Can´t believe week two is nearly over and this is my first blog! That´s how crazily fun my time here in Elche has been so far!
I am now sat in an after school kid´s club next to top school (where I have made many lovely friends) and I am going to attempt to tell you all about my shannanigans here!
Since the first day, it has been a wonderful experience everyday. In the mornings/afternoons I teach at a Secondary School (Sixto Marco) where the teachers are extremely nice and laid back . Every other evening I teach adults at Top School which I enjoy very much. The students are absolutely great and I love teaching them. So much that I am going out for dinner with them next week! Aaron teaches the evenings I have off, and we often discuss our lessons beforehand to avoid any repitition. My timetable overall has been really good, teaching no more than 5 hours a day between sixto marco and top school. I think I am one of the lucky ones with a fairly easy timetable.. which means I have had plenty of time to make somes friends here.
As I don´t drink or go out partying I have managed to occupy my time in other ways. At the after school club I met two beautiful Morrocan ladies and one Algerian/Spanish. I often visit them most evenings even when I am not teaching at top school. They allow me to join their Spanish and Arabic lessons with the young kids, and also use the Internet whenever I wish. I have been out with them a few times now for ice cream and turkish tea. This weekend we hope to go to the beach!
I have also made friends with some guys from the local turkish restaurant (the only place that sells halal meat that i know of yet!) They have been very welcoming and often give me free tea and sheesha! So definitely can´t complain there!
Tomorrow I am going to lunch at Zainabs house (Zainab is one of the students from the after school club). Although her English is just as bad as my Spanish, we still manage to find ways of communicating. Thats the beauty of the people around here.. so welcoming and kind.
The rest of the group and I often meet up during lessons and in evenings, the weather is great so we go for walks, ice cream, frozen yogurt and have a drink in the evenings.
I am really enjoying my time here in Elche. UKLC have set up this programme so nicely, and thank God I have no issues so far. Life is great here.
So here is finally the promised post on the half-marathon and the non-teaching stuff. Given the attractions of Spain's fiesta culture and the chance on Friday and Saturday to have a more indulgent night, why would I choose to forgo these for a 21.1 km race at 9:30 on a Sunday morning?
Well, I do have a bit of history in this area. I'm very much a morning person who includes "Where can I run?" before "Where can I go out at night?" in the list of questions I ask when I arrive somewhere new. I first gained Wales international vests in road & cross-country running in 2009 and arrived in Spain hoping to maintain fitness in the hope of selection for Wales in the Great Manchester Run the day after returning from Elche later this month.
For most of my colleagues on the Leonardo project, however, I would be known for my distance runner's typical split leg shorts rather than any athletic accomplishment by the end of our time in Denbigh. This was helpfully reinforced by Michael's locked room mystery on the theft of my shorts on the last Saturday before leaving Denbigh.
Once I got to Elche and started to recce places to run and a track to train on when not teaching, I quickly found out that a half marathon was due to take place in Elche on May 6th. My curiosity suitably piqued, I asked one of the distance runners at the track if the registration was still open. He directed me towards "the bald guy with the beard" on the infield for all information on the half marathon. Having found out that the start was a less than 5 min jog from our apartment and that this was the oldest half in the world, I was sold. I was told that I could either enter online or in person at the tienda de Caldon, I thought I'd go for the latter option, where I could get information in person if I wasn't confident in Spanish dealing with all the details on the website. This was however where my Spanish did let me down, as while I was asking if anyone knew roughly where this shop called Caldon was, I found out within a couple of days that what I had in fact been told was tienda Decathlon. Having got my entry sorted, I learnt at school that PE teacher Juan Llopis had also entered and a pint was bet on the outcome of our battle to add a little bit of spice to the race.
Now often for a Sunday race, I'm rooming with other athletes the night before or travelling with other athletes on the morning of the race. This race involved passing Saturday with a more than slightly hungover group of teachers in our apartment whose Friday night had not involved resting for a race. Not wanting to particularly spend all day on foot around Elche the day before the race, I was more than happy to have company that was not in the mood for moving anywhere fast. I got the tea and food that they needed to fight very sore heads and the next morning, I got the support round the course from Alex, Jess and Steph that I very much needed to overcome the protestations of my legs. As I passed them on the Ferrocaril bridge for the first time at 2km, I was tucked in to a lead group with five Moroccan guys who would be my company for the next few kms.
