walk to school
The second class was CE2 who are much younger and who just practiced asking my name and where I come from. They had to draw me and write my name with a speech bubble coming out of my mouth, saying I come from England. One of the things the students have a lot of trouble with is the distinction between 'England' and 'English'. A lot of speech bubbles said 'I come from English.' One boy said to me, 'My name is.... and I come from Spanish,' and I had just opened my mouth to correct him when the teacher said, 'very good! Well done!' It is very hard to correct the teachers English in front of the class so I let it go.
Another thing they struggle to grasp is the difference between America and England. Time and time again when I asked about their ideas of English stereotypes, hands would shoot up and they'd say 'baseball!', 'hamburgers!' and when I said I came from York they said collectively, 'aaahh! New York!'. I am considering it my personal duty to iron out their Americanisms and teach them about real English culture.
sun at lunchtime
My afternoon lessons went moderately well except for one class who were so loud and badly behaved, I had no authority over them whatsoever. They were more interested in drawing union jacks on their whiteboards than learning about English stereotypes. One of the girls, who had given me a huge hug when she saw me- I had been touched- paid absolutely no attention to anything I said, and never looked in my direction once during the lesson so goodness knows what runs through her head! Frustratingly the teacher never stepped in, so its more or less impossible to enforce any rules or respect from them- I'll have to work on that.
There is a lot of bad communication within this assistantship programme that has made it hard work. Before I started, I was told, I was not a teacher and I was not to take classes. I was there to assist and take small groups of children. I have tried to explain this to teachers but time after time they expect me to stand in front of the class and take the whole class while they sit at the back and do marking etc. Because the students struggle to understand me and I struggle to understand them it makes it very difficult to establish a good relationship between us.
first signs of autumn in Apt
My final class was CM1 and in there, the teacher made the world of difference. He started the class by explaining in french I was here for half an hour to do English and we would be looking at instructions. He asked the children to think of the connotations of the word 'instructions' to encourage them to work out what it meant in french- 'conseignes', and then let me do my part. Immediately it was so much easier because they were in perfect understanding of what was expected of them. If the noise level grew he silenced them with one word and he also spoke to me in English in front of the students which meant I could understand and they couldn't, and so I wasn't undermined at any point. It makes me think about teaching as a career choice when you see the teachers that really make the difference.
I was exhausted at the end of the day, but Becca and I had both finished so we went out for a dinner at a Crepe restaurant. Another interesting thing in Provence- it was Thursday night and we were the only people in the restaurant, and in the town when we left. Still, it was a delicious dinner and a very nice way to celebrate the two weeks of teaching done. Becca has been in Apt for a month now, and me three weeks and it was nice to sit and reflect on the time spent, (the money spent- not so nice) and what we'd learnt. It could seem like we don't do a lot here, but I think we were both feeling ready for a holiday!
coffee icecream, nutella, cream and speculoos crepe
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