I honestly cannot believe that after tomorrow I only have 2 weeks left at Presentation Primary. I am in disbelief, but I am sure the sadness will kick in soon. My students know that my time is running out, so I am starting to collect handmade Christmas cards and other little things they are making me. One of the ones that I received today said I was the best teacher and she said that she wished that I didn't have to go. I was so touched to hear that from one of my students. I am glad that they also enjoyed the time I have spent teaching them.
This week, I started off with a rather hectic day. On Monday morning, I was headed into a classroom to teach a maths class, and I was summoned to the principal's office. I instantly wracked my brain trying to figure out what on earth that I could have done wrong. I came up with nothing. When I arrived at the office, the principal actually asked me to substitute teach for the day. About 5 or 6 of the school's teachers were sick and she wanted me to take over a 4th class. This is a class that I had never stepped into before. When I got there, I found out that I only knew one of the students. The other students knew that I was the American student teacher so they were excited. They also had seen some of the drawings and things that I did so they instantly asked if we could do art.
I could find no lesson plans or anything on the desk for me to follow. A student told me that they usually start with maths. I somehow weaseled the protocal out of the girls although they were reluctant to tell me that they begin each day with a quiz. We worked on the maths (fractions - ack!) and the girls were very good. After break, they normally have Irish and English. As I cannot teach Irish (for obvious reasons), I decided that we could do an art lesson. We no sooner had started it and passed out the materials, when a man showed up that I had never seen before and said it was time for a football (soccer) training. The girls didn't want to go as they had just started the project and apparently they thought they had been done with football.
After football we did English. They have so many books and workbooks for each subject in Ireland, it is difficult to keep track of everything you do. There is a stories book, a spelling book, a grammer book, a sounds book and a book about words just for English. We managed to get a good amount done before lunch. The afternoon consisted of them going to Ballyloughran for swimming that day, so I got to go on a little field trip, which was nice. Monday was definately a different experience that my normal days here.
The rest of the week has gone as usual. I have been busy in the evenings making signs, posters and other things for the teachers. I am glad that I can help out, however, I think I am going to have to buy new Sharpies when I get back!
My lessons have all been going very well. The students are very receptive and eager. The teachers really love my ideas which is good feedback. I had a little extra time with one of my junior infants classes this week, so I taught them a song (Down By the Bay) one day. None of them had heard it and they all wanted to sing it over and over so I decided to teach it to a few other classes too. The girls are now asking to sing all the time. In one of the classes, I have to wear a microphone because a child is nearly deaf, so that is a bit scary. Talking into the microphone is weird anyways as I realize how annoying my voice is, but then to sing! I should think that Shauna would be lucky not to be able to hear me!
Well, this post has gotten a bit long. I am going to head off to finalize plans for London tomorrow! Thanks for reading. See all you Americans in 18 days!
Thursday, November 29, 2007
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
Tuesday
Every Tuesday morning, I start the day with a half hour of Irish Dancing. This is always fun to watch and participate in a bit. I am certainly not going to come back an expert but I enjoy going with the girls. Here are a few pictures:
I have been working on writing a book with many of my classes. Both of the junior infants classes and the senior infants class wrote their own version of "The Magic Hat" by Mem Fox. I made the cover and they each drew and wrote a page. The junior infants were basically only able to write the name of an animal while the senior infants wrote a whole sentence. This is Ms. Regan's Jr. Infants Class with their book:
I have been working on writing a book with many of my classes. Both of the junior infants classes and the senior infants class wrote their own version of "The Magic Hat" by Mem Fox. I made the cover and they each drew and wrote a page. The junior infants were basically only able to write the name of an animal while the senior infants wrote a whole sentence. This is Ms. Regan's Jr. Infants Class with their book:
Monday, November 26, 2007
Thanksgiving in Ireland
This year, I was able to celebrate an American holiday abroad: Thanksgiving. I was unsure about how one would celebrate this holiday in a country other than in that of its birth. I was very well expecting to teach my students about it and have my first go at assembling something that I hoped would look and taste like pumpkin pie... but I had no idea that we would be invited for a full Thanksgiving feast! I also didn't know that my school would have the lounge decorated in American flags and have treats for all. I was touched to be able to share this holiday with so many others.