Unfortunately after a nice steady 5 kms in 16:05, they injected a 5kms so fast that my 15:30 for this section still saw me dropping off them, and facing a long and gradually slowing Sunday slog. By the time I came back through Paseo de l'Estacion where we had begun, the race was in its 17th km and they were well out of sight but I was greeted by the support group of earlier in the race on the bridge, and believe me, at this point I needed it! One more encounter a couple of kms later with Alex and his camera, and it was just a matter of hanging on for the finish in warmth now up into the 20s - which I'm sure was nice for spectating, but not for a runner already losing time hand over fist.
As I turned into the finish straight, I could see the finish clock just ticked past 69 minutes, and I had a half marathon personal best dating from 2010 of 69:28. I might have been dropped by the leaders but I was not letting the personal best go, and what passed in that state of fatigue for a flat out sprint was unleashed to bring me through the line in 69:24 for 6th place, a new PB and my bet won as Juan would not cross the line for another 25 minutes.
(above) early on in the lead group
(left) battling away on my own later on
The sprint for sixth
A post race massage and telling off from a chiropodist for the lack of attention I pay to my battered distance runner's toes later, I was reunited with the fantastic supporters I had en route. Alex, Steph, Jess and I enjoyed the rest of the day indulging in a marathon of a more gourmet nature, but Alex's blog is the place to go for that story and the accompanying photos of great food.
Possibly amused by another 'short shorts' joke after the race
So what other extra-curricular activities does this trip offer? Well for some it's the beaches that you can get to a short bus ride away, for others it's Spain's late night fiesta opportunities, or just sun-bathing in Elche's amazing palm grove. My own favourite experiences have included going to church over here where I received great hospitality and the chance to test my Spanish skills by following a Bible study with some of the other young people in the church. Also, getting out to run in the hills to the north of Elche and getting to see bits of the area on foot that nobody else has got to explore in the group was cool. Miriam, Steph and I also took the chance to travel to Alicante where we met up with Mary from the Leonardo French group visiting her Spanish beau, while also taking the chance to meet up with us on the Saturday evening of the first weekend. There were also two birthdays as Alex and Steph became a year wiser.
Steph and Alex giving an accurate assessment of how nice the birthday cake was!
The owner of the short shorts is enjoying life in Elche and best of all I've received confirmation of my selection in the Wales team after we get back. Next time it'll be back to blogging about the teaching and maybe an end of project post about my overall feeling about how it's gone.
A picture says a thousand words.. This picture says one.
Hey! I’m Alex, I’m 20 and my UKLC adventure began a couple
of months ago. I’d been looking for summer jobs as a sneaky way to jump onto
the tefl ladder - I didn’t think I had a chance of finding a job as a full time
teacher without experience and a degree - when I stumbled across the Leonardo
Project that UKLC were offering.
A month’s experience in France or Spain, a First Aid
qualification and a sports leadership certificate as well as a goody bag of
other treats aimed at newly qualified teachers? Yes please!
I was invited to an interview in London where I met Celine,
Michael, Catherine and 11 interviewees. After some formalities, we were given some
information on UKLC, who they are, what they’re all about, who’s behind it etc.
and then conducted our own 3-5 minute warmer/fluency exercise to the rest of
the group.
Some good ideas floating about already, I jotted a couple down and
we all had a chuckle when Hywel put his jeans on his head.
We were then given the task of planning a lesson in 40
minutes, drawing inspiration from what some might call a textbook. Any one
fresh out of CELTA will know this is no mean feat. We did it though! To round it
all off, we presented our lesson plans to the other groups and were given a bit
more information about the project.
10th April 2012
The next time I saw the crew, we were in Howell’s school in
Denbigh, North Wales and had been joined by everyone from the Manchester and
telephone interviews. After refuelling on free cups of tea and coffee in le cafe rouge we joined Michael for fun
games for the language classroom and an introduction to TBLT.
