The Older Kids

Just finished up my third week at the secondary school. I am enjoying both schools, but what's funny is that the things I like about the IES (Instituto de Educación Secondaria) are completely different than the reasons I like the CEIP (Colegio de Educación Infantil y Primaria)! Here are my favorite things about the IES:

Random Photo #1 (I still wanted to add some pictures even though I do not have any at the school yet)- Mérida, Spain.
I walk past this spot on the way to work each day.

The younger grades (11-13 yrs old)- These classes are the most enthusiastic & willing to participate. They have large class sizes (close to 30 students, where as 14-18 year olds have about 15 students). Typically I prefer smaller classes, but in this situation it makes it easier to plan games and activities. Most of the students who are not as excited to participate in the younger grades just have an I-am-embarrassed-about-my-English attitude, but in the older grades the apathetic ones have an I-just-do-not-care attitude. I much prefer the first & these ones still get fairly excited about me helping them one-on-one. Middle school is the age I have had the least experience with back in the States, but I am liking this age group a lot more than I expected (at least in this setting).

Random Photo #2- Roman Art Museum, Mérida, Spain. We visited the museum
during one of our first weekends in Spain (entry is free on Saturdays & Sundays!)

Working with 4 different teachers- Originally I did not think this would be ideal & it did make the 1st week a bit confusing/difficult. However, I am now enjoying their different teaching styles (variety is the spice of life!). It's nice that I only have to plan activities for some of the classes; in others, the cooperating teacher just shows me the lesson plan the day of & lets me take over some activities. If I had to plan them all, it would get tiring, but if they were all the second option, I would get bored. Planning for these classes is a bit different than lesson planning back home because I only see each class once every 2 weeks. This makes it hard to build on what they know and what they are currently studying. The other teachers wanted it this way to give the students a "break" from the normal English class to keep the subject fun and exciting for the kids (and to give themselves a "break" by telling me "consider this your hour with the students...")

Random Photo #3- This is from the Auxiliar pot luck I mentioned a while back.

The teachers- They are so friendly and welcoming! And it is not only the English instructors. Basically anyone I end up beside in the teachers lounge or computer room will start up a conversation with me (one-on-one Spanish is so much more enjoyable than the rapid-fire 10 person discussions in the teachers lounge at the CEIP (though I do love the teachers there too)). The teachers have offered to help me with even the littlest things such as forgetting my umbrella or not knowing where I should go the first time my cooperating teacher was absent sick.

Random Photo #4- Lagos, Portugal. 

My schedule- In the last post I mentioned how good it was, right? Well guess what, it got better! My second week at the IES, the instructor I work with on Thursdays told me she thought they made my schedule in a rush & it would be better for me if I could have Thurs-Fri off in a row. So she switched three classes to Tues & the fourth to Mon. This does mean I start school at 8:30 am Mon-Wed, but I have the rest of the week to sleep in.

Random Photo #5- Venice, Italy. I got to go here for our first long weekend at the end of October!
It was so beautiful, I will share more from that trip soon!

Yesterday morning went especially well! First period was with the 16 year olds and I was able to get everyone to participate. The activities I did were not my favorite, but my main goal was to get everyone involved & now I have a better idea of how to plan for their class in the future. Second period was with a group of 11 year olds. I was pretty excited about the activity I had planned & the cooperating teacher thought it sounded good too. I had them working in groups of 4 which can be risky when you don't know the students, but it turned out to be a success & the teacher even said she planned to do it with some of her other sections. Score! The rest of the day went pretty well too, but it was really the morning that stuck out & got me more excited about working at the IES (: