Since I have 2 school assignments, I will alternate weeks at each of the schools. This week was primary. I was happy to start there, as it is less intimidating to teach younger students. My school has...
- 1st-6th grades, so the kids are 6-11 years old
- Only 1 class per grade (the elementary school I attended in the states had 4-5 per grade)
- Very small class sizes, which I love! 10-14 kids in the younger grades, and 14-18 in the older grades
- English taught 2-3 hrs/wk per grade. There is a homeroom teacher who teaches math, science, reading, etc, then students attend English classes with a separate English teacher- in the same way that elementary students back home attend art, music, and P.E. for an hour at a time on certain days.
- School hours of just 9 am- 2 pm. Most days I only have to be there for part of that time.
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| I found this photo of some of my students on the school's website. |
Since these kids are just starting out with the language, I get to use both Spanish and English when teaching them. It's been great to practice my Spanish, as I only expected to be able to use English in the classroom. I have felt pretty comfortable with my Spanish in class, though it is easier to say something to them in the language than to understand what they are saying.
There is only 1 English teacher, so it's nice to work alongside the same teacher for all my classes (secondary will not be this way). I have helped with portions of activities, but I have not taught an entire lesson solo (or anything close to that). I have also helped students one on one, especially with their speaking skills, as they have been working in their activity books. I am still getting a feel for how much English they know. It's been nice that the teacher has not put too much pressure on me at the start. Some teachers at other schools just throw the auxiliar into teaching to whole lesson right away. I think that is more common in secondary positions, but it seems more effective to first be given the chance to observe and pick up on the way the students are used to doing things. I am looking forward to having more responsibility as the year progresses, as I have learned that when I know I am responsible for presenting a topic and making it interesting, I am both more effective and more creative. Some people thrive on responsibility more than others, and I did not realize how much that it true for me until this week.
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| I do not have any pictures with my current students yet, but here I am helping some kids while student teaching in college. |
One of the teachers is retiring (as of today), so everyone is going out for drinks and tapas this afternoon, and they invited me to go with them. Later tonight a lot of the auxiliares in Mérida are having a pot luck dinner together at my piso. I'm not sure of the rest of my weekend plans yet, but I'm sure we will discuss it at dinner. Hopefully the secondary school next week will go as well as the primary did!
Besides teaching, here are some other things I accomplished this week...
- Applied for my NIE/TIE (which allows me to stay in Spain for a year) ...it took 3 visits to the extranjería!
- Opened a bank account
- Several smaller things such as emailing about private lessons, practicing Spanish, and looking into upcoming travels
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