By the end of the afternoon we each had an arsenal of games
which were easy to set up and could be used as some curious platforms to some
really cracking lessons. We managed to get 6 theoretical teaching hours from
Michael asking “How old are my shoes?”! En serio!
Howell's School, Denbigh
11th April 2012
Day two kicked off with some language lessons in the morning
but soon we were doing chest compressions and giving mouth to mouth as our
First Aid course got underway. The guys giving the course were great, they knew
their stuff and the hands on approach made the content easy to learn, as well
as being a good opportunity for a giggle.
12th April 2012
Day three was a long, old day!
9-10! That’s 13 hours! Although, in fairness, it was 13 hours of golden
information. TBL actually meant something to me after today! The morning
session was making the most of resources,
which in the first example was, well, no more than a whiteboard, some paper, a
few pens and the teacher. “You are only limited by your imagination” Michael
Hudson. And he was spot on when he said that as by the afternoon we were
creating our own lessons to give to the rest of the group – lessons that really
had to be extracted, not from text books but live music posters and tourist
brochures etc. I felt the lesson my group and I ended up creating was a bit poo
really but we’d restricted ourselves too much. Can’t quite break this rigid
CELTA thinking! The other groups produced some fantastic lessons and really
showed what was capable if you allowed yourself to think a little freer.
Every day starts with this view. Not too shabby!
In the afternoon, a couple of
guys from Big Tree Training gave us our first aid training. We’re all certainly
going to remember it – maybe for different reasons – but they certainly knew
what they were on about. They imparted some great knowledge onto us which,
hopefully, we will never have to use. That said, it another thing to add to the
CV and that knowledge may one day save a life. Sweet!
The evening was spent with Keith
and Nathan for our sport leadership certificate. Nathan is as cool as a
cucumber, very calm, very measured. Keith, on the other hand, is a coke and freddo fuelled bundle of energy. Great guys really, and with their help we’re
now all set to coach kids who find themselves wanting to impersonate various
types of bean.
13th & 14th
April
These two days were pretty
similar really – that’s not to say that they were boring or anything like that though.
I’d say it was the perfect way to wind down the training week. The information
Jacque and Carol fed to us over these days seemed to round off everything that
we’d learnt from CELTA and the three days previous. Jacque and Carol, by the
way, are younger learner teachers who have considerable experience teaching
English to this demographic and had flown from Switzerland especially to teach
us for these two days. (If you’re reading this, by the way, thank you so much!)
They covered everything really;
classroom management, techniques for creating silence and how to build a good
rapport with your students, to name a few. We were told what they were teaching
us was for younger learners but there were 31 people in that room (all 20+
years old) enjoying these lessons as much as the 5 year olds that are lucky
enough to have these two as teachers.
The training week ended just
after lunch and it was genuinely quite sad knowing the next time we’d be seeing
each other, 16 of the 31 weren’t going to be there. On the bright side though,
we had a few days to practice ‘the look’ before we’d be teaching!
Happy teachers!
19th April
Back in Denbigh again! I arrived
a bit earlier than the rest of the group as I wanted to have a bit of practice
teaching before leaving. Spent the day with Hywel, Richard Gunion and Kiri playing
about with lesson plans, swapping ideas etc. Very laid back day! :)
20th April
Kicked off the day teaching a
three hour lesson to a group of Italian kids, preparing them for their
afternoon in Chester. Good lesson and I’m now a bit more relaxed about the
month ahead. As an added bonus, the rest of the group will be joining us
tonight. Woop!
Nervous much? Of course not..
21st April
Full schedule today! Started with
classroom games and activities (more goodies!) before going to to complete our
europass CVs and language passports. Not the most exciting but it’s necessary
for future funding bids! Finished the day with a language lesson from native
Spaniards and a cheeky trip to one of the finest pubs Denbigh has to offer.
22nd April
SPAIN! Very early start today.
