Here in Frutillar, as I have previously mentioned, we are aiding a local school, Green Colegio (school). This school is for children grades 1st through 8th. Our typical schedule consists of arriving at 8:30, break (recess) at 10:00, 2nd breakfast, break at 11:55 and class until 1:30. The students stay until 4:00 every day except for Fridays they are also off at 1:30. There is one English professor and during her class we are actually able to help/teach. On my first day and first class I read a paragraph to the class (they usually have a recording), graded their homework and helped them learn new words in English. I realize, more clearly now, how difficult the English language is and how selfish we can be in asking other cultures to conform. Try explaining a hole in English to child who only speaks Spanish. Not easy. Thankfully, I have Google translate to help me communicate with my students.
Yesterday, I was left to my own resources with a worksheet packet. I had to actually teach! I am by no means a teacher and want to send a huge shout out to those who are. The worksheet packet seemed easy enough until we actually began working. First, we had to connect words to images… easy enough… not. I could hardly make out what some of the images were! Students, right and left, were swarming me with questions. “Miss! What is (insert word here)?” I finally said “Siéntese, por favor. Un minuto,” (Sit down, please. One minute) and quickly deciphered the image to word code. I then used Google translate to translate each word: Earthquake = Terremoto.
The next page was even worse… The students had to fill in the blanks on words based on images and then find them in a word search. I couldn’t even figure out number 11. I guessed. Also, explaining the Milky Way to them was a “fun” task. The paper shows it as a black and white blob. Again, praise technology because I could Google it!
The last two pages were the hardest to teach because the grammar was either incorrect or more than one answer was correct. You can have a little or a lot of something so they couldn’t really pick just A, B, C or D. Then we had sentences like, “There aren’t ________ help.” and had to place “some” or “any” in that space. My brain hurt with those.
Side note: If anyone has any basic English worksheet sites they love, please send them my way so I can share them with the teachers here. (I will be informing the teacher on the issues we had with the lesson)
When my class doesn’t have English, I usually prepare for break. The school has two breaks, one is 30-minutes and one is 15. We create different stations for the kiddos: football, basketball, volleyball, crafts, yoga, and zumba. I lead zumba and love it. We dance to the Cha Cha Slide, Kung Fu Fighting (We act like ninjas and they love it), Party Rock Anthem and then some more salsa-ish songs. (The style of music they prefer is Regeton…thought that meant Reggae…nope.) They love when I throw in current dance moves and are impressed that I can do them. (Flossing is a favorite) During the 15-minute break I also let the students lead the class. (Some of them take dance classes) I admit they are better than me with some of their moves.
The other day was a blessing with my kids because we had art class! (They all knew it was my favorite from asking the previous week.) I asked the teacher if I could draw on the whiteboard and proceeded to draw whatever the kids shouted out at me. This ranged from animals to Pokémon. I loved bonding with them over something I love.
I am currently planning to draw something for the 30 students I have and include a word in English that describes them. With only two weeks left here in Frutillar, I know leaving these amazing kids is going to be hard, but that is a good thing. I hope each country is hard to leave because that means I gave every moment and relationship my all.
