What am I Doing?!

“What am I doing?!” was the first thing that I thought last Monday. Actually, the first thing I thought that day was “What the bloody hell is going on out there?”, since they were having an opening ceremony/blessing that started well before 7am involving drums, bells, and dragon dancers… I’d spent most of Sunday afternoon/night planning lessons for the first day. My instructions were to play games and sing songs with the students. I’d been advised of my classes a few days previously: year 4, year 2 and year 7. Aside from the general idea that my students would be mostly beginners, I had no concept of what level they would be at. I was all ready to go at 7.30 (first lesson at 8.05, year 4), when I was told that we weren’t having classes on that day at all, since it was the first day. An hour later, we were told that, yes, classes were on, but only after the morning break. Cue rush to organise myself for class 2B and then 2A. My year 2s weren’t as advanced as I had assumed, so I had to rejig my plan on the fly, but overall I think we had moderate success.

At lunchtime, I was told that on Mondays, my 7A class would have their lesson following the afternoon break but after lunch Tuesday-Friday. Oh, and can I please teach preschool Monday to Thursday as well? I agreed, mostly because 5 year olds are pretty cute. Unfortunately, I didn’t study how to teach little kids, so there have been hits and misses (today we had tears because they got carried away during a game…). Hopefully I’ll get the hang of it soon!

My 7B class has been testing my boundaries.The class is mostly boys, and apparently they were terrors last year. It doesn’t help that nearly half the class doesn’t have the textbook! After a few lessons, we’ve got the measure of each other, so incidences of bad behaviour have dropped significantly. I’m using a warning system with them, two warnings and you go outside, more than 4 warnings per week gets you sent to the discipline officer. Since we started this, I’ve only had to send one boy outside. I plan to introduce bribery on Fridays to encourage the improvement… With luck, I’ll have everyone cooperating in the next few weeks. There was an incident last week, involving a tooth. There was a bit of a ruckus, and when I checked it out, I found a tooth (or part of a tooth) on a desk. I believe it belonged to Kevin, but it very soon belonged to the bin…

7A has a completely different dynamic. It’s a mostly female class, they’re pretty bright, and pay attention most of the time. The only thing I’ve found is that the girls dominate the boys, except for a couple who are switched on. I need to find a way to get the rest of the boys involved…

My year 4s are a dream! They’re easily my favourites, always paying attention, participating and singing. They’re also pretty good at drawing, I’ll be putting some of their pictures up in the classroom.

Year 2A and 2B are interesting. They’re both very easily distracted, and need a lot of reminding to focus. 2A are a lot more advanced in their English than 2B. The classes need completely different approaches, and some of the kids in 2B are actually a bit resistant. We had a new student arrive today who doesn’t speak any English, so it’s going to be tricky business. Luckily some of the girls are helping to translate what I’m saying…

My preschool classes are incredibly hyperactive. As I mentioned before, I didn’t do any study about teaching littlies, so I’ve been finding it difficult to know how to approach it. Making it more fun is the fact that I have not been told what I’m supposed to be teaching. Last week we did body parts (Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes and the Hokey Pokey) and this week I’m focusing on colours. I figure that I can get them to do a colouring activity about a rainbow?

Overall, it was a difficult week. I didn’t get my textbooks until Wednesday afternoon, so I had to make a lot of things up for the first few days. Some of the lessons for years 2 and 4 involve singing, but luckily noone seems to be deaf yet due to my awful voice! I’ve also been trying to draw things, particularly for 2B. Well, I say draw. It’s mostly stick figures and smiley faces… On Saturday, Josie and I went to Fahasa (the bookshop) at Co-Op to buy a few posters, so my classroom isn’t quite so bare now. I’ll also put up some of the artwork that I get my classes to do to brighten things up more.

So, here are a few pictures of my classroom and my stellar artwork!