Too early, in fact! Left Denbigh at 3am and went to Manchester airport from
where we would be flying to Alicante. Made it into Alicante without any
hiccups, although there was some nail biting when the bags took a more than a
while to come through the airport! We then met Libertad who issued us all with
our information packs before heading our separate ways to our flats. Spent the
afternoon exploring what we’d call home for the next month and, of course,
getting well acquainted with Flashpoint.
Oh, hello Spain..
..and hello Glorieta!
23rd April
This morning we met at top school
to receive our timetables for the next month and then were divided into two
groups for our first of two language lessons; lower level and higher level. The
higher level class was good and the feedback from the other half of the group
seemed pretty positive too. Happy days! Some of us were teaching tonight but
there were a few hours to plan, although with Michael’s help, that was maybe an
hour of planning and a couple more to chill out and discover the beautiful palm
parks Elche has to offer.
24th April – 27th
April
Rocking up to Salesianos
I’ve joined all these days
together as many of these lessons were very similar. I’m teaching 11-18 year
olds with Steph in a semi-private school called Salesianos and we’re sharing
evening classes teaching adults in Top School. The class sizes in Salesianos
are anything between 25+ and 10, whereas the Top School group is rarely more
than 5 people. This said, on one occasion I found myself standing in front of
36 13-14 year olds for the last lesson of what had quite easily been one of the
hottest days so far. This is not a situation one can prepare for and should you
find yourself in such a situation, I wish you the best of luck. All of the
classes are about an hour in length.
Ooh, Salesianos again.
This week I spent mainly focusing
on introductions – if there’s one thing I took from the training week, it’s
that a good teacher student rapport is essential. All of my lessons started
with a bit of an introduction about me; my name and two of my favourite things
which I asked the students to guess from the pictures. I got them to produce
their own name card thing before asking them to tell the rest of the class
their name and what they like. A couple of extension questions broke the
monotony and gave them each a chance to say a bit more. This also proved quite
effective for gauging the students’ actual levels.
Depending on how well they did
that, I either did a quick grammar focus or moved onto the next activity. ‘I
like play football’ is a very common mistake so 5 minutes spent on discussing
how we can say this is pretty useful really. The next activity was either
noughts and crosses, where the students formed the questions needed to produce
one of the answers that were in each section of the grid or Who am I?, where I asked the students to
rummage through my bag and make a few guesses at who I am and what I’m all
about. Both of these can be tweaked to push the students but as a general rule
of thumb, leave the who am I? game
for higher level students.
With some of the younger learners
we discussed classroom rules and got them to create their own and also some for
me. Seems fair really! With older learners, this really isn’t necessary –
they’re aware of all this.
Time permitting, I’d finish with either a
game; the alphabet game or the count to 10 game, or I’d finish with the
question swap milling activity. You’ve got to remember, it’s VITAL to model EVERYTHING
and if you’re doing the who am I?
activity you must empty your wallet of money before someone does it for you.
Not that I’ve made that mistake!
Did someone say something about Leonardo?
30th April – 5th
May
Monday’s lessons followed the
same format as those in the previous week. I hadn’t met these students so it
was necessary really. Tuesday was May bank holiday so there were no classes in
Salesianos although I did
teach in Top School in the evening.
Lesson planning like you've never seen it before!
This was my 4th Top
School lesson and something about these lessons isn’t clicking. Can’t quite put
my finger on it, maybe it’s just that it’s lacking the energy that goes hand in
hand with teaching teenagers but whatever it is, these lessons don’t seem to go
as smoothly as I hope even though the group is very cooperative. Stand by for
updates.
The lessons I chose for the rest
of the week were either “I’ve just jumped off the Empire State building..” or
Prison Break, both of which passed with varying degrees of success. Some
lessons were awesome; I came out having covered everything I wanted to and even
had a bit of time spare, whereas some felt like I’d been flogging a dead horse
for 55 minutes in a class of students who couldn’t have cared less. Very
frustrating!
The Empire State building lesson
usually felt like it lost its momentum by the end of the hour, but that’s my
fault. The prison break lesson, I found, was so successful that when the bell
went I was always surprised at how quickly the lesson had gone. If you’re going
to do this, by the way, do not ask them to design prisons for themselves – it will
have a theatre, a selection of live music acts, a penguin zone(!) etc. Instead,
ask them to design a prison for their classmates. It’ll work better!
I've tried to make teaching the main focus of this blog but I couldn't not share this with you. You've seen the crystal clear cyan skies, you've read about the teaching techniques (OK, enough alliteration) and now.. THE FOOD! We're eating like kings here and following Hywel's half marathon, the man in short shorts, Steph, Jess and I went on a marathon of our own - Maratón de tapas!
I think we made it to 5 different restaurants and had about 8 dishes of spectacular tapa. As for the winner, it had to be the sepia and chive burgers with black ali-oli topped with a prawn with a valiant effort from the tempura prawn and vegetables.
Om..
nom..
nom..
nom..
NOM!
7th May – 9th
May
Half way through week 3 and
things are coming together now. Woop!
Classroom management takes time
to learn – please realise this! As Jacque and Carol said, rule with an iron
fist in a velvet glove. You need the balance of being friendly and jolly and
being assertive. You must nip any bad behaviour in the bud. It’ll come
with practice. Chill.
Glorieta by night!
With regards to my Top School lessons,
they seem to be working a little better now. All of my lessons are running over
the hour as students aren’t shuffling towards the door as soon as they sense
the 8pm finish approaching. These are adults, they respond much better to
challenging or, in some cases, controversial topics. Also, as there is less of
them, they tend to finish their work sooner so prepare for this. I have learnt,
however, I need to improve how I keep a conversation alive while not actually
participating in it. I’m learning though.
Also, I’m getting a feel for the
students in Salesianos. I know which classes are going to be tricky and I know
which classes are going to gobble up the work I give them before hungrily
asking for more. It’s a shame I have each class only once a week (and in some
cases only once a fortnight) as the student teacher relationship takes a lot
longer to form when it’s like this but I understand why the school works it
this way. Anyway, it’s late and I have lessons to plan. Hasta pronto!
14th May
Week 4 is under way and I'm astounded by how fast everything is going by. The majority of us have just spent the weekend sunbathing and relaxing at Arenales - a pleasant change from Santa Pola, which is more suited to kite surfers and wind surfers than sun bathers.
Windy Santa Pola
Mmm :) Sunny Arenales
Back to teaching, I still have lessons which bomb completely but I also have the lessons which exceed all expectations. I guess I'm still learning - I wouldn't be doing this if I was a perfect teacher! Things are definitely coming together though.
This week I'll be continuing with the Prison Break lessons, asking students to break out of their super secure prisons with some bits 'n' bobs from around the flat (dental floss, a light bulb, a plug, etc.). I did it with some groups today and it went pretty well. I had some fantastic stories from some really creative students. I'll keep you posted how it goes with the rest of my classes this week.
For my lowest class (both age and level) I looked at the weather and got them to create their own forecasts using various future constructions. Some of them were great, many not so great. Next time I teach the weather, I either need to put in some more ground work to really engage them in the topic or vary the exercises they use to practise talking about the weather.
4 days of teaching left in Elche! :(
15th May
I'm tempted to delete everything I blogged yesterday. What an awesome day! Every lesson ended on a high and I'm sure (or at least I want to believe!) that it's because both the students and I enjoyed the lessons and covered more than we expected and not because each lesson this week is the last lesson I'll have with these guys.
Elche's Cathedral
More Prison Breaks and even a weather lesson that I felt was needed in order to redeem myself after yesterday... Well, that was nice obviously but the main aim was to get students talking, using future constructions forecasting the weather, not to make myself feel better!
Yesterday, for my Prison Break lesson, I asked one student per group to come up and collect up to 3 items their group would use to escape their prisons. Today, however, I laid out all 15 objects and said they must use a minimum of 5 in order to escape. For one, their stories were longer and more detailed and secondly, it gave them a chance to learn vocab that they otherwise wouldn't have learnt. Happy days!
My weather lesson today, started much as my weather lesson started yesterday; with a clip of Prince Charles presenting the weather forecast.
However, today, before watching the video, I asked them to have pens and paper at the ready and to scribble down any weather words they heard. This acted as a lovely little springboard to get them to brainstorm all weather types before eliciting forms and getting them to produce their own 7 day weather forecast for a city of their choice. This is where my lesson flopped yesterday as many found it too easy.
Today, I pushed them and was rewarded with some excellent weather forecasts, utilising the IWB and google maps. Derek Brockway eat your heart out!
3 days of teaching left in Elche! :'(
21st May
I'm back! I'm in the UK and my time in Elche is over - at least for now.The last three days there just got better and better, complemented by two awesome nights out with my fellow Leonardos. The first of these was a group meal, kindly paid for by Christine Top, and the second, a chance (for those of us with it!) to let our hair down.
The Leonardos in Top School
Mmm! Even more good food!
Steph and I with Susi, Ana Cari, Begoña (in a very appropriate t-shirt!) and Gloria.
I'm now in Denbigh where I am teaching this week and will be teaching throughout July. There was also talk of work going in the new academic year in Elche so it appears I've already made that jump onto the TEFL ladder, and not all that sneakily.
So, I've gone from CELTA accredited newbie to genuine English language teacher in little more than 6 weeks. I'm still learning but I've already learnt things I'll never forget, I've met some of the most amazing people imaginable and I couldn't be happier.
None of this happened by magic, though. There was a whole host of people working away in order for us to have this truly unforgettable start to our new careers and I'd like to say a MASSIVE thanks to all of them: Celine Aloe, Michael Hudson, Catherine Grieveson, Christine Top, Libertad, Vicky, Gloria, Begoña, Ana Cari and Susi in Salesianos, Jacque, Carol, Richard Gunion, Nathan, Keith, the guys at Big Tree Training and anyone that I might've missed out. You've all made this experience what it was and I think I speak for everyone when I say "Cheers!".
Now, anyone who reads this (the proverbial two men and a dog
in all likelihood) has probably heard that they should walk a mile in someone
else’s shoes. Well yesterday, I took a pair of someone else’s shoes and ran
like the clappers to try and get the bus to Colegio San Alberto Magno.
This blog post was supposed to be about my run in tomorrow’s
Elche Half Marathon and other not directly teaching related experiences. Well,
the strange twists that life takes struck yesterday and that will all have
to wait one more post. I had woken up in the morning, got ready and padded down
in sock-clad feet to get breakfast. Having had my breakfast and feeling relaxed
about being in plenty of time to brush my teeth, put on my shoes, collect my
bag and meander to the bus stop, I went to turn the door knob to my room … and
it didn’t budge. My calling out brought an enquiry from Jess as to what was
going on, and my explanation of being unable to get into the room. It’s worth
noting at this point that it’s supposed to be impossible for this to happen.
The room doesn’t have a key lock, you can’t shut your keys in the room. The
room only locks with a catch that you turn from the inside, but it nonetheless
seemed pretty clear the catch had slipped and locked inside my bag with any
materials I had planned to teach with that day, my toothbrush, wallet, phone,
and more significantly with regards to walking to any bus stop, my shoes!.
After 10 minutes of me kicking the door, wrestling with the knob, banging, and
shoulder charging the unyielding door, the sanguine figure of Ben emerged from
his room to enquire about the noise from the other end of the corridor. Having
explained the situation, he asked my shoe size, and provided me with a pair of
size nine shoes (I’m an eight and a half). “What time do you have to get the
bus?” he asked. “Pretty much now” I replied and headed off. Now I’m a fair 10,000m runner but the dash to the bus stop
was more like a middle-distance burn-up with a defeat being the result as I
arrived to see the only bus already reasonably far away down the road towards San Alberto Magno, which is by the motorway to the North-East of Elche. After 30 seconds of ‘what on
earth do I do now?’ thoughts, a car pulled up. “San Alberto Magno”? enquired
the female driver, telling me to get in. Sitting in the car, I greeted the
familiar figure of Andres from my five year olds class, and learned that my
ability to get into school that day was as a result of Andres saying “Mummy, my
teacher” from the back seat. So I enjoyed a ride in with Andres’s family and
beat the bus to school.
