Done being Miss Lindy LOL
Well, week 2 is done. The low point was probably when I realized how much more fun it is to be on activities than ESL. The teaching part... was stressful, and took crazy amounts of time to plan, and ended up with very little sleep for me. We're working on a system where you're either one or the other (activities or ESL). And the activities people plan and lead pretty much the entire day that happens after 10:45 am. The ESL people teach 2 lessons in the morning, and then theoretically have the rest of the day off.
But how it actually happens, the activities people need one or two extra people to help out with this or that activity to make things run smoothly and so our counselor/kid ratio is right. Which I understand. And which I had fun with once this week -- I was drafted to help Magma teach baseball, and it was a lot of fun. Even figured out that my pitching skills are not-quite-nonexistent! But on Thursday I was in charge of rotating the kids for this tournament they had set up, which was way too complicated and ended pretty hideously... 5 stations, with all of the activities counselors getting their own station. 8 min to explain and play their game -- rotation time included. So Leo, with basketball, was outside the walls of the chateau, and I took kids to him, and took his last group to either Hoola (who is wonderful and didn't complain about having a minute and a half to teach and play volleyball) or to Gorgeous (who yelled at me that I needed to make the kids - who were dog-tired and didn't even want to be walking anymore - run). I hated it.
Magma was new for this week; he's been doing AmVil for something like 5 yrs, is french with really good english, and... looks very pretty in drag. So our skits this week all had some little bit where Magma showed up in drag as "Georgette". It was hysterical -- blonde wig, stuffed bra, leopard-print skin-tight velvet-y shirt, and a snake-print tight velvet-y short skirt. And heels. His voice jumps about 2 octaves, and the kids listen SO well. (I got to marry him to Gorgeous using the Princess Bride Priest voice :D)
So what I've learned from AmVil is that if you want people to pay attention, put a boy in drag.
I'm not sure if that's commendable or not.
As far as my lessons went this week... I had 3 troublemakers in my class who all sat next to each other. The angel-children are definitely the ones who you have to look out for... Matthew, and Sean, and David. They listened and worked well about half the time and the other half I wanted to pull my hair out. David was also part of my family - cute kid, but going and going and going. Got to the point where he was hitting people during the dance competition and Otis pulled him out and pretty much sat on him to get him to chill out. And they were pretty good at getting Steven to go along with their antics. So crazy: 4, sane: 8.
Because the rest of my class was precious - I had Elvis and Jim, who were on the good-kid spectrum and made me have faith in the humanity of french boys. Elvis legitimately looks like Elvis; Jim was the quiet kid who always had the right answer. And then the girls. I may be partial (actually, scratch that, I am partial) but I have so much more ease handling girls who talk during class than boys - because they tend to pay attention as well as talk, at least some of the time. My biggest problem was actually getting them to talk - Melinda and Isabella were so quiet, all the time. Britney and Victoria tended to have all the answers - Britney because she carted around a Fr/Eng dictionary and used it because there was no tomorrow; Victoria because the answers were actually in her head. They (and Jim) were probably the reasons that the rest of the class knew what was going on. And then there were my sweethearts: Angel and Yada. First off: amazing names. Second off: Angel looked like a little (prettier) me and worked so hard to try to figure things out. Yada just had a great sense of humor - not necessarily one of those things that translates across languages, but it was there in the hand motions and the smiles.
As far as the lessons themselves went: we hammered body parts, and I taught them the hokey pokey, which amused me to no end. We talked about directions, and where they "lived" (because their assigned rooms are US states and their beds are major cities) and up, down, left, right, NSEW. Musical genres (Allison's #1 least favorite thing ever!) and different musical time periods. It all worked. I just want to be able to do these lessons again at some point and really be able to figure out exactly what they need.
And the Boom was funny - we had a couple of kids who actually got into the slow dances (and there was at least one kiss stolen at the end of them) and other kids who wouldn't touch them with a 10 ft pole. I've realized that I'm going to come back to the US with an unhealthy knowledge of popular music and the habit of dancing like a French kid. Lots of bouncing. *facepalm* Magma and Leo were hiding outside; convinced both of them to come in and dance with me for at least a bit. "Georgette" showed up for the song "Sexy Chick" and a few more. I got to dance a couple of fast dances with Matthew - kept running into me - and got a slow dance with Ian, which amused me to no end.
Table conversation was interesting all week. They tried to teach me some french while I attempted to teach them english. They understood enough english to have a basic conversation, which was really nice. The teachers sat at the next table over, and evidently told Queen (who was the other LOL "parent" this week) that the kids were here to learn English and that there was no reason that they should be teaching me French. Made me sad.
The teachers loved us, though. They bought us these chocolate filled pastries the last breakfast, and made the tables look gorgeous - white tablecloths, flowers, flower petals and pinecones strewn between the pitchers and baskets of food. The kitchen staff joined us and the teachers for breakfast; it was pretty much the sweetest thing ever.
