a watched radish never sprouts
and despite ALL the freaking out (and some quantity of late-night cheese and Honey Nut Cheerios -- let it never be said i am a normal creature), I had a really good lesson today.
I like this class! The English-learning class, in this context. Chris liked my handout (which I was really worried would have too many questions and at the same time have language too easy), and so did the students (which is really the better reward).
Tomorrow I don't have to teach, but I'm going to do some lesson planning tonight anyway so it's not all on my shoulders tomorrow night. I get to introduce sports vocab. From what Chris said I have to do, I'm probably too confident. Not to mention, I get to pimp rowing to learners (which never happens in any language).
Today I had the pleasure of drilling them (I say it, they repeat it) in pronunciation because they asked about "metal detector" and "astronaut" and "alien" and UFO ("oofoh," they called it, no matter where they were from). Chris warned against having to break words into syllables because as native speakers, sometimes we don't know where the breaks are. But all that talk, plus the learning this morning, was just dumbed-down versions of the ling I've had for four years. I'm not dissing CELTA; they have enough of a time cramming enough ling PLUS teacher training into a semester's worth of tutelage, which is then crammed into a month of class time. It's hard to even pick the adjective for how today's class time felt when I knew three times more relevant information than these people are going to learn. I don't want to say refreshing, I don't want to say that I felt too smart, I certainly didn't feel like I was descending to anyone or thing. I hope I didn't come off as a smartass.
In fact, the same went for the Japanese lesson yesterday. Giles, who is fluent, immersed us in Japanese for the first hour of class so we could feel how our learners might (except we did still all have L1 in common, and I explained some lingy things to Cheryl in said L1). We emerged able to form "[this/that] is/is [this/that] your/my/a pen/book/cell phone/bag/tea/wallet/keys (?)", "I don't know," yes and no, and teacher. Glad I still have my quick language skills, and intrigued to find how well they worked in an immersion situation. I should ship out to the Gaeltacht for a month. I might emerge as good in Irish as I am in Italian.
omg. I thought that with another day's separation I could really deal with not having talked to cairo boy in a few days -- and not extensively since Saturday. Y'know, all that about how time separation would make me think less about him and more about what's pertinent to life? But this evening I'm doing nothing but missing him. letting him make the next move, of course -- but once he does, I've got to ask about visiting him. The longer I wait, the more my plane ticket will cost. I shouldn't expect much until the weekend, I think, because his family's all in for his brother's HS graduation, which happens on Friday. I'm sure he's crazy busy taking around his grandpa and generally making preparations for some huge grad party (though if I'm lucky, they covered both kids at once last weekend). Then Sunday is Father's Day.
but soon after that, he goes off to Canada for the end of June and most of July. so we need to get talking. I miss him tons and I hope that, at the least, I can reciprocate his visit to me with one to him, and most hopingly for more than four days.
I also looked into apartments in Dublin tonight. Most of the ones I found ask about E1000 per person, though that may have just been the price range of that site. Also, the Trinity accommodation site said that one can't reserve them in advance, and will offer accommodation on campus any two weeks in September so we can get ourselves housing.
I don't know what to do about that. I'd so much rather not wait until I get there, but it may be my only option if I'm not in campus housing, by choice or rejection.
this was such an upbeat post.... I think I got overwhelmed by the housing search. I'm gonna need some big loan. Alli, wanna lend me maybe $25k?
anyway, last night I dreamed about skiing. It was a cold day, but all I needed was my JL top and ski pants. We were going down "Science Hill" at full speed. Zach was there, and a couple of friends. Maybe the wife.
p.s. the rockies KILLED THE SOX thxvrymuch. This is not solely an I-like-the-Rox-better thing as much as it is a we're-totally-the-underdog-in-this-series thing.
GO!
ROCKIES!!
I like this class! The English-learning class, in this context. Chris liked my handout (which I was really worried would have too many questions and at the same time have language too easy), and so did the students (which is really the better reward).
Tomorrow I don't have to teach, but I'm going to do some lesson planning tonight anyway so it's not all on my shoulders tomorrow night. I get to introduce sports vocab. From what Chris said I have to do, I'm probably too confident. Not to mention, I get to pimp rowing to learners (which never happens in any language).
Today I had the pleasure of drilling them (I say it, they repeat it) in pronunciation because they asked about "metal detector" and "astronaut" and "alien" and UFO ("oofoh," they called it, no matter where they were from). Chris warned against having to break words into syllables because as native speakers, sometimes we don't know where the breaks are. But all that talk, plus the learning this morning, was just dumbed-down versions of the ling I've had for four years. I'm not dissing CELTA; they have enough of a time cramming enough ling PLUS teacher training into a semester's worth of tutelage, which is then crammed into a month of class time. It's hard to even pick the adjective for how today's class time felt when I knew three times more relevant information than these people are going to learn. I don't want to say refreshing, I don't want to say that I felt too smart, I certainly didn't feel like I was descending to anyone or thing. I hope I didn't come off as a smartass.
In fact, the same went for the Japanese lesson yesterday. Giles, who is fluent, immersed us in Japanese for the first hour of class so we could feel how our learners might (except we did still all have L1 in common, and I explained some lingy things to Cheryl in said L1). We emerged able to form "[this/that] is/is [this/that] your/my/a pen/book/cell phone/bag/tea/wallet/keys (?)", "I don't know," yes and no, and teacher. Glad I still have my quick language skills, and intrigued to find how well they worked in an immersion situation. I should ship out to the Gaeltacht for a month. I might emerge as good in Irish as I am in Italian.
omg. I thought that with another day's separation I could really deal with not having talked to cairo boy in a few days -- and not extensively since Saturday. Y'know, all that about how time separation would make me think less about him and more about what's pertinent to life? But this evening I'm doing nothing but missing him. letting him make the next move, of course -- but once he does, I've got to ask about visiting him. The longer I wait, the more my plane ticket will cost. I shouldn't expect much until the weekend, I think, because his family's all in for his brother's HS graduation, which happens on Friday. I'm sure he's crazy busy taking around his grandpa and generally making preparations for some huge grad party (though if I'm lucky, they covered both kids at once last weekend). Then Sunday is Father's Day.
but soon after that, he goes off to Canada for the end of June and most of July. so we need to get talking. I miss him tons and I hope that, at the least, I can reciprocate his visit to me with one to him, and most hopingly for more than four days.
I also looked into apartments in Dublin tonight. Most of the ones I found ask about E1000 per person, though that may have just been the price range of that site. Also, the Trinity accommodation site said that one can't reserve them in advance, and will offer accommodation on campus any two weeks in September so we can get ourselves housing.
I don't know what to do about that. I'd so much rather not wait until I get there, but it may be my only option if I'm not in campus housing, by choice or rejection.
this was such an upbeat post.... I think I got overwhelmed by the housing search. I'm gonna need some big loan. Alli, wanna lend me maybe $25k?
anyway, last night I dreamed about skiing. It was a cold day, but all I needed was my JL top and ski pants. We were going down "Science Hill" at full speed. Zach was there, and a couple of friends. Maybe the wife.
p.s. the rockies KILLED THE SOX thxvrymuch. This is not solely an I-like-the-Rox-better thing as much as it is a we're-totally-the-underdog-in-this-series thing.
GO!
ROCKIES!!