Now, I had nothing that I had prepared with me. Isabel taught
the 3 year old class that I was scheduled to teach in the morning with me
assisting, and then I used break time to re-prepare the “Dictionary of the Sea”
for the five year olds to do in the afternoon and found a different book for
their storytime to the We’re all going on
a Bear Hunt that I had planned. Bizarrely the result was probably my
favourite lesson so far with the five year olds who really engaged with the
story of The Magic in the Castle
(after a bit of a battle for attention after they came in hyper from lunch
break!). There were also some great ‘dictionaries of the sea’ that they
produced.
And the door? Well I arrived back at the apartment to find out that
Ben took a few seconds with a hairpin to get it open after I left. I owe him plenty for my
decent outcome to the oddest day of my teaching career so far!
I´m in Spain. It´s nice. Life in Elche is different to life in Denbigh. It is not quite as cold and the local people speak Spanish. Other than that I suppose it´s rather similar. I wake up early and go to bed late, have the chance to learn from Michael every day (or did have until he cruelly left us), and my life revolves around the English Language.
The training week in Wales was important. My perspective of teaching has changed more than a bit since hearing all that I´ve heard and doing all that I´ve done during that week and my first few days in Elche. That planning lessons can be fun and not take ages is welcome news. I´ve learnt how to construct enjoyable lessons that actually teach about grammar without it being obvious. So far I´ve done a lot of introductory lessons so that the students can get to know me and I can get to know them. Also, in the case of my adult classes, they can get to know each other. Drawing pictures that represent something about yourself works well as the students are interested in the life of the foreign teacher and happy to talk about their own interests too. Getting them to work out if statements are true or false is another ice-breaker worthy of consideration. I considered it and did it and it went well.
Prison break was a hit of a lesson that culminated in the formation of language so vivid and creative I had to sit down. The phrase "beautiful, angry, inoffensive lions" has probably never been uttered anywhere before it was last week in Elche, but it sure does get you thinking, doesn´t it? That was a tag question. I really should teach about those soon, right?
My adult class have given me permission to script a film entitled "Shark Policeman" even though they came up with the unique idea. Hollywood loves films containing sharks and policemen, so a film about a policeman that´s part shark part human could only be a box office smash. Especially considering the fact he throws sharks at the world´s worst criminals trying to escape a high security prison. As well as teaching adults I work at a secondary school, but I have so many different classes that I haven´t had so many lessons with each class yet. It´s been great so far, and I´m sure the experience will continue to be interesting and good for me.
But there´s no denying that I wouldn´t feel half as confident as I do going into classes without that week in Wales and Michael´s support. Carol and Jacquie provided so much energy and enthusiasm, which immediately rubbed off on the whole group. I felt like I was being made over, useful ideas and clear direction helping to create a better me. So, I´m a teacher now. That´s what I´m telling people and I stick by it. I´m doing it; I´m teaching. But, do you know what? Most of all I´m learning.
I started writing
this entry on the eve of departure to Spain and haven’t got round to posting
until now. I had been fortunate to have the opportunity to teach a three hour
class to an Italian residential group in Denbigh and plan alongside Richard and
Kiri from UKLC. Alex also arrived to teach on Friday, and Richard then went through a
series of kindergarten activities with Alex and I on Friday afternoon. With
Michael having also given us input on the last day before departure, by
the time of the flight I had reached the point of saturation for any more ideas without
getting to put lesson ideas into practice.
Upon arrival
at Alicante airport, Libertad from Top School met us at the airport and while
the other four went in a taxi to our apartment, I got a lift with Libertad
which gave me a chance to get used to using my very rusty Spanish again, though
trying to understand Spanish from crying three year olds in a kindergarten
class compared with Libertad’s clear delivery isn't always so straightforward!
Libertad herself is really approachable and was able to go through conversation
topics from talking about Elche as a town, vital info like where we would catch
the bus to San Alberto Magno, her love of her time spent as a student in
Sheffield, and my future plans for working in Japan. When she dropped me off
outside the apartment, Ben, Aaron, Sophie and Jess were waiting as I had
the only key. We said goodbye to Libertad before getting stuck with trying to turn
the key in the door to the apartment and wishing Libertad was still there.
