I had quite a bit to do this past week. Though school started last week, this was my first full week of teaching. I still didn’t get to everyone because we had a half day on Thursday for Teachers Day. We’ve been trying to solidify commitments and English extra-curriculars. I asked about leading English corner like last year, but they said they want an English club instead. It will not be a time open to anyone who wants to come. They want to set objectives and have the club produce something the school can enjoy. Now it’s a kind of English drama/dubbing club. We also need to interview and accept about 25 students into these clubs (there will be one club for grade 8 and one club for grade 7). I’m not entirely sure what questions to ask someone who wants to be part of the club, but I’ll solidify some of it this weekend.
This year's incentive: student with the most stamps on his/her name tag can choose a postcard. I may need to order more at the end of the first semester. They're especially excited about the top left one because it changes images when it moves.
We’ve also been asked to lead sessions for the other English teachers. We (the foreign teachers) are going to take turns leading classes. We don’t completely know what they want, the most concrete answers I’ve gotten are “words for encouraging students” and things related to our strengths. I’m at a bit of a loss though on what to do about language learning. It’s one of my strengths so I haven’t had to spent as much time on it as some. The other teachers know I studied a number of languages, but the rumors have grown from me being comfortably fluent in Spanish and Italian and having a bare proficiency in Chinese and Japanese, and a very limited memory of Latin. People say I know 8 languages and a student keeps asking me to help him with French and the words in “Lady Marmalade”. I think he likes musicals. He asked about Moulin Rouge and Broadway.
I’m hoping I don’t burn out from being overworked. I get paid for taking on the extra work, but 17 regular classes and running an English club, working on my TEFL, creating lessons for other English teachers all sounds exhausting. The school also wants us to turn in all our powerpoints at the end of the year. I already had to turn in my semester objectives and my lesson plans for the first two weeks. I’m always impressed by the ambitions and the accomplishments of the school I work at, but at times it feels like too much.
I suppose I’ll be addressing some of it as time goes on and I get a sense of what I can do and keep up with. In the meantime, I had a great teacher’s day, sore red hands from tug of war, a few treasures from students, and time to catch up with some of the other teachers about their summers. Sadly, the prizes did not include live chickens or vegetables. I don’t know what the winning team got on Teachers Day, but I won a sizeable supply of napkins.
I’m hoping I don’t burn out from being overworked. I get paid for taking on the extra work, but 17 regular classes and running an English club, working on my TEFL, creating lessons for other English teachers all sounds exhausting. The school also wants us to turn in all our powerpoints at the end of the year. I already had to turn in my semester objectives and my lesson plans for the first two weeks. I’m always impressed by the ambitions and the accomplishments of the school I work at, but at times it feels like too much.
I suppose I’ll be addressing some of it as time goes on and I get a sense of what I can do and keep up with. In the meantime, I had a great teacher’s day, sore red hands from tug of war, a few treasures from students, and time to catch up with some of the other teachers about their summers. Sadly, the prizes did not include live chickens or vegetables. I don’t know what the winning team got on Teachers Day, but I won a sizeable supply of napkins.
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