I have been working at language school for the last 6 months as many of you already know. My students are typically between the ages of 14 and 40 (roughly speaking.) I loved working at the school with the exception of all the "required and unpaid meetings" that were called 10 minutes in advance requiring me to shower (because in Brazil if you leave your house without taking a shower, it's a sin) and run to grab a taxi (because during this time we didn't have a car... we do now!) and it was just to learn that they wanted us to sign our names on some form after each lesson, or something else that an email could have resolved.
Anyhow, due to these frustrations (and some other assuntos) I'm still not sure if I am going to continue working at the school, however, I am continuing my private lessons and am starting my classes at the university this week!
This whole teaching thing has been a constant challenge for me as I am famous for my lack of patience. I feel that this position is the best for me, as it forces me to overcome my irritation when people don't understand something, and try and find different ways to explain them so that they do understand. A great and important skill in life that I am currently cultivating.
My greatest challenge has recently been a young, bright, 7 year old boy. M is an incredible student and greets me each day with a beaming "GOOD MORNING TEACHER!" with his colored pencils and notebooks all in hand, ready to tackle the next lesson.
My first two weeks (4 lessons) with him went great! We learned greetings, we learned the names of food, colors, and how to use the verb "I like" making questions and all. We learned body parts and sung "Head Shoulders, Knees and Toes" I thought I was on a roll. I've never taught illiterate children before (here in Brazil children don't learn to read until they are pretty big... school days are 4 hours... and consequently not much gets done considering the majority of this is snack time, play time and settling down time) and I wasn't sure I was up to it, however, the first two weeks were so successful I thought I was the best!
Well, I should have learned better. I had two lessons that bombed. I was teaching clothes.
Let's just say he was irritable, not interested, tired, cranky, and just wanting to talk about food, colors and body parts again. I didn't know what to do, and I'm still unsure how our next lesson on Thursday will go, but I decided to try a new approach. We're going to try doing a letter of the alphabet each day, learning words, writing these words (which he is starting to do in school) and practicing things he is already comfortable with, colors, numbers, "I like" and trying to add new things each week such as "Where does the alligator live?" or something like that. I found a ton of printables on http://www.kidzone.ws/kindergarten/vowels/lettera.htm and http://www.tlsbooks.com/letterworksheets1.htm and I also use www.twistynoodle.com to print "A is for Alligator" coloring sheets with tracing spots to boot. (I am PDF-ing 4 that focus on one letter and then printing them 4-up on one sheet) I especially loved the Find the Words that Begin with the Letter coloring sheets. I sure hope that my little kid, M, enjoys this new approach. I think that this will at least give him the expectation of what will be coming up on the next lesson, since he already knows the alphabet!
And now to my big kids. I start Wednesday teaching at the largest local university. I'm terrified, but also super excited. It's been a crazy few weeks (especially since it is around Carnival, everyone is on vacation, working half days, etc....) so all of my due dates and appointments were obviously not met and this is forever frustrating to a girl who lives by her agenda. Note: I live in a cowboy town. Carnival is not a big deal. No parades, just some parties, dance clubs have costume parties, and pretty much everyone is happy for the 4 day weekend so they either 1) go to the family farm, the chácara, sitio or the fazenda depending on how big the land-area is or 2) they go somewhere else that is more interesting. They go to the beach, they go to a big city that has a mall, pretty much anywhere but staying here since the town is dead. I am, however, staying in town, working, playing with my pup and getting all my lesson plans for the next two weeks DONE so I can relax and concentrate on winning over more students!
All said and done, I have been spending a decent amount of time looking at various text books and I finally decided at one point, "Puxa (gosh...)" I'm just going to make my own. And so began, what I thought, was an easier option. Obviously I didn't prioritize and left everything for the last minute but I got it done. All 46 pages of it. All grammar topics (and a few modal verbs) in one workbook. With some texts, conversation topics, etc. This book is going to be the basis for my class and I think it is going to be super helpful because it is really basic and all the vocab (18 new words per lesson) have something to do with college, or are very commonly used words in English. I even have a TOEFL section! If you're interested in checking it out, let me know, I can send you a pdf. If you find any errors, PLEASE let me know as I am sure I am going to run into a bunch as I go along.
