This week was my first week teaching and it was an interesting experience. I spent Monday running between my different schools and calling people to try and figure our my time table as I hadn’t gotten it yet but once that was sorted I was good to go. I only work Tuesday to Friday from 8h30-12hoo which is grand. It’s nice to have Monday off so I can have a long weekend or if I plan any little trips I don’t have to be in school on Monday. Along with this it is great only working in the morning as I have my afternoons free to do other things.

So Tuesday I started and headed for my first school ready to get stuck in. Unfortunately they were not quite so ready for me so I spent the day researching Halloween  for my classes next week which was a nice way to spend the morning. Wednesday I headed for my next school and got a shock when the teacher asked me did I have anything to photocopy. I confidently said ‘no‘ and began thinking this should be interesting. So I was just given the class to teach by myself and I had zero material prepared. It was probably the longest hour of my life with kids expectantly waiting for me to teach them and then the teacher just sitting at the back watching everything I did. To say I winged it was an understatement. After the initial introductions were done I noticed a poster of the body out of the corner of my eye and thought lets go with that. After some games of Simon Says and some verses of ‘head,shoulders,knees and toes’ the class finally came to an end and I let out a sigh of relief. Next up I had the youngest in the school who I think were about 4/5 years old so that was a little easier just going over the basics of ‘my name is’ and then some counting. The rest of the day went by with me making things up on the spot , but I don’t think anyone really noticed. When I came home I saw that I would have to get something prepared for class the next day and this year was not going to be like I thought it was. Thursday and Friday were spent in my last school with me asking ‘What is your name?’ and ‘How old are you?’ about 200 times I would say. I used the classes to get to know the children and gauge their level of English. Again it was a little intimidating having the teacher just sitting down the back watching you but they were all really nice so sometimes you just have to get one with it, act the fool and exaggerate your pronunciation of everything.

This week really has been an eye opener into what this year will be like. It looks like I will just be given the classes to teach by myself so planning is going to be key. I can’t be winging it for 45 minute lessons. Also I have to try and figure out going from one class with the oldest in the school down to the youngest and trying to make my lessons fun. Just talking to a class of 25 is not easy because after 10 minutes they start to get bored or it’s always the same people who will answer the questions. Oh well, I’m sure I’ll learn as I go and until then I’m just thinking back to all those times I went to school with mam and how she acted. Along with this I now know  why my mam was always so tired after a day in school , I only teach for the morning and in the afternoons I am wrecked, so hats off teachers. With this after all my exaggerated pronunciation (which I’m sure looked hilarious) and talking so much this weekend I can feel the beginnings of a sore throat so I have spent it in bed taking preventive measures.

So that was the first week and it was interesting, I am certainly not a qualified teacher and don’t even know if the kids will remember anything I said but hey repetition is everything and if they can confidently say what their name is and how old they are by Christmas (hopefully) I’ll be happy.

Is it weird that although these kids are like more than 10 years younger than me I still feel too young to teach them? HAHA 🙂

Until next week.

Emma

xx