Back to Work

The day we flew out to Madrid I had an interview at a language school here in Cambridge. It was nice leaving England knowing that I had a months work lined up for July. The school runs throughout the summer. I kind of figured if I got stuck into the job there might be a chance to get work in August too.

Just finished my second week of work. The other staff working on the Juniors course are fun. We have kids aged 14 to 16. Theoretically the maximum class size is 12. This is great when it is report writing time. In my morning class I ended up with 10 students - 7 from Spain, 1 Mexican who lives in Italy, 2 more Italians and a Russian. We have had a good time in the last week debating which is the best country in the world, NZ of course!

In my second class I only had 8 students - 2 Italians, 4 Spanish, 1 Turkish and 1 Danish. Classes with them involved project work and preparing for a drama afternoon. They chose to write a drama based on an old Spanish story - The Celestina which translates to the Procuress. Or after a revision or two an evil cupid who tries to make as much money as possible with little regard to the outcome of the relationships she helps to set up. The script was written by the students with very little help from me. With 9 scenes I was impressed with their ability to memorise all the lines with only a couple of days rehearsal. We were awarded a prize for the best drama and the best actress! This was fitting as the actress was the key author of the story.

Some students have gone home this weekend and new ones will arrive tomorrow. With any luck my new classes will be the same kind of level as the previous ones. In the intermediate to upper intermediate range. This means they can usually understand the instructions you give them in class pretty well. Not sure how I would cope with the Elementary level students. I have had an observation in the last week which went well. It was kind of nice that before the observation I was offered work for August too! It took the pressure off a bit.

A big part of the job is the social programme. Each afternoon there are two activities and the same in the evening. On Saturday's there are day trips, usually to London or Oxford. Sunday afternoons there are also activities. As with teaching in NZ, I have enjoyed my involvement in these activities outside the classroom. Even in London last weekend when the Tour de France started! There were thousands of people. It was inevitable that people would get lost and they did. Eventually we rounded everyone up before lunch. It is not easy when the roads are shut off. What we would do without cellphones, I don't know.

Things are busy here at the internet cafe so time to go.