In addition to the stress of getting this book finished, printed and bound, I needed to recruit students for my class! My original week for doing PR was the first week of Feb, when classes started. However, since the director was on vacation, and the person responsible for approving all propaganda that has the name of the university on it was also on vacation, (read: nothing gets done in Brazil from Dec 1--Carnival) I had to wait until the week before I was supposed to start classes. UGH! Thankfully, they finally got my info on their website (LOOKIE HERE!), on their facebook and all over the bulletin boards at the university. I made tear-off flyers, which were a hit! Professors and students told me they loved the tear off part.. they had never seen a poster like that! Go figure...
So, after spending 12 hours, for three days in a row handing out pamphlets, yelling "INGLÊS NA ULBRA! AULAS COM UMA AMERICANA! MAIS INFORMAÇÕES AQUI!" (something which I have been told by a girlfriend of mine NOONE does and she laughed SO hard she almost peed her pants when I told her that I did this... and H just shook his head in shame!!) I have come to the conclusion that everyone at the uni now knows who I am. I walked around during lunch and dinner hours chatting with people while they ate, left pamphlets in classrooms during class changes, and held demonstrative classes to get to know prospective students and to get them to sign up.
Result: I now have 16 students signed up BEFORE the class even started! (A huge deal since Brazilians, like most Latin Americans, can't seem to plan something more than about 10 minutes in advance.) I even had people just come up to me and ask for the sign-up form, then handed me $100 reais pointblank and then said "Até quarta!" (Until Wednesday! -- days of the week in Portuguese are in numerical order, to see why click here.)
All of my heart work seems to be paying off. I hope that this week I have happy little kids and big happy big kids. Se deus quiser.... (The Brazilian way of saying Ojalá...using the future subjunctive. And yes, Portuguese even has a future subjunctive!)
You are so inspirational, Becky! Reading about how hard you are working motivates me to work harder at everything I'm doing. Right now I am balancing working 8-4 for the munchkins, teaching an afterschool pinata making class once a week (which ends next Monday), teaching a homebound high schooler Spanish II (which ends this week), trying to teach 2 group classes as part of my tutoring business, organizing an advanced conversation group with a native speaker to benefit advanced speakers like myself, planning a Multicultural Night for my students on March 22nd with cultural booths, food, and performances (I will be dancing in it), AND trying to meet the needs of my family, dog, and friends. Let's just say...it's a little much at the moment. But like I said, reading about the very cool things you are doing motivates me to push myself in new directions.
ReplyDeleteI would love to see your book! I think I still have my English grammar bible from my TESL coursework so I could use it to double check or give you ideas later. I think it would be cool to make my own textbook for Spanish as well -- though I'd have to have enough time to sit down and plan it out! That's my problem. Right now I've been making unit/lesson vocab sheets for each lesson, and it's working because none of my students are really serious about learning. They show up when they want and don't practice, which makes it hard to get past the first set of basic greetings sometimes. I also have some students who begged for me to start a new group class so they could get cheaper Spanish lessons, but they are not showing up to this class I've worked hard to design! Ay ay ay...Americanos! Good luck down in Brazil. Everyone seems excited to learn English with a real-live American girl (and a pretty one at that!) :)
Haha you are even more inspirational. I love your posts about your little ones! I had made a few final changes with design at the printers (and i am waiting for him to come back from the farm (it's carnival, so everyone runs away to the farm, here) so i won't have the final final version until i get it back, but I'll pass along this one. I think it is going to work out to be the best thing since it's concentrated, not complicated and gives students lots of room for note-taking and TONS of practice, something that is lacking a lot of times in grammar books. I pulled a lot directly from the internet meaning I won't publish it or actually SELL it, and obviously I plan on making a better version for next semester since I was such a procrastinator that I didn't get around to finishing it until one day before I had to send it off to the printers. I'm going to try and give worksheets each week too, we'll see how that comes along. I hope it works, classes start tomorrow!!!
ReplyDeleteAnd those students who aren't really motivated... trust me, they exist everywhere. I had a classroom of 40 year old business women (all super rich) and they were the WORST EVER. One refused to repeat stuff along with the rest of the group, she insisted on waiting until everyone else had repeated for her independent turn. She's been studying for over 3 years at the school I was at and she still can't manage more than Hello, how are you? I am fine. THATS IT. BAAAAH.