I successfully made a pumpkin pie although I very much feared that horrible things would happen to it. I don't even think that I have eaten pumpkin pie on more that 2 occasions in my life so I had no idea if I did it correctly. My first class students, however, absolutely loved the pie and were even very excited about the whipped cream I also brought. I wish I could have brought enough to make pie for all my classes, but I see 9 different teachers (although a few cater to the same students) throughout the week, so this might have been difficult to fit in my luggage. My lessons on Thanksgiving went very well. Information was shared, books were read, turkeys were drawn, thanks were given, and pie was consumed. All in all a very successful Irish Thanksgiving.
After school on Thursday, Maggie and I went to a local family's for dinner. They are also American and are here on a missionary trip. They have 3 daughters who were all wonderfully nice and we all celebrated together. They had made all of the Thanksgiving favourites! There was turkey (naturally), green bean casserole, yams, cranberries and rolls. It was delicious and friendly. We were even granted the great pleasure of watching the Packer game on Sky Sports as they ordered the channel for the night. The only way for it to have been more perfect was if we were able to catch the Macy's Parade. We did play Apples to Apples though, which I have sorely missed!
Thanksgiving was a great expereince, followed by a very relaxing (and, sadly, internet-less weekend) where I got many things accomplished. We spent a great deal of time with our host family as well, including attending their service on Sunday. They have their own church, which they have built so I was very interested to learn about another congregation.
I cannot believe there are less than 3 weeks left! So much teaching to do! So many places to see! I hope that I will share everything here with you!
Below are some pictures of my first class celebrating Thanksgiving:
More pumpkin pie enjoyment!
We made a chart talking about whether or not we all liked it and used it to talk of some mathematical concepts.
Drawing and cutting out all of those little pumpkins was a long but ultimately satisfying task!
This is rather unconnected with the theme of this post, but it is one more project that I worked on with my students. I also made the title that is placed in the centre, which took a great deal of time. Here 'tis:
I successfully made a pumpkin pie although I very much feared that horrible things would happen to it. I don't even think that I have eaten pumpkin pie on more that 2 occasions in my life so I had no idea if I did it correctly. My first class students, however, absolutely loved the pie and were even very excited about the whipped cream I also brought. I wish I could have brought enough to make pie for all my classes, but I see 9 different teachers (although a few cater to the same students) throughout the week, so this might have been difficult to fit in my luggage. My lessons on Thanksgiving went very well. Information was shared, books were read, turkeys were drawn, thanks were given, and pie was consumed. All in all a very successful Irish Thanksgiving.
After school on Thursday, Maggie and I went to a local family's for dinner. They are also American and are here on a missionary trip. They have 3 daughters who were all wonderfully nice and we all celebrated together. They had made all of the Thanksgiving favourites! There was turkey (naturally), green bean casserole, yams, cranberries and rolls. It was delicious and friendly. We were even granted the great pleasure of watching the Packer game on Sky Sports as they ordered the channel for the night. The only way for it to have been more perfect was if we were able to catch the Macy's Parade. We did play Apples to Apples though, which I have sorely missed!
Thanksgiving was a great expereince, followed by a very relaxing (and, sadly, internet-less weekend) where I got many things accomplished. We spent a great deal of time with our host family as well, including attending their service on Sunday. They have their own church, which they have built so I was very interested to learn about another congregation.
I cannot believe there are less than 3 weeks left! So much teaching to do! So many places to see! I hope that I will share everything here with you!
Below are some pictures of my first class celebrating Thanksgiving:
More pumpkin pie enjoyment!
We made a chart talking about whether or not we all liked it and used it to talk of some mathematical concepts.
Drawing and cutting out all of those little pumpkins was a long but ultimately satisfying task!
This is rather unconnected with the theme of this post, but it is one more project that I worked on with my students. I also made the title that is placed in the centre, which took a great deal of time. Here 'tis:
Thursday, November 22, 2007
Week Before Last
Author's Note: This would have been up much earlier had our internet not been down for several days. I apologize! More to come!!
I have gotten a bit behind in my updates so I have to quickly tell how the week before last ended! At the end of last week, one of the teachers asked if I could do an art activity as she saw the flowers that I had done previously. I had no idea what to do but I went online and did a little research and reading. I decided to introduce the idea of pointillism. I have a book that I brought with me called "The Dot" and I knew that the students would like me to read to them. It is about a girl who thinks she cannot draw or do anything artistic until her teacher encourages her and she ends up making tons of pictures with only dots and they are wonderful. As pointillism is an art of dots (using a lot of dots to create a solid picture), I thought that it tied in nicely.
The students did not initially believe me that people colour in entire pictures with dots. I showed them famous paintings and drawings that were created only using tiny dots of colours. They were amazed. The teacher said she would like them to create pictures of faces (which is a very hard thing to draw while only using dots!) so that is what we set out to do. I brought in my large and extensive collection of markers and the students set to it. They spent two days (one hour each day) working on these pictures and I think they started to really understand the concept. They aren't perfect, but I think that they are wonderful and all very individual. Here are some pictures of the students at work!
I have gotten a bit behind in my updates so I have to quickly tell how the week before last ended! At the end of last week, one of the teachers asked if I could do an art activity as she saw the flowers that I had done previously. I had no idea what to do but I went online and did a little research and reading. I decided to introduce the idea of pointillism. I have a book that I brought with me called "The Dot" and I knew that the students would like me to read to them. It is about a girl who thinks she cannot draw or do anything artistic until her teacher encourages her and she ends up making tons of pictures with only dots and they are wonderful. As pointillism is an art of dots (using a lot of dots to create a solid picture), I thought that it tied in nicely.
The students did not initially believe me that people colour in entire pictures with dots. I showed them famous paintings and drawings that were created only using tiny dots of colours. They were amazed. The teacher said she would like them to create pictures of faces (which is a very hard thing to draw while only using dots!) so that is what we set out to do. I brought in my large and extensive collection of markers and the students set to it. They spent two days (one hour each day) working on these pictures and I think they started to really understand the concept. They aren't perfect, but I think that they are wonderful and all very individual. Here are some pictures of the students at work!
Thursday, November 15, 2007
Wednesday (November 14, 2007)
Yesterday, a few very interesting things happened. When I was on my way into school in the morning, I was stopped by the secretary. She told me that one of the teachers I know was on her way to school but was going to be late. She asked if I would mind going to her class until she got there. I said that was fine and headed over. I have been in this class before and I know many of the students. But they have math first thing in the morning, which means students from another 3rd class come over and some of the students in this class go to the class I usually teach first thing in the morning. Either way, it all worked out very well. I asked the students a few questions about where they left off the day before and we started. I got through the homework corrections, the table recitations, and got a fair way into the lesson before the teacher showed up. When she saw how well it was going she actually let me finish. I think it worked out very well and I was happy to help.
I helped the new Romanian student one-on-one afterwards. I am working on basic English vocabulary and the like with her. After that, I head to the 3rd class English support class. I was going to teach for about half the class and I had a lesson planned. However, during the first part of the class, the teacher was having trouble with the students and matching questions and their answers. For instance, when given an answer such as "The girls is from Limerick," the students cannot come up with the appropriate question that would warrent that answer. Therefore, I asked if I could do an activity with them. I had a completely different lesson planned, but I decided to play the 5 W's game that I used to play in school and at parties when I was in elementary school.
Essentially, you list Who, What, Where, When and Why down the left hand side of a piece of paper with plenty of space in between. Everyone keeps their paper hidden from prying eyes and writes down a Who. This can be anyone or an animal or a group of people. Then they fold over the paper so that you cannot see what they wrote and pass all of the papers to the right. The next person writes down a What. This is a verb... any kind of action or event such as playing baseball. You can get very detailed as well such as "playing baseball in the rain while wearing white shirts." The paper is folded and passed again and again until every question has an answer (Where is a place, When is quite obviously some kind of time frame and Why is a silly reasoning...ie, because he/she/they were tired from doing headstands). Once the paper is completed you read it aloud. You can use them to write stories as those 5 W's are the key components to any story.
The students loved this activity so we played it twice. Other classes have begged for it too. One girls told me she is going to play it at their birthday party. I am glad they enjoyed it, but moreover, I am glad they can keep the 5 W's straight.
I helped the new Romanian student one-on-one afterwards. I am working on basic English vocabulary and the like with her. After that, I head to the 3rd class English support class. I was going to teach for about half the class and I had a lesson planned. However, during the first part of the class, the teacher was having trouble with the students and matching questions and their answers. For instance, when given an answer such as "The girls is from Limerick," the students cannot come up with the appropriate question that would warrent that answer. Therefore, I asked if I could do an activity with them. I had a completely different lesson planned, but I decided to play the 5 W's game that I used to play in school and at parties when I was in elementary school.
Essentially, you list Who, What, Where, When and Why down the left hand side of a piece of paper with plenty of space in between. Everyone keeps their paper hidden from prying eyes and writes down a Who. This can be anyone or an animal or a group of people. Then they fold over the paper so that you cannot see what they wrote and pass all of the papers to the right. The next person writes down a What. This is a verb... any kind of action or event such as playing baseball. You can get very detailed as well such as "playing baseball in the rain while wearing white shirts." The paper is folded and passed again and again until every question has an answer (Where is a place, When is quite obviously some kind of time frame and Why is a silly reasoning...ie, because he/she/they were tired from doing headstands). Once the paper is completed you read it aloud. You can use them to write stories as those 5 W's are the key components to any story.
The students loved this activity so we played it twice. Other classes have begged for it too. One girls told me she is going to play it at their birthday party. I am glad they enjoyed it, but moreover, I am glad they can keep the 5 W's straight.
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Handprints
I have been working with the Junior Infants on making their handprints with paints. The girls get to choose whatever colours they please from the paints that I have set out. I let them decide how they want to do the project. Some choose to have their whole hand one colour, others want their fingers to be a different colour than their palms. A few girls decided to have each finger and their palms all different colours. One girl opted for stripes, which was a challenge.
The handprints are turning out beautifully but here are a few photographs of the mess the girls made of their hands!
Rebecca wanted stripes:
Malgozata (I am not entirely sure that is spelled correctly, but it is pronounced Margarita) went for solid colours:
Annya and Aoife went for the finger/palm colour variation:
The handprints are turning out beautifully but here are a few photographs of the mess the girls made of their hands!
Rebecca wanted stripes:
Malgozata (I am not entirely sure that is spelled correctly, but it is pronounced Margarita) went for solid colours:
Annya and Aoife went for the finger/palm colour variation:
Ring of Kerry
Yes, I know this was about a week and a half ago, but I think it was about time I put up the pictures.
During our week off, Maggie, her mom and I went to the Ring of Kerry. We were very brave and toured it on our own... without getting on a tour bus that is. We used our maps and our shockingly high aptitude for reading signs mostly written in Gaelic and basically drove in a giant circle around a peninsula in Ireland. This drive offers some of the most beautiful sights in Ireland. You get to see mountains, and ocean and wonderful views of Killarney National Park. At times, you can be driving with the mountains reaching up on one side of the car and the Atlantic Ocean stretched out beside you as well. We had a few harrowing experiences with the narrow roads that made me sorely miss multi-lane highways. But we all made it through without a scratch.
On the way back to Listowel, we also stopped to see the Muckross house and the Torc Waterfall in Killarney. We took another jaunty ride as they are the most informative vehicles that offer travel. I am sad we missed the tour of the Muckross house but I am glad that I was able to see it up close. It is a large (OK MAJOR understatment) house that sits in Killarney National Park. It passed through the hands of a few owners before it was given to Ireland. The queen once stayed there and the owners went bankrupt in preparation. The house has 100 rooms, a chimney for every week of the year and a window for every day of the year. I am not entirely sure anyone actually NEEDS 52 chimneys that desperately. I am also glad that small children don't play baseball near those 365 windows.
Afterwards we headed back to Listowel as we were all exhausted. We had to rest up for Galway, the Aran Islands and the Cliffs of Moher of course!
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