An Apple? For me?!

Well today I received my very first Teacher gift and as you may have guessed from the title of this post it was an apple!  No joke.  I actually got an apple.  Not gonna lie, I kinda thought that would be an American thing but I am thrilled nonetheless. :)  Today my classes were a dream.  Its Friday so I thought we'd have more relaxed classes so we did word searches and drew pictures and cut pictures of magazines.  It still drilled vocabulary, but the classroom was relaxed and happy and everyone was having fun!  And, since I've had several requests for pictures here are a few of one of my classes "packing a suitcase" (by cutting out pictures from magazines and gluing them onto a poster).

Last night I went out with the other teacher who works with me (we'll call her G) to a great little restaurant within walking distance of our hotel.  She ordered different things that she thought I should try and I was happy to let her since the menu was all in Thai.  It was delicious!  My favorite was a pork dish called "lab moo tot."  We also had a cucumber salad which was super spicy (for me) and what was supposed to be chicken and cashews (but there were no cashews).  Anyway, it was really fun hanging out and eating with someone and especially because she was able to teach me some Thai.  Unfortunately, G goes back to Bangkok every weekend because that's where she has an apartment with her boyfriend so this weekend I'm on my own!  But I'm looking forward to being able to explore the area a little more - maybe go outside my walking radius - and of course, to eating more delicious food!  

No Fear!

My second day of teaching done!  It went well, I think – though not quite as well as yesterday.  My first lesson was boring.  I knew it, the kids felt it, and I felt bad.  I’m definitely planning on making it up to them tomorrow with a fun game – especially because even though the lesson was boring, they were my best behaved class of the day.  My second class was good – the lesson for that class was a lot better and the kids seemed to really get into it.  We were talking about frogs.  Frogs are fun!   Also, the kids were begging me to show them a cartoon yesterday (it is the highlight of every class for them if they get to watch Tom and Jerry or equivalent), so I found a video with a song and a frog.  Please, enjoy it for yourselves! Note the parts where an animal is getting thrown, squished, whacked, or in some other way “harmed” and imagine a classroom full of 7 year olds laughing hysterically.  They loved it.  And it’s really fun for me to watch and enjoy it with them.

My last class must have had candy in their previous class because they were little chatterboxes.  It was too bad because I had a really fun activity planned with cutting out magazines and stuff, plus a Donald Duck video (!), but we barely got to any of it.  It’s ok because I had planned to spend some time on it tomorrow too and it just means I have very little lesson planning to do for that class tomorrow.  Plus, even though the class wasn’t fun for me, once they got to the activity they seemed to really enjoy it and that’s what actually matters. 

But this has been all about teaching!  What about the other things going on in my life?  Well, currently I’m living in a hotel.  Hopefully tomorrow I’ll go out with my teacher assistant/assistant site coordinator to look at apartments.  Ideally it would be something near the school under 5000 baht per month (30 baht to 1 usd) but really I’d just like to be somewhere.  I’ve decided that hotel living is not for me – a little too restrictive in terms of what I can do with the space.  Also, my hotel room is covered in pictures of Manchester United players.  Don’t get me wrong, they’re attractive, it’s just not what I want to be living in for the next 6 months. 

Food, however, does not seem to be an issue any way you look at it.  Every night is a new adventure in trying the prepared food at either the night market or just across the street.  So far, everything has been yummy – even if I have very little idea what is in it or what it’s called.  For example, the other night it was raining, so me and two of the teachers I’ve been working with just went across the street and had this egg thing.  It looked like a latke but it was made with eggs and it had some other stuff in it too.  That is where it got mysterious.  I think there might have been bugs.  I’m not sure though.  I didn’t really like that part so I kind of picked around them as best I could.  It’s all part of the experience though and so far I’m really loving it.  I could go on and on about the food but I’ll stop and leave it for another post.  As my students say “Bye! Bye! Bye! Bye! Tomorrow!”      

Teacher! Teacher!

First Day of Teaching!  Ahhh!  I can’t believe that only a week ago I was on a plane to Bangkok and today I am “Teacher!”  I had three classes today, Grades 3, 4, and 5.  Everything went OK.  My grade 4 class was a dream, especially considering how they acted yesterday when I was visiting the classroom.  Yesterday they were very rowdy and wouldn’t quiet down for anything, however, today they listened and were very attentive to me and to the lesson.  It felt really good and it gave me a lot of confidence going into my next class, the third graders.  Unfortunately, the third graders were not behaving – they absolutely refused to stop talking.  I was successful in getting through the lesson but it definitely left me a little more frazzled.  I have a plan though... I think in all my classes they need more structure in terms of discipline.  The teacher who has been here for the last month doesn’t seem to have any sort of reward or consequence system in the classroom and I’m just not sure that’s effective.  The other teacher who works with me has a sticker system that she says works really well so I’m going to try that.  Especially because it involves their pictures and I think that will really help me to learn their names!  Speaking of their names... All of my students have “nicknames” given to them by their parents because their full names are so dang long and complicated (or at l east I think so) and these nicknames are sometimes hilarious.   Words like “star” “dream” “cartoon” “pingping” “bom””atom”... You get the picture.  Suprisingly, it does not make their names easier to remember.

Anyway, I’m going to try and do short blog posts so that I’m doing one every weekday.  I know, you laugh, but watch me!  Toodles for now!

Unfinished Post from the Airplane

Well, I have arrived in Hong Kong and am waiting for my flight to Bangkok.  The flight was very pleasant – I was sitting in a window seat and there was no one in the middle seat next to me, the food was surprisingly tasty, the flight attendants were very attentive and brought water every 30-45 minutes, and I was able to watch 4 movies!  I also slept a little ;)  Other than that, I guess I don’t have much to write about so far! 

Some of you (if there are any of you out there – we’ll just pretend, shall we) may be wondering why I am going to Thailand?!  I am going in popular fashion to teach English!  I’ll be living in a town called Chaiyaphum which is about 200 miles north of Bangkok. 

This post is unfinished but in an attempt to keep things moving I am moving on... Maybe I’ll edit it later.  Maybe not.  Your guess is as good as mine!