The LOL boys all sat with me; the girls sat with Queen. So I got to be the mediator between boy-scuffles - and truthfully, it was so much fun. The last lunch got out of hand -- David, sitting next to me, decided that he and Steven were going to keep their hats on. Except that that's impolite. So I ended up stealing their hats and sitting on them. Which was effective (I quote, from a 12-yr-old french boy who I've TOLD that this is the impolite term, that "You has a fat ass") in that they could not get their hats back, but also ended up with them turning getting their hats back into a theme for lunch. Thus ripping my nametag off of my neck, breaking the lanyard, and trying to trade the nametag for their hats; trying to dig their hats out with silverware; and trying to shove me off of my chair. So I ended up with David in a headlock; he then began to saw at my arm with a knife (ineffective, but if it had cut, I was going to be so ticked off) and then use his teeth. At which point the rest of his English profanity came out.
His teacher gave him SUCH a talking to.
And then this weekend - after the kids left on Saturday - was saying goodbye to Marley and Leo and Grandpa. I walked into Aze with Marley yesterday (she had used my credit card to buy her plane ticket home because they wouldn't take hers for some reason; got money to pay me back) and to the Cave d'Aze (pronounced cav) because she wanted to take wine with her. So, yeah, I went to the winery. Evidently there's some really good apricot syrup that flavors champagne? I dunno.
We threw a counselor boom, during the wedding afterparty (the bride had tried to intimidate Queen into getting us to disappear for the weekend. Queen decided this was unacceptable) and danced around in backstage clothes. Twas fun - Otis and Queen pretty much only dancing with each other (bummer; I like to dance with Otis), Leo disappearing every so often to go to bed and being dragged back by Bon Jovi music, Gorgeous and Hoola hitting on a random french guy from the wedding party to get him to give them a cigarette, Grandpa and I kind of dancing on our own. The high point of the evening was probably getting to dj for a moment and realizing that I could put on Backstreet Boys - doing so and watching everyone enjoy it.
Got up this morning to see Leo and Marley off. I'm going to miss them - a lot of fun, to chat with and to dance with, and good people to go to whenever I have questions. I also find it amusing that Leo called me Angel. /easily amused.
Went back to bed til 2, then went on a run (what?! I don't know either) with Queen and Otis. We were going to go up to see the rally cars race, and Otis and Ace (our new guy, reminds me a bit of Dave, back home? But Ace doesn't seem to want to hang out with us, which is a pity) had gone up earlier and seen a good spot. But we got there too late and it would have been a bummer - except that the view was spectacular. So we ran downhill to Ige (ge like genre), meeting stinging nettle, angry dogs, and a sprinkling of rain on our way, and wandered around Ige and then walked back to the chateau (finding ripe cherries on trees that... may have been someone's. but they were delicious) and played badmiton in order to tick off bridezilla (and because it's fun) for the rest of the afternoon.
We get 20 15-17 yr-old boys tomorrow. (Granted, we had 49 12-yr-olds this week, but still.) Eep.
But how it actually happens, the activities people need one or two extra people to help out with this or that activity to make things run smoothly and so our counselor/kid ratio is right. Which I understand. And which I had fun with once this week -- I was drafted to help Magma teach baseball, and it was a lot of fun. Even figured out that my pitching skills are not-quite-nonexistent! But on Thursday I was in charge of rotating the kids for this tournament they had set up, which was way too complicated and ended pretty hideously... 5 stations, with all of the activities counselors getting their own station. 8 min to explain and play their game -- rotation time included. So Leo, with basketball, was outside the walls of the chateau, and I took kids to him, and took his last group to either Hoola (who is wonderful and didn't complain about having a minute and a half to teach and play volleyball) or to Gorgeous (who yelled at me that I needed to make the kids - who were dog-tired and didn't even want to be walking anymore - run). I hated it.
Magma was new for this week; he's been doing AmVil for something like 5 yrs, is french with really good english, and... looks very pretty in drag. So our skits this week all had some little bit where Magma showed up in drag as "Georgette". It was hysterical -- blonde wig, stuffed bra, leopard-print skin-tight velvet-y shirt, and a snake-print tight velvet-y short skirt. And heels. His voice jumps about 2 octaves, and the kids listen SO well. (I got to marry him to Gorgeous using the Princess Bride Priest voice :D)
So what I've learned from AmVil is that if you want people to pay attention, put a boy in drag.
I'm not sure if that's commendable or not.
As far as my lessons went this week... I had 3 troublemakers in my class who all sat next to each other. The angel-children are definitely the ones who you have to look out for... Matthew, and Sean, and David. They listened and worked well about half the time and the other half I wanted to pull my hair out. David was also part of my family - cute kid, but going and going and going. Got to the point where he was hitting people during the dance competition and Otis pulled him out and pretty much sat on him to get him to chill out. And they were pretty good at getting Steven to go along with their antics. So crazy: 4, sane: 8.