Fortunately it turned out to be my own ineptitude and Jess easily outwitted me
in opening a door using a key. Once we were inside and saw the
really spacious apartment, with each room having an en suite and my room having
a balcony, we were pleased to say the least. The mood was only heightened
further by the beautiful spring sunshine streaming in through every window. We
wasted little time in getting out to La Glorieta and the Flashpoint bar which
would become the default meeting place in the first week, quite possibly due to
the €1.50 caña y tapa and the fact that men playing with the
wrong shaped balls would often be shown on the TV screens. It was fair to say
that outside in the warm sunshine at that moment, we were happy with our lot.
But what about the teaching? That note of nervousness on which I left
the last blog was born of the terrifying prospect of trying to teach TEFL to
3-5 year olds. Well the classroom management with 5 year olds is not easy,
especially when there are 18 of them in 5B and it’s the afternoon and they have
been in school since 9am. Two hours of English anyone? They are very sweet
though and love It’s time to say goodbye as
a song (acknowledgements to Richard Gunion and probably many teachers before
him!). The first week though has often seen me introducing individual new
activities and songs into Isabel’s classes rather than taking the lead in
teaching whole classes. On Monday I took the lead in preparing the year 5
afternoon class. They loved the competitive aspect of some of the activities I
introduced, but concentration span is a difficult issue at that time in the
afternoon, and ideas modelled on native speakers in a UK classroom don’t always
survive their first skirmish with a 5 year old’s concentration span (at least when I’m
teaching them). This is what the real teaching experience is for, however, and
I’m really looking forward to getting more classes under my belt and coming out
a better teacher. On a final note, if you teach kindergarten, expect stuff to occur that
no EFL training ever prepared you for. Assisting in one music lesson
(San Alberto Magno is a completely bilingual school and other subjects are
often taught in English) the music teacher introduced a song about elephants,
only for 3 year old Marcos to be afraid of the elephant flashcards and run to me to hide.
He could only be persuaded slowly back to his chair, and would only listen
tentatively without letting go of my hand. Perhaps CELTA needs to include a
session on classroom management for young learners afraid of elephants, or this
can be my recommendation to UKLC in the training for next year’s Leonardo
project!
This weekend will feature a bit of an adventure as I participate in
the Elche half marathon on Sunday. I’ll write a bit more about the development
of my own lessons as well as other weekend adventures in forthcoming blogs.
Just over a week has gone by since, bleary eyed after a 3am
start, we stumbled off the plane into the Spanish sunshine. Seven days on, there
has been little improvement on the sleep deprivation front, however, with a
good twenty hours teaching under our belts and plenty of guidance along the
way, the prospect of this Monday’s three hour lesson was a whole lot less
daunting.
Rewind back to last Sunday and I was trying my upmost not to
fall asleep on the sofa as we all crammed into one of the flats to discuss the
all important first lesson, which was looming ever closer. The twenty kilo
luggage allowance had left little room for books or extra resources, and
although the week’s training in Wales had equipped us with plenty of ideas,
translating those from paper to reality suddenly seemed decidedly intimidating.
It turns out, however, that the only resource that we actually required was
Michael, as half an hour later, we all had an introduction lesson plan ready to
go. Luckily he was here all week to offer advice, inundate us with lesson ideas
and nudge us in the right direction. Hopefully we’ve taken enough on board to
survive the next two weeks without him...
A far cry from the cold streets of Denby, Elche is all sunshine
and palm trees (admittedly we have yet to compare the karaoke...) and although
the locals are still awaiting the onset of summer, twenty odd degrees is
suiting us just fine. We have found a local, destroyed our body clocks in the
name of a truly Spanish night out and sampled many a caña y tapa. Most memorably, however,
was probably second class in, when a camera crew interrupted my lesson. Two
more news interviews later, it’s good to know that should TEFL teaching fall
through, a career in front of the camera awaits:
