Note: the thing I love about these books is that they come with catchy songs. The songs I have in Nashville are great, but they're very long and take several days of teaching to get to a point where there students can learn from it. Here, the song lasts less than a minute and by the end of class, they're singing it!
I digress.
This song is jazzy. The first time I played it for 1B (Martha's group, pronounced Marta since the "th" doesn't exists in Spanish, the ones that started out the worst and are now the more easily managed) was the first time I'd heard it. It surprised me with its beat and struck me as pretty funny, so I started dancing. It was very cheesy. In case you haven't been to first grade in awhile, cheesy is in. They ATE. IT. UP. I mean, they loved it! They were begging me to play it again. Every time I have returned to this group, they have begged for it. It was a hit!
Today was no different.
But let's get back to the beginning of the day.
The bus ride was in the pimpest bus I've seen since I've been here. Many have tinted windows (I'm tellin' ya, it's HOT), some have curtains, but all have something special to the driver. I've seen women's names on the rearview mirror or bumper stickers on the windows. The most extreme case was stuffed animals. That's right. This 40 year old bus driver had decorated every available space in his bus with stuffed animals. Tough, dude.
My pimp bus this morning had blue silk curtains. I don't mean the kind that decorate the windows, I mean the kind that completely cover the windows. I had a great opportunity to get sick since we were in motion with no road in sight, but I was fine.
I got to school just in time and got my books in order. Maribel had called me yesterday to tell me she'd be coming to deliver books and to pick up any other orders. It's always kind of a headache if I haven't looked through it first to see how many books I need to order for kids who have paid me everything and how many have paid half and on and on!
I got my affairs in order and headed to 1A (Anabel, started off great, then her strict teaching manner created a stressful environment leading to challenging behavior, not to mention a new student...). I saw on their seats that she had taped papers with their names on them. This is a good sign. I think consistency is the thing that's most obviously missing down here. The seating is just one example. Kids come in in the morning and sit wherever they want. Immediately, the control is taken from the teacher and given completely to the students. This only begins the problematic day.
I was glad to see the names on the seats because I think that means there will be some stability at this point.
I began with more Spanish today to make sure my new friend did not feel alienated. The last thing I wanted was another 30 minute hand holding contest!
Amazingly, they listened. I think Anabel threatened to beat them! At an rate, they listened; they repeated; they even remembered some things I had taught them! Success!
About halfway through class, the kids near the door are not interested in English anymore. They're paying attention to something outside and saying, "They want to see you."
I dismiss it. Kids stop by first grade all the time since it's next to the bathroom. They peak in the windows and doors without even attempting to be somewhat hidden.
I don't mind because I'm the freak here. I'm the different one, and they just want to see what's going on in the other kids' English class. I can't be mad at them for being interested, right?
I keep on teaching and in walks Maribel. We discuss the plan for a few minutes (I'll cut the class short so we can talk books and other things) and then the kids show off what they know.
I send Sebastián to go find Anabel. This is the other problem I see here. When I leave class, or send a student to find the teacher, often the student comes back and says she's on her way, but it takes 5-10 minutes which cuts into my next class. There is lots of unsupervised time, again taking power from the teacher and handing it over to the students in a silver platter.
Anabel came in and I was playing the song for them, though not dancing as much as I tend to do with Martha's ("Marta's") class.
I left and went to talk to Maribel (more about that in the next post).
I entered Martha's class at 10:05 instead of 9:40 because of my meeting with Maribel. We began with a review of flashcards. I literally started tearing up. Now, I wasn't that emotional. I have an overactive tear duct. I cry more than I should, and my eyes water all the time. My eyes water when it's cold, or hot or sunny, or I smile too much. You get the point. The bottom line is that I was smiling so much with how much they knew and how much enthusiasm they had to answer my questions (What is it?) and how even the struggling students (Victor) answered, that my eyes were watering. I told them that they made my heart warm.
Then I rewarded them with the song. I goofed it up BIG TIME and they ate it up equally BIG TIME. It was so fun. It made me realize that that's the beauty of teaching (and especially of the little ones); every day is a clean slate. Every day is an opportunity to enjoy, to learn, to teach, to have fun, to reiterate classroom policies. I loved today.
While we were singing, Anabel's class was unsupervised, so ALL of them were crowded around our door and window. I tried to get them to move along, since they were being a distraction, but then I gave up. They were repeating along with the CD during the vocabulary part and they were singing along while we sang. When we finished, I started packing up my things (CD player, file of teacher book, handouts, etc) and Martha's class started whining, "Teacher, don´t go. Please don´t go."
I loved today.
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