ABCs and 123s

I'm going to switch my weekly postings to Tuesdays because of my new schedule for work!  I had my first day yesterday, and spent the majority of it just watching.  I also learned a few things along the way...

My First Day

I went to the office around 9:30, which meant I had to leave my house at 8:45 to walk to the bus stop a couple blocks away, then take the bus (which thankfully has A/C) about 30 minutes to the town where I'm working and then walk to the office.  I learned that there will be 3 parts to my job: helping at a nursery school, working in the office, and tutoring older students in English in the afternoons.

First, I went to the nursery school.  Yesterday I just observed what the children were doing.  While I was there they did book work by practicing writing their English letters, played games outside, and sang songs in English.  I was quite impressed with these children since they are 3-5 years old.  They were all so cute, and I wanted to take them home with me.  However, little kids still intimidate me...I just don't know what to do with them.  I guess I'll find out quickly since I'll be teaching them, or helping to teach them!  Two other things I learned...(1) I still enjoy tracing and good penmanship, (2) growing up on a tropic island is different than growing up in North Raleigh.

When I was in kindergarten my teacher, Mrs. Bunch, told me that she knew I was going to be a teacher when I grew up.  She said that she could tell by the way that I passed out papers to my fellow classmates.  I was SO flattered!  I have always been fascinated with teaching, and would pretend teach my stuffed animals all the time.  I even had a chalkboard and magnetic white board.  Another thing I did was to draw the dotted lines across the middle of a ruled line of paper to know exactly how tall or short to make my letters.  You know how when you first started learned to write you had the extra wide ruled sheets with the dotted line in the middle to help you make the capital and lower case letters.  Well, that's sort of what I got to do yesterday - for the first time in my life since elementary school.  Although I was making the dots for the letters and not the dots across the page.  I don't know how many dotted Is, Bs, Ms, and Gs I made, but it was a lot!  And somehow not as much fun as I remembered it being, but I did still feel a since of pride knowing that I could make a good dotted B, M, or I freehand.  The Gs were a little tricky, but I blame that on the fact that they write their Gs differently than I do.

As we all know, when you are learning you alphabet you also learn an associated word to go with it - like A is for apple, B is for ball, C is for cat (and Y is for yak, especially if you are Owen Bunker!)  However, I'm pretty sure that I did NOT learn that M is for mango, but that's island life...and I love it.  Mangoes are way better than mice (which is probably what I learned) especially if they are in your house.

After the nursery school, which lets out at 12, I went back to the office and had lunch.  Then, waited....  I did watch some TV which was in English - a cricket match and my dear old friend CCTV News.  #19 of You Know You've Lived in East Asia Too Long When...you watch CCTV News when you are no longer living in East Asia!  (Just as a note: CCTV News is the only English TV station in EA, and thus my only TV station to watch for the past 3 years.)  Somehow, watching that news program hosted by that lady that I don't like was kind of like being home again.  I AM NOT comparing it to my American home, but my home away from home in EA - don't get offended Mama, nor am I saying that you are like that lady that I don't like who hosts the TV shows on CCTV News.  I'll know to bring my Chinese books to study during the down time in the future.

At about 3:00, I went to the boarding house to meet the children who live there.  These children are older - grades 5-8 - and go to school in the morning, so I can only work with them in the afternoons.  Hence the waiting.  I met with them, and got an idea of what they are learning in their English classes at school and their levels of English.  I was most impressed with what I saw from their textbooks and workbooks.  But when I asked them simple questions like "What's your name?", "How old are you?", and "Where are you from?" they could not answer me.  Then, I found out that they, like children in China, learn English not in English but in their mother tongue (i.e. Sinhala in Sri Lanka and Chinese in China).  I have NO idea why it gets taught this way, and it drives me absolutely CRAZY!  How on earth could you expect someone to learn a foreign language if they never hear it or speak it.  In elementary school, we had to learn Spanish - and I absolutely, on no uncertain terms, was determined not to learn it...I wanted to learn French and thought it was unfair that I wasn't given a choice in the matter.  So, I resolutely set my mind to not learn Spanish.  Our Spanish teacher came to class every week, and we sang songs and did other things I don't remember, but no matter how hard I tried...I still learned a little Spanish and remember it to this day.  I know hola, adios (I was glad to say that one to the teacher), and how to say 1-10 in Spanish.  It is so easy for kids to learn a new language, but they HAVE to hear it and be given an opportunity to speak it.  Anyway...off my soapbox...For the older kids, I think I will spend some time working with them on their speaking and listening and also some time helping them with their homework.

Anyway, I am looking forward to helping out the children and getting to know them better.  I will spend 2 mornings at the nursery, 1 afternoon at the boarding house, and 1 day in the office.

JL was so sweet - he walked with me to the bus stop in the morning to see me off, and then met me along the street on my way back and took for me ice cream at Baskin Robins to celebrate my first day of work (it was tiramisu, not mango).  The man knows my weakness!  He is also glad that I'm getting exposure to teaching little kids "as preparation for teaching our children later".