It's strange to think I've already been in Beijing for a week (well, technically just over if you count the couple of days we all spent at the Open University before we all got shipped out to our placements) - I really don't know where the time has gone!!
The first half of this week was spent observing the other English teachers at our kindergarten, to see how we should construct our own lessons. On Tuesday, me and Drew (the guy I'm living with and who is at the same school as me) taught a lesson together, and on Wednesday I taught a lesson by myself for the first time!! Not gonna lie, it was chaos....here's a mental note to all other TEFL teachers out there - do not attempt to teach a class of 30 6 year olds the game 'fruit salad'...it will not end well...
Me and Drew started teaching properly on Thursday with our own classes, that we will be teaching from now on. However, one of my classes had to be stopped until next week - the students in my class are 2 years old and have just started kindergarten - we went in to meet them on Tuesday, but as soon as they saw us, half of them burst into tears and started screaming, and the other half just gaped at when I said 'hello'....the next few weeks are going to be interesting! Luckily, the other class I'm teaching, I will be teaching with Drew, and as they're a bit older, they should be easier to manage!
The school is nice, and now that the students are getting used to seeing us everyday, they're becoming friendlier and even shouting 'hello' to us in the corridors. The only slightly frustrating thing I find is that only one out of all the Chinese teachers at the school speaks a little English...so whenever we try to introduce the kids to a new activity, we either need our English contact (Rita) there with us, or we need to type the instructions into a translator so the assistants can understand what we are saying and can tell the students what to do. Ah well, hopefully by the end of the five months, the kids will understand enough English to know what we are saying!
I'm a bit annoyed at myself this weekend - I was supposed to going to see the Summer Palace yesterday with James, and meeting up with Holly after she finished work in the evening - but all week I've come down with a horrible cold, which meant I've been stuck inside the flat all weekend! Feeling a bit better today, so hopefully I'll be feeling well enough to get out and explore a bit more of Beijing next week instead - I guess there's no rush - I am here for five months after all!
Now that we have wifi in the flat, I'll hopefully be able to upload some photos of my time in China so far to Facebook :) - watch this space!
Until next time, zaijian!
x
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