Because the rest of my class was precious - I had Elvis and Jim, who were on the good-kid spectrum and made me have faith in the humanity of french boys. Elvis legitimately looks like Elvis; Jim was the quiet kid who always had the right answer. And then the girls. I may be partial (actually, scratch that, I am partial) but I have so much more ease handling girls who talk during class than boys - because they tend to pay attention as well as talk, at least some of the time. My biggest problem was actually getting them to talk - Melinda and Isabella were so quiet, all the time. Britney and Victoria tended to have all the answers - Britney because she carted around a Fr/Eng dictionary and used it because there was no tomorrow; Victoria because the answers were actually in her head. They (and Jim) were probably the reasons that the rest of the class knew what was going on. And then there were my sweethearts: Angel and Yada. First off: amazing names. Second off: Angel looked like a little (prettier) me and worked so hard to try to figure things out. Yada just had a great sense of humor - not necessarily one of those things that translates across languages, but it was there in the hand motions and the smiles.
As far as the lessons themselves went: we hammered body parts, and I taught them the hokey pokey, which amused me to no end. We talked about directions, and where they "lived" (because their assigned rooms are US states and their beds are major cities) and up, down, left, right, NSEW. Musical genres (Allison's #1 least favorite thing ever!) and different musical time periods. It all worked. I just want to be able to do these lessons again at some point and really be able to figure out exactly what they need.
And the Boom was funny - we had a couple of kids who actually got into the slow dances (and there was at least one kiss stolen at the end of them) and other kids who wouldn't touch them with a 10 ft pole. I've realized that I'm going to come back to the US with an unhealthy knowledge of popular music and the habit of dancing like a French kid. Lots of bouncing. *facepalm* Magma and Leo were hiding outside; convinced both of them to come in and dance with me for at least a bit. "Georgette" showed up for the song "Sexy Chick" and a few more. I got to dance a couple of fast dances with Matthew - kept running into me - and got a slow dance with Ian, which amused me to no end.
Table conversation was interesting all week. They tried to teach me some french while I attempted to teach them english. They understood enough english to have a basic conversation, which was really nice. The teachers sat at the next table over, and evidently told Queen (who was the other LOL "parent" this week) that the kids were here to learn English and that there was no reason that they should be teaching me French. Made me sad.
The teachers loved us, though. They bought us these chocolate filled pastries the last breakfast, and made the tables look gorgeous - white tablecloths, flowers, flower petals and pinecones strewn between the pitchers and baskets of food. The kitchen staff joined us and the teachers for breakfast; it was pretty much the sweetest thing ever.
The LOL boys all sat with me; the girls sat with Queen. So I got to be the mediator between boy-scuffles - and truthfully, it was so much fun. The last lunch got out of hand -- David, sitting next to me, decided that he and Steven were going to keep their hats on. Except that that's impolite. So I ended up stealing their hats and sitting on them. Which was effective (I quote, from a 12-yr-old french boy who I've TOLD that this is the impolite term, that "You has a fat ass") in that they could not get their hats back, but also ended up with them turning getting their hats back into a theme for lunch. Thus ripping my nametag off of my neck, breaking the lanyard, and trying to trade the nametag for their hats; trying to dig their hats out with silverware; and trying to shove me off of my chair. So I ended up with David in a headlock; he then began to saw at my arm with a knife (ineffective, but if it had cut, I was going to be so ticked off) and then use his teeth. At which point the rest of his English profanity came out.
His teacher gave him SUCH a talking to.
And then this weekend - after the kids left on Saturday - was saying goodbye to Marley and Leo and Grandpa. I walked into Aze with Marley yesterday (she had used my credit card to buy her plane ticket home because they wouldn't take hers for some reason; got money to pay me back) and to the Cave d'Aze (pronounced cav) because she wanted to take wine with her. So, yeah, I went to the winery. Evidently there's some really good apricot syrup that flavors champagne? I dunno.
We threw a counselor boom, during the wedding afterparty (the bride had tried to intimidate Queen into getting us to disappear for the weekend. Queen decided this was unacceptable) and danced around in backstage clothes. Twas fun - Otis and Queen pretty much only dancing with each other (bummer; I like to dance with Otis), Leo disappearing every so often to go to bed and being dragged back by Bon Jovi music, Gorgeous and Hoola hitting on a random french guy from the wedding party to get him to give them a cigarette, Grandpa and I kind of dancing on our own. The high point of the evening was probably getting to dj for a moment and realizing that I could put on Backstreet Boys - doing so and watching everyone enjoy it.
Got up this morning to see Leo and Marley off. I'm going to miss them - a lot of fun, to chat with and to dance with, and good people to go to whenever I have questions. I also find it amusing that Leo called me Angel. /easily amused.
Went back to bed til 2, then went on a run (what?! I don't know either) with Queen and Otis. We were going to go up to see the rally cars race, and Otis and Ace (our new guy, reminds me a bit of Dave, back home? But Ace doesn't seem to want to hang out with us, which is a pity) had gone up earlier and seen a good spot. But we got there too late and it would have been a bummer - except that the view was spectacular. So we ran downhill to Ige (ge like genre), meeting stinging nettle, angry dogs, and a sprinkling of rain on our way, and wandered around Ige and then walked back to the chateau (finding ripe cherries on trees that... may have been someone's. but they were delicious) and played badmiton in order to tick off bridezilla (and because it's fun) for the rest of the afternoon.
We get 20 15-17 yr-old boys tomorrow. (Granted, we had 49 12-yr-olds this week, but still.) Eep.