the basic colors from last year, but today we taught them the word for “black” since most of them were coloring their bats black or brown.

At 2pm Victor (the person in charge of the auxiliares in this region) stopped by the school to talk to me about the NIE appointment in Jaén. Instead of Wednesday I’m going to go tomorrow because the other 2 assistants (Ben and Eva) from Puerta are going tomorrow. This way we can all get it done together and I can meet them.

This turned into a bit of a confusing situation. Ben and Eva are going to Jaén tonight and staying with another auxiliar that they met during orientation (Orientation was October 6th and I missed it). Victor and Inés were hoping that I could go with them, stay in the same house, then ride the bus back to Siles tomorrow but they didn’t know if there would be enough room in the house for me. I’m not sure if Ben and Ava were as confused about the situation as me, or if they had already left, but when they called they said they just were going to meet me at the extranjería in Jaén the next day and ride back with me. So now Inés is going to personally drive me to Jaén in the morning, then bring all of us back, then do her teaching in the afternoon. It is a 2 hour drive to Jaén. Whoa. Long day for her. Have I mentioned how amazing she is? Anyways, I’m hoping that all will go well with the paperwork in the morning and I’ll have my NIE so I can open a bank account and get paid.

Javi (the school director) and Inés said that the Auxiliares program has already given the school money for me for the year and that Javi will pay me each month. They still want me to be paid for all of this month even though I arrived late so I will help make class materials and such to make up for the hours that I didn’t work. I’m so glad that they are still going to give me the whole amount. I am very thankful for that.

Later I need to go grocery shopping. I forgot that the grocery stores are not open on Sundays so yesterday my food options were lacking. Good thing I ended up sleeping the day away anyways.