Decisions, decisions...
Okay, so I know my last post started with me being shocked it had been two months, but...has it really been a whole month already? Ha, at least this time it kinda feels like it.
I switched schools...wow, two weeks ago. I'm up at the high school now, teaching a bunch of unruly inner city kids French. My French 2, 3, and 4 classes really aren't so bad, but my French 1 class, with all my freshmen? Hell on wheels, let me tell you. Thank God I only have them every other day. (yay for block scheduling!) I mean, they're good kids and all, but they have absolutely zero respect for the classroom or each other. It'll be interesting, let me tell you...
I'm also starting a massive project/simulation with my two sections of French 2. The teacher I inherited them from warned me that they were "very unmotivated" and "tired of French", so I decided to throw the book out the window. Never did like those things much...anyway, so we're taking a "trip" to France sometime next week. I bought these (obviously fake) toy passports for everyone, and they're going to get a certain budget from my stash of Monopoly money. When they come (maybe on Wednesday, I'm still very much up in the air about the timing of this whole thing), they're going to have to buy a plane ticket from me (in French, of course), find their seats in this (admittedly horribly fake) airplane setup I'm creating, and we'll do airport vocab, all that kind of good stuff. The next day we'll probably be in "Paris" and I'll have to have all kinds of crazy stuff set up around the room for the kids to explore...it's going to be huge, very labor-intensive, and there's a good chance that my kids will be too busy showing each other how "tough" they are to admit that they're having fun with it, but whatever. If you want people falling all over themselves to tell you how awesome you are, don't become a teacher! The key is to always smile, make them do it anyway, and know that in all truth, you have done something for them, even if they don't realize/admit it yet.
As for the rest of life...*sigh* Lots of angst and wavering back and forth, as usual. I'm in an...interesting place with my Frenchman. How is it possible that things are going fabulously and not so well at the same time? Just have to keep the faith that everything will work out for the best in the end...
I have a feeling I'm going to end up in Korea instead of Brussels. (Did I write about that here? Now I can't remember.) I was looking at going to grad school in Brussels but I don't think I'm going to qualify for the visa I need yet. So as much as I love Brussels (and I really, truly do), I think I'm going to have to detour through Korea for a few years first. That's cool with me in the end (no, really) because I want to go to both places...does it really matter what order I go in? And if it'll keep the legalities of all this simpler, well, that's all the more reason I need!
I'm making tagine for dinner. It takes forever and a year to make, but it's soooooo good...unfortunately, my hand slipped when I was putting it all together and now there's like four times more vanilla than I needed in this pan. Hopefully it will still be decent!
I switched schools...wow, two weeks ago. I'm up at the high school now, teaching a bunch of unruly inner city kids French. My French 2, 3, and 4 classes really aren't so bad, but my French 1 class, with all my freshmen? Hell on wheels, let me tell you. Thank God I only have them every other day. (yay for block scheduling!) I mean, they're good kids and all, but they have absolutely zero respect for the classroom or each other. It'll be interesting, let me tell you...
I'm also starting a massive project/simulation with my two sections of French 2. The teacher I inherited them from warned me that they were "very unmotivated" and "tired of French", so I decided to throw the book out the window. Never did like those things much...anyway, so we're taking a "trip" to France sometime next week. I bought these (obviously fake) toy passports for everyone, and they're going to get a certain budget from my stash of Monopoly money. When they come (maybe on Wednesday, I'm still very much up in the air about the timing of this whole thing), they're going to have to buy a plane ticket from me (in French, of course), find their seats in this (admittedly horribly fake) airplane setup I'm creating, and we'll do airport vocab, all that kind of good stuff. The next day we'll probably be in "Paris" and I'll have to have all kinds of crazy stuff set up around the room for the kids to explore...it's going to be huge, very labor-intensive, and there's a good chance that my kids will be too busy showing each other how "tough" they are to admit that they're having fun with it, but whatever. If you want people falling all over themselves to tell you how awesome you are, don't become a teacher! The key is to always smile, make them do it anyway, and know that in all truth, you have done something for them, even if they don't realize/admit it yet.
As for the rest of life...*sigh* Lots of angst and wavering back and forth, as usual. I'm in an...interesting place with my Frenchman. How is it possible that things are going fabulously and not so well at the same time? Just have to keep the faith that everything will work out for the best in the end...
I have a feeling I'm going to end up in Korea instead of Brussels. (Did I write about that here? Now I can't remember.) I was looking at going to grad school in Brussels but I don't think I'm going to qualify for the visa I need yet. So as much as I love Brussels (and I really, truly do), I think I'm going to have to detour through Korea for a few years first. That's cool with me in the end (no, really) because I want to go to both places...does it really matter what order I go in? And if it'll keep the legalities of all this simpler, well, that's all the more reason I need!
I'm making tagine for dinner. It takes forever and a year to make, but it's soooooo good...unfortunately, my hand slipped when I was putting it all together and now there's like four times more vanilla than I needed in this pan. Hopefully it will still be decent!