My Case For Student Teaching Abroad:

If you are an education student, you should student teach abroad, because:

Practicality:
---If you want an abroad experience, but don’t really want to be away from SNC or home for a whole semester, this is a wonderful way to do it for 9-10 weeks. Even if you miss people for this time, it’s definitely worth it.
---If you’re an ELL minor (which I’m not), you can have a whole placement in an English classroom full of ELL students. Even though it’s not my minor, I’ve gained lots of insight into how students learn English as a second language and what they struggle with the most.
---A placement in Mexico is a really practical way to complete your immersion experience for a Spanish teaching minor. Your language skills will definitely improve as you communicate with your host family and the teachers and staff at Varmond, and you’ll come back with a better accent.
---It’s not as expensive as you may think. If you live on SNC campus senior year, you can get reimbursed upon your return for housing for the time that you are abroad. What you spend on your homestay (room & board) abroad is about the same if not less than what you would need to live at SNC for that time. That means the extra cost is really just your plane tickets, any travel you want to do while abroad, and miscellaneous expenses. At least in Morelia, many of the cultural events and museums are completely free, so you don’t have to have a lot of money to have a really full and enriching experience here. In expenses above what I would have paid if I had just stayed at SNC, I paid about $1,200. Even if you need to take out a small loan to go, it’s entirely worth it.

Enriched learning:
---You learn so incredibly much about cultural customs, traditions, foods, and in my case, the language, which makes for a 24/7 learning experience. You may even develop some new tastes.
---In the school, you learn about the education system in a foreign country, which is very insightful and invaluable to bring back as a teacher in the U.S. You see teaching methods, styles, and a curriculum that are at least a bit different from what you’ve learned at SNC for 3 years and from what you’ll experience in your 2nd teaching placement. This opens the door for lots of learning that simply isn’t possible if you only teach in the States.
---Some people think it’s foolish to teach abroad if you plan to teach only in the States your whole life. I disagree with that. Seriously, if you are able to learn how to teach effectively in a foreign country with an educational system that is bound to be different than to what you’re accustomed WHILE adjusting to a new city/country, host family, climate, food, friends (and the process of trying to find some), limited resources (you can only bring so much with you, and it’s harder to find resources in a new and unfamiliar place), culture, language (in Mexico), and limited technology and contact with people back home (which is likely), you will come away with the ability to go anywhere and learn how to teach effectively there. In no other place will you again be teaching and adjusting to so many changes and new things all at one time! Those flexibility and open-minded teacher dispositions will be top notch by the time you leave!
---If you are truly open to the experience, you will become a better human being. You will learn how to live in solidarity with people from another country and culture, which will get you thinking outside of the American mindset. You will see the world through different eyes.
---You are guaranteed to feel what it’s like to be the minority due to your ethnicity, race, culture, and/or language. This has been a powerful experience for me and given me much more understanding and compassion for minorities in the U.S. I now know what it feels like to look different and stick out in a crowd, sound funny, and just not quite fit into the culture perfectly.
---By moving away from everything and everyone that is familiar for a while, you learn much more about yourself, and you learn how to be more independent.

Unless you have a family commitment or health problem that requires that you stay in the U.S. for student teaching, or unless you’ve already been abroad for a summer or semester and that was enough for you, I really can’t think of a good reason to not student teach abroad. Even though it’s scary at first, there are tons of unknowns, you’ll have to miss part of your senior year at SNC, and it might strain you a bit financially, it’s simply too rich of an experience to miss!

Tiempo para despedir…time to say goodbye

Wow, I can’t believe this is my last blogging day in Morelia, since I fly out Friday early in the morning. I’m really just about done here. Many have asked me if I want to stay or when I’m going to return. I would like to visit here again someday, but I truthfully can’t say if or when I will. I don’t know when I’d ever have another opportunity to come back! My host mom explained to me that to say you’ll never return makes it sound like you didn’t enjoy your time here. Maybe it’s just best to leave my response as, “¿Quién sabe?” (Who knows?) I think I have mixed feelings about going. There are a lot of people here I’m going to miss, and I like the greater emphasis on family and religion in the culture here. Morelia is a beautiful city, and I’ll miss living so close to all the cultural events and historical buildings. I’ll actually miss having chile on my food (coming from the girl who came here saying she didn’t like spicy foods), and I’ll surely miss the warm climate with gorgeous sunny days nearly all the time. However, despite all these people and things I will miss, I am really excited to see people back home again and catch up with them. I am also excited to start my second student teaching placement, so I can learn more things about teaching and have a new experience with a different teaching style, curriculum, grade, school, etc.

This was a fun last weekend in Morelia. On Friday night, I went to the VIP theater with a couple of friends. We saw “Slumdog Millionaire” for only what would be about $8, but our seats were huge, leather recliners with armrests. Waiters took our orders and brought food to our seats, which had adjustable trays attached to hold everything. When I ordered palomas (popcorn), it came with a cup of chile as a condiment! It was okay with chile, but I think I prefer my popcorn with just butter and salt. On Saturday, I went to my cooperating teacher’s birthday party, which was fun. We had en enormous brunch, and I could barely eat anything at La Comida. Saturday night, I was out and about with a couple of friends. We saw the Michoacan Orquestra play for a little while in front of the Cathedral, part of an international dance festival that was going on in another square in town, and the firework show shot off from the top of the Cathedral. On Sunday, I spent the day with my host family. After doing just about the last of my laundry by hand, my host mom told me that we were leaving. They didn’t tell me where we were going or how long we’d be gone, and I decided to just go with the flow and not ask. Well, we went on a little day trip to Quiroga, a city near Patzcuaro, to do some shopping in the little shops there. It was a great chance to find some gifts to bring back. Before we got there, we stopped at a little restaurant that was kind of in the middle of nowhere. I had some amazing quesadillas and flan there. After church on Sunday night, I had a little bit of the pozole my family bought in Quiroga. It was really good with radish, chile, onion, and lettuce stirred into it. I kept adding more and more chile to it until it was a little spicy. I’ve definitely gained new taste buds in Mexico!! I now enjoy that feeling of my tongue, throat, and even stomach burning for a few minutes after eating some spicy chile. My host family finds my change in tastes so funny…they keep telling me I’m Mexican now! ☺

This week, I'm still in my normal teaching routine. I feel pretty comfortable with my time management ability, and I think I'm able to keep everything moving along at a fairly comfortable pace so students are always working but not too rushed. The good news also is that I'm not behind much in the book now, so I won't be leaving Ms. Monica with extra content to fit in. One new thing I'm trying a little it correcting students when they use incorrect grammar in their speech. I explain what they said that was wrong, have them repeat it correctly, and thank them for participating to let them know that it's fine to mistakes, but they need to learn from them. I've found that when people correct my Spanish, it's helped me a lot, so I'm integrating that a little bit now in my teaching, too.

