Hywel's reflections on training

I arrived on the coach the Tuesday following Easter weekend in Manchester with nervousness and curiosity about what awaited us in the training in equal measure. The coach had the quiet of a group of people still unfamiliar, half remembering names of one or two from interview days, and familiarising with new faces. Add in the tiredness of many having had early starts and it was a low energy start, albeit broken by one warm smile of greeting from a familiar face from the London interview day (thanks Jess!). I was definitely unaware of how completely I would value this group of people by the end of the training week on Saturday.

We had a sense of how the rapport would build as the room was a little livelier once we reconvened for academic director Michael’s first session reinforced by tea and a trip to the vending machine. By the evening of Thursday, when we were doing the bean warm-up game in the sports leadership training, I was in my element. This warm-up, Keith told us, was a big hit with the 6-8 year olds. The enjoyment I got out of it suggests it may have touched rather perfectly on my mental age!

The rest of the week saw this tapping into our childlike side continue as a theme, especially in the fantastic day and a half of EFL for young learners run by Jacque and Carol, best epitomised by the making of the giant imaginary hot dog, complete with sausage, onions, lettuce, tomatoes, ketchup, mayonnaise and mustard, all brilliantly captured in photos by Miriam. In summary, we came out with a battery of great lesson ideas, as well as sports leadership and first aid training. More than anything though we had a knowledgeable, approachable and enthusiastic group of people as a support group, especially in Michael, who was fantastically helpful, but also in the people we would be teaching alongside and living with. To have had this week training and living together in our chilly but lovely little corner of Denbighshire was amazing in itself, and writing this 48 hours later, I already miss many of them. To know that I have these people to turn to, and that I will have the pleasure of 4 weeks with them in Spain, makes me immeasurably more enthusiastic about what I am about to undertake. Now a final word about what that undertaking is - I said at the outset that although kindergarten was the group I was least confident in taking on, that I was open to giving it a go, as I felt developing skills outside of my comfort zone was one of the big opportunities that the Leonardo Project gave me. Well it looks like I have what I wished for, now I am a week away from the reality of grading my language for 3 year old Spanish kids after a CELTA in which I got feedback that I needed to be careful of grading my language with intermediate adults. I’m more than willing to confess that for all the great week I’ve had I’m still a little scared! Until next time.

Hywel