I’ll close here. I hope you’ve enjoyed the blog. It’s definitely helped me process my experiences by journaling about them. I’ll leave just one more blog on my “Case for Student Teaching Abroad” before I head out. When I get back, I hope to figure out how to transfer my pictures using the memory card. If I can do that, I’ll probably put up one or two more blogs with videos and photos to catch you up on things I haven’t been able to share. Take care, and I’ll see you all relatively soon! ☺

Substitute for a Day....Un día bien pesado

Today was really crazy to say the least. ¨Bien pesado¨ (really tiring or literally ¨good (meaning very) weighted¨ is how I described it in Spanish. The first hour and 10 minutes were wonderful. I was teaching in my 6th grade, and I had thought of some cool activities to include in history to make it a bit more interesting. I had the students draw a map to show where Germany and Russia were moving their armies at the start of WWI. I then had them briefly act out ¨war fever.¨ The boys had to goose-step down the aisle of the classroom as ¨soldiers,¨ and the girls had to run up to them and act swooned over. It was a fun and very short activity to help them remember the concept of ¨war fever.¨ We also had an awesome Hawaiian themed birthday party with tons of food and an enormous pop-up card I made and had all of my 55 students sign planned for my cooperating teacher, whose birthday is tomorrow. The party was going to be in the first recess.

Well, I found out at 8:30 that I needed to substitute in 4th grade for the rest of the day starting at 9:10a.m., and I didn't have a free hour other than recess times!! I ended up going to the b-day party for my teacher for 10 minutes, and the rest of my day was consumed with 4th grade. It was an incredible learning experience but so, so hard. Two girls told me their books were at home, but when the coordinator came in and asked them, they both had their books in their backpacks. One student discovered spelling words written in pen on a table that one girl used to cheat on her spelling test, so I had to check her book against the table and report her! Aside from that the students were generally rambunctious. I at least made sure to ask names at the start, and I quickly learned the napes of those who misbehave more frequently. I found myself raising my voice a bit louder than I normally do, so my throat is rather sore now. I also went into Spanish completely, since I wasn't sure how well they'd understand my English, and I wanted my instructions to be completely clear. I realized that I can't function without knowing the procedures, rules, and consequences of a classroom! I felt completely ineffective! I learned that I never ever want to be a substitute on a long term basis, and I think that I'll leave a friendly little manual in my own classroom some day for my substitutes so that they can know all the basic expectations, procedures, rules, and consequences for my classes. With only a rough lesson planner as a guide, it's still nearly impossible to substitute effectively.

I feel much, much more effective in my 6th grade classes where I know the procedures, I have rapport with the students, I know all the names, and I always have back up plans of things to do next or fillers.

This weekend, I'm going to go to a movie with some friends tonight and then I'll go to a birthday party for my cooperating teacher tomorrow morning.

Wrapping up quickly!

This weekend, I took a trip to Zihuatenejo, about four hours southeast of here, with a couple of friends I met through CCL. It was awesome to see the ocean, and I went parasailing, which was pretty adventurous of me. I also thought it was interesting to take in the more touristy culture of Mexico. The items in the markets seemed a lot different than what is sold in Morelian markets. Some of the things seemed to represent how Americans stereotypically represent Mexicans, and I could tell that they probably only sell these things to tourists. You’d probably never see a Mexican buy these items.

I did get plenty of sleep during the weekend, but I think I’m more beat than I thought. I took a huge nap after La Comida today, and I almost fell asleep for the night! That’s why this blog is rather late.

The students didn't do as well on the math exam as I had hoped. Quite a few failed or got lower passing grades. I think part of the challenge was that some students struggle with some basic math functions like multiplying and dividing. Therefore, even if they know the process for the harder problems that involve fractions, they mess up on the basic things. Miss Monica and I talked about this problem and plan on including some of the basic multiplication and division facts in the curriculum as a review to help the students. I also think some students were crunched for time. Some of them take a long time for math, and we were only able to give them 40 minutes on a math test with 35 problems. They haven't all learned how to pace themselves. Plus, it was apparent that some students simply hadn't studied what we reviewed, since some forgot how to do entire sections. Although I wish they would have done better, I at least learned some good lessons about how to prepare my future students for unit or bigger exams.

My time in Mexico and at Varmond is wrapping up soon. I’m in my second to last week! My main goals for the rest of my time at Varmond are to continue working on my rate of speech, keeping all students engaged and participating, and keeping the students active with additional activities when they finish early. I’m about a day or so behind in the curriculum, so I find myself wanting to talk quickly to cover things, but I still have to remind myself at times to slow down. I can usually tell when students are checked out and not participating; I just need to remember to continually keep an eye out for them, so that I’m continually re-engaging in some way. The students also continue to work at very diverse rates, so I need to continually have extra activities. The sudokus were popular, so I need to bring more of those to school, since they’re all gone now. I also need to better guage when to move on to the next content or let students keep working. I think part of this week for me is challenging just because I need to get back into a rhythm after exam week, and the students probably do, too.

Today was a little crazy, because we were coming off of a three day weekend, everyone wore normal clothes (green) for St. Patrick’s Day, and we had a huge scavenger hunt during everyone’s recess times. Students had to run around the school and match clues to teachers, coordinators, and staff. Students were coming to the door throughout the day in the middle of class to ask Miss Monica and me questions. It was fun, but it made for a crazier day. They also sold cucumbers, chips, and drinks at recess, and they turned the water in the water cooler green! Anyone who didn’t wear green to school was either pinched or painted green! All in all it was a fun day, but I am looking forward to a more normal week.

One cultural tid bit to close:
I’ve mentioned religion is a big part of the culture here before, but I’ve observed something else that is interesting. In many of the taxis and public buses, the drivers have rosaries hanging from the mirror, images of the Virgin Mary displayed, or huge stickers of Jesus on the backs of their seats, sometimes with a message. I think this is really interesting, because this would probably never be permitted in the U.S.

Exams Over...Phew!

Well…exam week is over. Exams went fairly well from what is already graded. Only a couple students failed in each subject. I have all the test administering procedures down pat now…clearing tables (desks) except for a pencil and eraser, being quiet during an exam, raising hands for questions, reading through instructions with students at the start, and announcing how much time has passed/how much time they have left. The exams made for a lot of grading this week! Miss Monica and I split the grading work. She told me that if I’d grade the compositions (all 55 of them, and all at least one page long), she’d do the others (since they’re mostly multiple choice, fill in the blank, etc.) The compositions took so much time to grade, and I still have some to finish this weekend. I’m trying to leave helpful comments for the students so that they can learn from their mistakes, and that’s taking a little longer to do. Next week, the students will be correcting their exams as homework. This is part of Miss Monica’s routine, since she said the students will not check the mistakes they made otherwise. This is probably true for many of them, so I think this is a good idea.

The reviews I did for the exams went well. I didn’t have a chance to include many of the games or fun ideas I had other than the grammar matching at the start of the week, but I at least tried to make the review guides interactive. For math, we went through the whole review guide as a class. I asked students to explain how to do problems and provide answers as we went along. I tried to keep an eye out for students that had dazed looks or were tuning out, so that I could draw them back into the class. Sometimes I called on them to ask them to help out on a problem or make sure to check for their understanding. This seemed to help. I also left plenty of time for questions and was really happy when students asked for more explanations. Near the end, I had students write problems on the board, and then the rest of the class raised their hand afterward if they agreed or disagreed with the answer. When they disagreed, I had them come up to change it. Throughout the review, I tried to acknowledge all of the answers and consider them even if they were wrong. Usually, if a student was wrong, I asked them to think again and correct their answer. This seemed to lead to better student understanding. I also tried to make sure everyone was participating by asking for new volunteers and having them work out a problem and raise their hand when they had an answer. I guess I’ll see if this review paid off when the grades are all calculated on Tuesday!

Overall in my student teaching experience here, I’ve found that I really do love teaching. I love those light bulb moments when something clicks for a student and times when the students are really excited to participate and all have their hands raised. I’m also finding ways to have fun and not take my teaching too seriously. For instance, when I make little mistakes in front of the students, I try to make light of it. I’ve also found ways to act just a little bit goofy in front of the students (like saying the spelling word “groan” as if I’m groaning…they always laugh when I do that). Sometimes, some of the students look at me funny to try to get me to laugh while I’m giving spelling words, so I just make goofy faces back at them. These little things make class just a bit more fun I think. I think the students know that I can handle a joke…because on Thursday, I had the first trick played on me!!! A student pulled out a pen and asked me to write my full name for her. Well, it was one of those clicky pens that shocks your hand when you try to click it before writing…haha. After trying it twice, I just looked at the student and shook my head with a smile. She got me. I went right back to teaching, and I think only a few students that had plotted the trick noticed what happened.

I think I have found a good balance between a little bit of goofiness and being authoritative. The students know that I can laugh, but I won’t let them get away with things. I can walk closer to them or stare them down with my stern teacher look for a few seconds, and when they notice me, they usually snap right back to work. They know that when I mean business, I mean business. I’ve already removed things from students when they’re coloring in class instead of reading along or paying attention, and I think they realize that I’m generally pretty fair. I think they respect me overall, which I’m really happy about.

I’ll close for now with some fun cultural bits:
---St. Patrick’s Day is not celebrated in Mexico (probably because there’s so few Irish people). We celebrate it at Varmond, because the principal is part Irish. (My coop. teacher thought it was so interesting when I told her about some of the ways it’s celebrated in the States…with the green river in Chicago, green drinks, and Shamrock Shakes at McDonald’s.)
---Flour tortillas are kind of rare here (even though that’s basically the only kind we have in the U.S.) Corn tortillas is the norm here (rare in the U.S.)
---The chocolate used in sweets (donuts, muffins, etc.) here is a lot less sweet than what we use in the U.S.

Exam Week...on the other side this time

Hello, all.  This is trimester exam week for the students at Varmond.  It's so interesting to be on the other end of giving big, important exams that are a big percent of the students grades!  I'm mostly doing review guides and administering exams.  So far, so good!  Overall, the students are doing decently.  To avoid situations in which the students could cheat, Miss Monica divide the class of 27 or 28 in half and put them in two different rooms with each of us watching a room full.  This allows them to all have their own table to work at.  The students are responding well and respecting my authority when I tell them that they need to be completely silent during exams unless they raise their hand and I come to talk with them.  So far, we haven't caught anyone cheating (and cheating has been an issue in 6th grade in a number of circumstances) on the exams, so I'm happy about that.  The reviews seem to be going fairly well, too.  I went through half of the math review guide that I wrote with each class.  I made sure to leave time for students to ask questions, and I was happy when I could tell a few of them were remembering things or relearning how to do them.  I learned that it was helpful to ask students how they solve the problems, since one student shared a method that they've used in Spanish before.  I encouraged them all to use it, since I figured it would be the most familiar method for them.  In grammar, I had time to fit in one fun matching game with subjects and verbs to compliment the review guide.  I'm hoping that helps them remember how to make subject-verb agreements.  I guess I'll find out tomorrow after the grammar exam!

In other exciting school news, my coop. teacher and I are helping to plan the Kermesse for St. Patrick's Day, which will be complete with a scavenger hunt.  Students will need to look for teachers that match obscure clues (e.g. I am the teacher who still has a baby tooth that never fell out!)  We have to come in green on Tuesday, and fortunately, I packed ONE green shirt for Mexico!

I'll close for now with some fun and random cultural things I learned:

• If you show up too early to a place (especially in the morning), they ask you, "¿Te caíste de tu cama?"  This means, "Did you fall out of your bed?"  Jaja (haha in Spanish)
• If you show up too late?...."¿Te pegaron tus sabanas?"  This means, "Did your bed sheets hit you?" as in did they cover you up and prevent you from getting out of bed?
• Here, and afilar (a sharpener) goes around the streets to go to people's homes and sharpen their knives!!  He plays a flute sound to let you know he's in your street, but superstition has it here that when you hear the flute sound, it's bad luck for your money.  Why?  I haven't a clue...but that's what my host fam. told me.

I hope the randomness of all that entertained you!  

Full Time Teaching :)

This is a fountain at the end of La Calle de Romance.  When I saw it from a distance, my first thought was that it was covered in snow!  Silly Caitlin, there's no snow in Mexico!!  When I got up close, I learned that it was all bubbles....how fun!  You can pick up some of them and play with them.  I saw one girl throw some at her boyfriend...haha.

This is La Calle de Romance, a little walk where couples can go.  It's too narrow for cars, so it's just for walking.

My first week of full time teaching went pretty well for the most part.  Since I write lesson plans to turn into the coordinator over a week before I actually teach them, I've found that I need to plan everything again to adjust to where we actually are in the curriculum.  Everything changes for my actual plan, and I've found it helpful to plan throughout the week before each day.  We always seem to be a bit behind, which seems to be common for the teachers at Varmond due to the constant volume of content to cover.  I finished up the main content from the February book and fit in time for some review this week, but we've yet to start the March book.  This is in part because this was a short week.  Varmond is hosting a huge fútbol (soccer) tournament this weekend (Thurs. afternoon through Sunday), so we had an early release on Thursday and no classes Friday.  Due to the short week, I was squeezing everything in as quickly as possible.  My cooperating teacher had a history review guide that the students needed to copy from the chalkboard (42 questions).  We did this over the course of three days, but it took a lot of time.  My cooperating teacher told me at the start of the week that we could do the same with my math review guide.  When I realized that there was no way the students would have time to copy my guide, I typed it up and had copies made to hand out.  I decided to look up some internet resources (websites with math games) to add to the guide as optional extra practice.  This was kind of fun to look up, and it's a way I can integrate technology a little bit more.  Technology is very, very minimal in the primary curriculum.  The students have a computer class, but the other classrooms are not equipped with any computers, overheads, etc.  They only have CD players to play the disks provided by AMCO.  The secondary students are required to all have laptops at school to use, but before 7th grade, the technological integration is minimal.

On Thursday of this week, I encountered a challenging classroom situation.  I found out that the Spanish teacher needed to be in a meeting during his class time.  My cooperating teacher asked me to go to their room and teach them in English, so we could use it as time to catch up on our Feb. book.  Well, the students were really confused to see me in their Spanish room, they all wanted to know where the Spanish teacher was, and they did not want to work from their English books during what should have been Spanish for them.  Nevertheless, they at least all sat down and took out their English books.  However, at least half the class was chatting with their neighbors and not paying much attention.  Despite my switching into Spanish to give directions and explain what was going on and telling them that I needed them to be quieter, they continued goofing around.  I think part of it was due to the unexpected situation and part due to the fact that we were working in Language Arts, a content section that is full of really hard workbook pages with unfamiliar words, difficult puzzles, and obscure references to American culture.  Sometimes I can't even figure out the answers to the questions in Language Arts.  Moreover, the students know they don't receive a grade in this content; they just have to fill out the pages in class when we go over them and sometimes as homework.  Few students understand the questions, so they aren't very fun activities.  This means there's really no intrinsic or extrinsic motivation for students to do these pages.  All in all, this made for a pretty crazy classroom.  I started removing 5 minutes of recess for students who were not paying attention, but this didn't help significantly.  They were just completely unmotivated, and I didn't know how to make these pages more interesting.  Looking back, I probably could have tried having time for team work or turned them into some kind of competition.  However, given no time to prepare to teach this extra class, I was just glad to get through it.  It was a good lesson for me, and hopefully the students will take me more seriously now, regardless of whether I'm teaching in the English classroom or another classroom.

Tomorrow I'm heading to Varmond to be a "Staff" person for the soccer tournament.  I think this will mainly consist of telling people where the bathrooms, food, fields, etc. are.   I hope I can also catch some of the games.  From what I've seen at recess, the students are quite skilled in soccer here!!  The rest of the weekend, I hope to see more places in Morelia.  There's some more sections of the Historic Central colony I want to check out.  Also, I borrowed the movie "P.D. Te Amo" (P.S. I love you) from my cooperating teacher, and Sonia and I plan to watch that at some point.  I haven't seen it in English, so I hope I can follow it all in Spanish.

I'll close with some more cultural tid bits:  

• A typical thing said at the end of a visit in the evening or before one goes to bed:  "Que descanses" ("That you rest")
• Calling (on the phone) during the main meal time, La Comida, is considered relatively acceptable (as opposed to our American culture in which it's rude to call during dinner). Since people know they can find someone at home during La Comida, they'll call then.  However, my family hasn't received many calls during our meal tim
• About 70% of Mexicans are diabetic...!!!  (I heard a Doctor give a presentation on diabetes tonight...more on that on Tuesday.)
• A lot of stored a more old fashioned (not sure if I've mentioned this before or not.)  Many smaller shops still have all the supplies in back.  You go to the counter and ask if they have something; if they do, they go look for it and find it for you.  Then they give you a receipt for the things you want to buy.  You take the slip to the cashier to pay for your purchase, get a stamp that says "PAGADO," and return this slip to the other clerk in order to pick up your purchase.  This can at times make for a longer shopping trip, especially if the clerk takes a while to find the item you want.

Time is sure MARCHing on

Haha...sorry for the pun.  That was a bad one.  I do feel like time is going quickly though.  I have just over 3 weeks left here...so hard to believe.

This is my first week completely in charge of the class, and it's going fairly well so far.  I'm realizing how challenging it is to keep the whole class active the whole time.  On Monday, I introduced a couple new things.  When I was looking for something to make a sound that I could use as a classroom management tool over the weekend, the only thing I could find was a baby rattle.  It doesn't look too much like a baby toy to me, so I figured I could at least try it.  It helps some, and I prefer it to shouting above the volume of the students.  I also introduced Sudoku puzzles and the 5 chapter books I brought along with me as things to read/do during extra time.  The students seemed very interested in these.  I also still have my "mail box" in which students can leave me notes.  There's a few students who seem to enjoy writing me notes as they wait after school.

Balancing time has been a bit of a challenge.  I'm just about done with the February book, and I need to start March.  I've also been squeezing in time for reviews for the English exams next week.  Today, I realized that most of the students didn't really understand the homework I assigned in grammar, which my cooperating teacher wants to count as a quiz.  I had to take time today to go back and explain the content again in a different way with more examples and ask the students to look back at their homework to make sure they did it correctly.  The students seemed to understand it better after this.  I think when I'm pressured to go quickly through the content, I take less time explaining content or checking for understanding.  I find it so hard to teach this way.  My cooperating teacher told me today that teachers at Varmond are always expected to cover content very quickly and perfectly while filling in all the pages, so they're always working under a certain level of stress from these high expectations.  I think high expectations are good, but there needs to be some wiggle room to allow for the needs of individuals.  Many times, I can tell that some students do not understand the content sufficiently based on their homework, grades, etc., but there's always very little time to go back and teach for mastery or allow individuals to re-do their work for better grades.

This week I'm mostly trying to get completely comfortable running the entire day and keeping everything moving along.  In the following several weeks, I want to figure out how to keep everything moving while making it more engaging.  I'm trying to at least include more student participation in a large class discussion format for now.  I can tell I need to vary my instructional methods more though, since some students look completely zoned out when they're just listening to lecture regarding content.

I'll close for today.  Here's a couple cultural tid bits:

• Baby showers here are called "Baby Showers," but with a Spanish pronunciation.  I went to my host cousin's this weekend, and it seems similar to ours...with games, food, all women, and gifts.
• If you ever come here, here's a couple basic things to know:  "Con permiso" (with permission) is used to pass by someone on the street or in a room or when getting off of public transportation.  "De nada" and "por nada" (the response to "Thank you") are interchangeable.  I first thought that people were saying "por nada" (for nothing) as in "Thanks for nothing"...as if they hadn't helped me.  Since this would be rude to say in the U.S., I was really confused...until I realized the two were the same.
• They eat pizza here, and it's pretty much made the same way.  BUT...ketchup is the condiment of choice. They pour it all over the top of their pizza slices before eating.  Ketchup packets even come inside the pizza box!  My host dad told me that pizza isn't pizza without ketchup.  I tried a slice like this.  It was okay, but I think I prefer my pizza plain.  

Challenges but Blessings...always

This is La Iglesia de San Diego.  (Church of St. Diego)  I went here for mass, and it is gorgeously decorated in gold over the whole inside.  Since they had a sign with a camera crossed off at the entrance, I didn't take a photo of the inside.  This is the church where my host parents were married....neat, huh?

This week seemed to fly.  I can't believe I have literally one month left.  This week was full of some challenges but also blessings.  The students in one of the classes were caught copying English homework from each other in another class, and my cooperating teacher reprimanded them by telling them that they will not be able to take the trimester exam.  This made me think about how I will handle this kind of situation when I have my own classroom and have to give consequences.  I'm not exactly sure what I would do, but I realize now that rules and consequences is something I need to give more thought to before setting up my own classroom some day.  This week was also challenging in that we are under pressure to finish the February book.  There are honestly too many pages in the book to cover in depth in one month to the extent that students will really understand the content.  Unfortunately, I think my math presentations will have to be cut.  My cooperating teacher told me that we'll likely only have enough time to share the answers.  I think I will have to adapt my original plan, and instead, maybe I can have students share their general problem solving strategies as a large class.  This won't allow everyone to share, but I'd rather do this than just share answers and move on.  I'm definitely learning how to be flexible with my lesson plans so that I can still follow the curriculum and school requirements.

Despite some of the challenges, I do enjoy teaching, and I feel like I'm getting better with time. One day this week, I gave the students a list of pages in their book to work on independently after I explained them.  I really enjoyed giving them work time, since it allowed me to circulate the classroom and help individuals or small groups with specific questions.  This is another way I've found that helps me differentiate.  Students can work at their own pace, are always active doing something, and I'm able to meet their individual needs through 1-1 conversations.  In one of my classes, I also realized that over half the class understood the math page we were doing well, but a chunk were still confused.  I set them to work on the page and pulled a semi-circle of students up to the board for further explanation.  I think this was really helpful, because just about everybody seemed to know how to do the math problems (multiplying decimals) when we were done.  The only tricky part about this independent work time is that I have to eventually pull everyone back together, so that we're on the same page.  Overall though, I think it made classroom management pretty easy.  Only near the end of the day did I have to remove them from partner work to go back to their own seats, since I could tell they were starting to get chatty and unfocused.  The students are responding well though.  When I have them move from teams to their own seats, I tend to include a countdown from 10 so that they move more efficiently and know that I'm serious.  So far, this seems to work well.

Next week, I'm moving on to full time teaching.  I'm excited to see what the week will bring!  I need to finish the Feb. book, start the March book, and do reviews for the trimester exams that start March 9th.  I think I'll learn a lot about time management and balancing priorities!!

This weekend, I'm going to be doing a bit more planning than normal, since I decided to take advantage of some cultural opportunities this week in the evening.  Wednesday night, I went to El Museo del Estado for a torito exposition.  I learned that they throw painted egg shells filled with confetti and closed with tissue paper at the torito and on top of each other's head as a way of celebrating.  My host aunt was so kind as to make sure I was able to have a head covered in confetti.  :) I saved a confetti filled egg, and I'm hoping I can travel with it uncracked back to the U.S.  in a small plastic box I have.  Thursday night, Sonia and I went to a concert at el Teatro José Rubén Romero.  It was a woodwind quintet playing classical music.  I was surprised that maybe only 40 or so people attended, and it was in this fairly decent size theater.  Maybe classical music isn't so popular here?  I learned from my host family that these places have cultural or music events like this EVERY Wed. and Thurs.!!  There's also a place that has cultural events on Fridays.  The best part about all of this?...Todo es gratis.  (Everything is free of charge!)  What a blessing it is to live within a 15 minute walk of all of these amazing cultural places and events that are generally free or very minimal costs!!  Moreover, I feel really blessed to have met Sonia and be able to share all these things with her.  Our host families often are busy with jobs, house chores, and their every day lives/responsibilities, so it helps that we can go out and explore the city together often.  We live 5 blocks away, have some basic things in common, and get along really well...what a blessing!  Plus, we can talk Spanish together at a rate that we both understand, but we're still learning new things, since we can share new vocab. that we picked up.  I feel very privileged to be here and be taking in all of the cultural experiences in addition to teaching.  Even when some days are hard, something good follows it and I am always, always surrounded by a lot of really great, caring people.

I'll close with some fun cultural tid bits.  I must say first though that some of these may just be the culture of my host family and not the culture of all Mexicans:

• Here, we put salt on fruit to cut the acid and prevent canchor sores (How intelligent, eh?)
• The people here seem to eat a lot more parts of the animal (and not just in sausage form!) One comida this week included tamales with entire shrimp inside (yes, the legs, heads, and shells).  I picked these parts off, but my host dad definitely ate the head.  My host brother ate out every part that was edible other than the shell. 
• I drank a really red water that had shreds of lettuce, orange slices, and peanuts in it.  At the end, I asked why it was so red.  I found out it was made with the juice from raw BEETS!  I do not like beets, but this water was actually pretty decent!  (I learned that it's just best if you try something and eat it all before asking what it is....best to avoid any preconceptions.)
• Chile and limón go on absolutely everything...meat, fruit, vegetables, and even french fries!
• Oh, this is all of Mexico:  PDA is not acceptable within the house.  That's why you see it all over the street and in parked cars.  My host mom told me that it's completely taboo for unmarried couples to be in a bedroom together at all and if you're really traditional (like my host grandma), it's completely taboo for unengaged couples to even be in each other's houses at all (even if it's just with the whole family for a meal, visiting, etc.!)  At night, couples will be outside the girl's front door saying good night or spending their more intimate time on park benches, quieter streets, or in vehicles.  This is pretty much the opposite of our culture in which the joke is always, "Get a room."  I think if there were a saying like that for here, it would be "Get a quiet street." However, it seems more acceptable to have PDA here.  Couples constantly walk the streets with the guy right behind the girl and his arms wrapped around her (as opposed to holding hands side by side).  Sooo interesting.  My "norm" is their oddity and vice versa.  Such is life.

Half way done...wow!

Well, I am now about half way through my time here, which I can hardly believe.  It is going very quickly!  So far, I feel like I've gained more confidence as a teacher, improved my Spanish, become part of a new family here, and learned a lot about the culture in Mexico, Morelia, and at Varmond.  I've also definitely had the opportunity to practice being flexible, open minded, and positive.  I find it kind of amazing that I feel pretty much at home here.  There are still times when I can't follow some Spanish conversations well or participate.  However, for the most part, I feel like I fit in here...not to the extent that I could live here indefinitely or for a very long period of time, but I know I'll miss the people, places, and culture here for sure.

Over the weekend, I went with my host family to Copándaro de Galeana, a small pueblo less than an hour away.  There was a Carnaval there which involved a "toro" (bull) parading around the city streets.  Don't worry...it was just men under an adorned, flashy bull costume.  A band came behind the toro to provide music (brass, drums, and woodwinds), and the toro stopped at assigned houses that provided drinks for the huge mass of people that were parading around the city with the toro.  When the parade stopped, there was a dance in the street with the toro.  I have some neat videos of this parade to share but am unfortunately experiencing some technical difficulties with my camera right now.  If I'm able to, I'll upload the video in another blog.  The Carnaval also entailed much of what we would think of as a carnival with rides (tilt-a-whirl, ferris wheel, etc.) and food vendors set up in the middle of the pueblo.  

Toros have been parading around Morelia since Saturday.  When someone pays them, they stop in the street, play music, and dance!  I've heard them pass by my house as late as 11p.m. when I'm trying to sleep!  It's a little crazy, but just part of the tradition here.  They have toros now, because they signify the bad.  They celebrate with them before Lent starts (like our Mardi Gras, except it's a 4 day event here!)

In the school, I'm doing most of the teaching this week, and I'll be completely on my own next week.  This week is a little crazy, because we're trying to finish up the February book with enough time to review before the standardized exams in the second week of March.  Some students are leaving for vacation and need to take parts of the exam early, so that makes things yet more interesting! 

One way I'm trying to keep the focus more on the process of learning while still completing all the pages is by turning all of the math word problems in the book (over 20 of them) into presentations.  I assigned a word problem to each student, I'll give them time to work on it in class/ask questions, and I'm going to have them present their problem to the class on either this Friday or Monday (or some on each day).  I found that this was a great way to differentiate.  I read through all the problems first so that I could assign problems according to students' ability levels.  I'm hoping this will allow all of the students to successfully complete the assignment of being able to explain the process of solving a math problem to their classmates.  I'm also using this as a way to get them talking in English more.  

Classroom management is going fairly well.  The students know that I'm watching them, and making eye contact and using physical proximity has continued to be helpful.  My only challenge now will be to bring them initially to attention at the start of a class or in the middle of an activity when there's more noise in the classroom.  I want to find something that makes a noise (like a stuffed animal or whistle) to use as a signal to start class, bring the class back from team work, etc.  I think I'll be making a little shopping adventure this week or weekend.

Okay, well I need to get ready for bed now.  I'm not sure how soon I'll be sleeping.  Two more toros just went by our house complete with bands.  (I've given up on early bedtimes during the Carnaval.)

La Comida Mexicana (Mexican foods)

I thought it'd be fun to begin this blog with photos of foods that are all quite delicious here:

                

 "Pan Tostada" with "Atole"         

This is toast...yes, toast, that comes pre packaged aaaand pre-toasted.  Crazy, huh? Atole I may have mentioned.  It's like a thick, milky tea. Possible flavors may include: Strawberry, Chocolate, and Cookie.  I know there's others. These are just the ones I've tried.

     Mexican Tacos

Left: Taco with steak and salsa

Right: "Choriso" (spicy pork) with beans

Top: Quesadilla with "la salsa verde" (green salsa)

  Note: It is made with thick mozzarella cheese and not enclosed like our quesadillas.  

          

The Equivalent of the 

Mexican Sandwich:      

Bottom: "Una tostada"    

(a crispy tortilla)

Middle: Cold refried beans 

      pureed and ham

Top: cooked potato and 

     carrot cubes; fresh 

     lettuce, tomato, and

     onion; cheese, "crema"

    (cream), and la salsa

     verde (green salsa).

All the food groups on one 

delicious tostada.

 "La sopa tarasca"

This is a fancy and DELICIOUS tomato soup with "la crema" and chiles that have a lot of rich flavor but are not at all spicy.

                               

"Ejotes verdes con salsa mexicana"    

Green beans with Mexican Salsa 

                

"Puntas de filetes con salsa verde y corundas"

Pork tips in green salsa with beans and a tomale-like bread covered in cream.

My teaching went pretty well this week, and I learned some important lessons!  One I learned was in spelling.  I was able to turn two of the workbook pages into a game.  However, since the students rarely have an opportunity to work in teams, they are not accustomed to how to behave in this setting.  I learned quickly that I needed clearer rules, and they needed to be rules that were fair.  If anything at all seemed to give an unfair advantage to one team, the students were sure to point it out.  At the beginning of the game in which students needed to listen to clues and write spelling words on the board, students crowded around the board to help their teammates and ended up shoving and pushing each other.  I had to stop the game to establish clearer rules about only one person from each team at the board and walking instead of running to and from the board to avoid accidents.  In future game/team settings, I will be sure to give more explicit rules in advance to avoid such problems.  However, I did enjoy using a game versus the traditional way of filling out the workbook pages.  It provided a nice change of pace, since we had over 2.5 hours of class in a row without a break.

I did learn that classroom management is much easier if the students are constantly engaged in some activity or given some task to do.  In a lesson today, I continuously gave the students something to do next.  I noticed that the only students talking or goofing around were those that finished early, so I kept giving them new activities.  I eventually had to bring everyone together so they'd be on the same page.  Eventually, I want to integrate more additional activities outside of the curriculum to keep those students who always finish early engaged in something and challenged.  I realized the importance of this technique of keeping students engaged when I observed my 6th graders in another class.  They were giving presentations one at a time to the class, but during each transition between presentations, the students had nothing to do.  The room erupted into kind of a recess time every single time there was a transition, and it took a long time to bring them back each time.  I don't blame the students.  I think we adults do the same thing if we're at a conference or event and there's a break in the programming/activity.  We start to chat with those around us.  If that is what we do, how can we expect our students to behave any differently?  When my students are given a task, they are overall hard workers during class....even if it's just another workbook page!  They work pretty quietly and diligently as soon as they have something to do and know and understand exactly what is expected of them.  I think I just always need really clear directions at the start and a constant "What should I do next?" list of activities.

This weekend, there is a Carnaval in just about every city or pueblo in Mexico I think.  It's a pre-Lenten celebration (kind of like an extended Mardi-Gras but with more cultural events added in.)  In Morelia, it started on Thursday and will last until Tuesday.  I plan to catch some of the events in Morelia, and I might be going with my host family tomorrow to a neighboring pueblo for their Carnaval.  More on this on Tuesday!

I'll close with a few interesting Spanish phrases/words I've picked up while here.  Some are different from what I learned in H.S. Spanish:

• "Padre" = Cool  /   "Bien Padre" = Waaay cool  ("Qué padre"- "How cool"  is a common phrase here)
• "Andale pués" is their way of saying "well," "um," or filling up space.  It's often used right before saying good-bye
• Everyone here says "Bye" but with a really odd accent (to me).  I'm sure you'll hear me use it when I return!
• "Panza" = Stomach (not "estómago")
• "Cholla" = Head (not "cabeza")
• "Pasto" = Grass (and it's what they use to refer to the lawn...not "césped")

Sights of Morelia

This is La Casa de La Cultura.  It is an ex-convent and now houses some cultural events and Mexican art work.  The pegs sticking out of the side of the top of the building are the rain gutters.  These is a pretty common style of gutter on the older buildings.

This is the gaspacho that Sonia and I ate.  It is just a cup of fruit, but it is covered in limón and orange juice, chile, and cheese.  Most of the fruit here is eaten with condiments on it (in shops, at parties, at school, everywhere).  The flavor was a bit strong for me, but I ate it all!

This is the fireworks shooting off from the Cathedral.  There are fireworks from the Cathedral every Saturday night and sometimes other nights, too.  I can't believe I saw fireworks in February!

This is the Cathedral downtown all lit up at night.  You can see all the people packed around to see the fireworks!

This is the aqueduct in Morelia, one of the most famous architectural structures.  It is a very long structure, probably spanning at least a mile long.  It used to carry water within the city but is no longer in use.  I ride along this structure every day on my way to school.

I can't believe that this is my fourth week here, and I'm coming pretty close to the middle of my time here!  Wow! 

This weekend was fun.  I saw more of Morelia, since Sonia and I walked around Saturday night and Sunday morning/afternoon.  I love that I am within walking distance from all of the major cultural/historical attractions.  I will have to check more of them out during my time here!  I have photos of some sights above.  Other places I've visited include El Museo de Dulces (museum of sweets) and El Museo de Arte Colonial.  Since you can't take photos in many of the museums here, I don't have photos from these places.  However, I learned a couple interesting things.  Sweets/candies is a major product made here, and it has been since before the Spanish colonization.  Sweets are still made with natural ingredients like the pulp from fruits and sugar. At the museum, we got a little test taste after watching how the sweet was made. :) At the art museum, the Colonial art was all Christian and included many crucifixes.  I learned that some of the crucifixes were made from the husks of corn (how resourceful!).  Something I find sooo interesting is that all of the images of Christ and the saints in all of the churches and museums here have completely white skin, even though we know that Christ wasn't actually white.  I think it must be the Spanish colonial influence.  (As an aside, the toy dolls are all mostly white in stores/markets.  It bothers me that I haven't seen more images of Mexicans represented in the dolls, especially since they're clearly the majority here.  It really opens my eyes to the "White" power/privilege on a more global level.)  Well, that's about all for my cultural update.

On the school front, I'm keeping quite busy.  We're a bit behind in the February book.  It is hard to keep up with the breadth of material and still make sure students are understanding the content.  Today, I went back in math to review one of the pages and answer questions students had.  At the same time, I need to think of some additional activities for the advanced students.  When I gave the students work time, three of them had already done the page.  I have some sudoku puzzles (A puzzle in which you have to fit the numbers 1-9 in each box, each row, and each column) from a book I brought along, which I think might work well for them.  It would still relate to math, since they'd have to practice thinking logically.  I also think it could offer them a challenge, since the puzzles are sometimes challenging for me!  As I take over more of the classes, I want to integrate more activities for students to do when they are done with their work.  Too often, students have dead time as they wait for others to finish their work.

I asked my host teacher if I could convert some of the workbook pages into activities or games to complete them, and she said that would be fine.  I plan to find some ways to do this, since I think it would be much more motivating and engaging for the students.  I also think it would make classroom management easier.  Many times when there are behavioral problems in the class, I can tell it's because the students are bored and not interested in the content or the typical lecture/worksheet way in which it is always presented.  

As far as classroom management, I've begun trying out some non-verbal ways of managing the class.  The students are used to hearing a voice telling them to stop doing something, but instead, I've been trying to use the "teacher look" and proximity (walking closer to/standing next to those who are talking).  This has been fairly successful so far.  Students notice that I'm watching them, and they snap back to attention most of the time without me having to say anything.  Since students are slow to move back to their seats from group work, I've started giving them a countdown from 10.  This seems to help a little.  As time goes on, I hope to experiment with some more classroom management techniques.

I'm going to get going.  I think either tonight or tomorrow I'll be helping my host cousin make some baby shower invitations, since she is expecting in late March! 

Trying to Think Outside the Box but Teach Within It

Here is a photo of me with my cooperating teacher, Miss Monica.  We are decked out in red and pink for Valentine's Day. Note the palm trees surrounding Varmond School.  I looooove them.

On Friday, we had a Kermesse at school for Valentine's Day.  Each grade had 1.5 hours free to go to the party. They could play games, purchase food and V-day gifts, and attend the Disco (the name for dance places here).  This was very exciting for the students.  Above I've included a video of the students dancing to give you an idea of what it was like.  I think this song is popular here, since it was also at my host mom's uncle's b-day party.  I think it's funny, because it reminds me of the country songs that we dance to in the U.S., and everyone here seems to know how to dance to it and enjoy the song!

This week in school, I taught how to make pop up (3-dimensional) heart cards in Composition, so my students could make them for their V-day card exchange.  Each student received a name of a classmate and had to make a card for them.  Overall, the cards turned out very nicely, and many of the students enjoyed making the pop-ups.  I quickly learned the challenges of giving clear instructions to a group of 27-28 students at one time.  Since making the pop-ups was really challenging for some students, I made sure it wasn't a requirement for the assignment.  One thing I learned about the Composition curriculum is that there really isn't a clear assessment method set up.  The grading seems pretty subjective to me.  I plan to write a general rubric for comp. work so that I can be sure that I'm grading more fairly and designing assignments in which the students know exactly what my expectations are.

In math, I came up with a really brief kinesthetic activity that worked well.  For teaching multiplying decimals by multiples of 10, I had students stand and take steps to each side saying "multiply" and "divide" to help them remember which way to move the decimal point for each operation.  I liked that this was a quick, effective, and fun warm up.  Afterward, all of the students seemed to remember which way to move the decimal in the problems!  I think I need to include more activities like this that are brief, since this is about all we have time for normally.

I was able to talk about the challenges of the curriculum with my cooperating teacher, and we seem to be on the same page.  There's always so much content to cover, and almost none of it overlaps or is connected.  Each content area is pretty much a separate subject entirely, which makes for a curriculum with a lot of breadth and minimal depth of understanding.  We must cover 7 content areas during the week, and we only meet with each class for 1.3 to 2.5 hour each day depending on the day.  Also, because we are required to have the students fill out all the workbook pages, regardless of how valuable they will be for our students, there's only so many of our own ideas that we can include in the classroom.  It's frustrating to have to teach within this box all of the time.  My biggest challenge is to think outside of this structure a little.  I still need to work on being more creative with the workbook pages and the few additional activities that we can include.

One student made a really interesting observation, which spurred a lot of reflection for me.  He asked me how long I've been studying Spanish.  It's been about 8 years for me (a little less, since I didn't take Spanish every semester in college).  He then noted that they, in sixth grade, have been learning English for about the same length of time!  Honestly, they've spent much more time than me in English classes in this bilingual school setting.  Here I am in this Spanish speaking country, able to use my Spanish to communicate with my host family, colleagues, and others around the city.  I still struggle with the language barrier here and sometimes need people to talk a tad slower, but overall I can function living here.  When my students try to talk to me in English or ask me question, it's usually a big chore for them.  I can tell that they are still translating one word at a time many times and often searching for words they don't remember or know.  In their writing, their grammar often reflects Spanish grammar patterns more than English ones.  This tells me that they're still not able to think in English in the way that I can think in Spanish.  I find this really problematic, because they've certainly had more time devoted to their foreign language than I have to mine.  I think this problem is partly rooted in the fact that the curriculum does not include many opportunities for talking in English, which I believe is an integral part of language acquisition!  One of my major goals now is to restructure the way in which I utilize the curriculum books so that the students are talking in English much, much more.  I want them to gain a level of comfort and confidence speaking English.

All right, well I best be going.  Frida, my host sister's 4 year old daughter who is visiting today with her family, has been begging me to play a game with her!  The game is called "el lince," and I've never seen it before or heard of it.  I hope I can learn how to play!

This weekend, I hope to check out some of the museums here.  I live in the historical center of the city within walking distance (of 20 or 30 min. max?) of all the major historical buildings and museums.  Cool, huh?  I also home to rest my voice a bit and recuperate more.  My cold is muuuch better, but I still have a bit of a sore throat.

I will leave you with this Spanish Joke I learned this week:

--"¿Quál es el pollo que te quiere más?"  ("Which is the chicken that you want most?")

--"¡'Po yo!  (Which is an abbreviation for "Pues yo" which means "Well me!")

--Jajajaja (this is how you write "Hahaha" in Spanish.)

Under the Weather but Onward with Teaching

I’m a bit under the weather this week, just with a head cold, so this will probably be a little shorter than usual.  My weekend included a mix of activities.  Friday night while walking around the city with Sonia, I saw a clown doing a street performance.  He juggled and rode a unicycle, much like American clowns, but he was much, much funnier.  His vocal expressions and jokes were much funnier than what I’m used to seeing.  Saturday, I decided to try out washing clothes by hand.  My host family does not have a washing or drying machine, so they do most of their laundry by hand using tepid or cold water, a few buckets, and a few drying lines they have in part of their house.  (This method of washing clothes is fairly common for the Mexicans of middle and lower social classes.)  Have you ever tried wringing out a soaking wet sweatshirt by hand?  It’s quite the chore.  Although washing clothes by hand was tiring, I thought it was a neat way to be more in solidarity with my family and embrace their simpler way of living.  Saturday night, I went to La Plaza Morelia with Sonia and a 10-year old who is the daughter of a doctor, who Sonia works with in her hospital internship.  The girl is also in a bilingual school and wants to improve her English, so we talked in English for the night.  At La Plaza, we watched salsa dancing.  The show included professionals in elaborate costumes dancing with very quick feet and fancy turns.  On Sunday, my host sister, who lives out of town, came with her three little kids, so I spent most of the day with them.

This week, I’m teaching composition, spelling, and math.  Composition is fun, because the main project is making Valentine cards for an exchange on Friday.  I’ll be showing them how to make pop-up (3-dimensional) cards tomorrow. J  I learned that the students really enjoy competing against one another when I had them race in teams today to write spelling words on the board.  I think activities like this outside of their book are more engaging.  Although the curriculum doesn’t allow much time for such activities, I’m going to try to fit more in.  Although sixth grade is supposed to be a review from all the primary grades, I learned that math is a difficult content area, at least for some of the students.  I need to be really thorough in my explanations and check for understanding frequently. 

My main goal this week is to be very clear when I am teaching (explaining content, giving directions, etc.)  I have to keep reminding myself that my students are all learning English as a second language.  Sometimes I speak too quickly for them or use words that they don’t understand (just as most of the Mexicans do when I try talking to them in Spanish, so at least I can sympathize!).  I am working on slowing my rate of speech down, repeating instructions, and thinking about what words I use to explain something.  I’ve also found that using more visual aids with my explanations is very helpful.  The nice part about this placement is that I teach everything twice.  I enjoy having the opportunity to teach something a second time, so I can adapt and improve parts that didn’t work the first time.

Here’s a fun cultural fact to finish this blog:  Mexicans eat hot dogs, but they call them “Salchichas.”  They sometimes eat them in a bun, but I’ve more commonly seen them in a soft tortilla like a hot dog taco!  They also add things to them like salsa and chile, which makes them quite uniquely Mexican.

Note: Friday’s blog may appear on Saturday, since on Friday, the teachers have a V-Day party at the elementary coordinator’s house.  

Extra Extra.....Just Photos!

Above is a pot full of pozole, the soup made of corn and pork. If you look closely, you can see that the corn is much different looking than the corn we would put in a soup. 

Below, is another view of the pozole.

Above is a pot full of tomales, the food we ate for El Día de Las Candelas.  You don't eat the corn husk, just the stuff inside.

Below is the flag of Mexico, which stands really tall on a mountain top in Morelia.  I can see it from the streets around my house, but it appears really tiny.

This is the outside of my host family's house.

I am cold....in Mexico...haha.

Guess what? I am in fact cold here in Mexico. Sometimes, I think I'm colder at night and in the morning than I would be in the Upl.S. This is because, houses and buildings in general here do not have any heating, since they don't really need it! Well, the low here will reach 40 or 50 degrees at night. That means that it will in fact reach about 50 or 60 degrees inside every single building. Varmond has many walls made completely of glass or plexi-glass, so the cold comes right through. Still, I'm quite grateful to be avoiding the weather in which your wet hair turns to icicles and the inside of your nose freezes. I told people here that this is how cold WI is right now, and they couldn't imagine it. Haha!

Even though this week was a short one for us, it still felt quite long. Tuesday through Thursday was spent mostly in finishing workbook pages, preparing for the open class, and having the open class. The open classes with the parents went well on Thursday. The second one was better than the first, since we learned how to organize the games better from the first class. My role in the open class was the math problems in English. I held up a problem related to fractions, and the students had to run to the tables to find a card with the answers. Sometimes, we had parents participate and answer the problems, which made it more fun. The open class gave me a chance to meet some of the parents, and talk to the Principal and Academic Dean of the school a bit. All of them were very friendly! The Principal said he'd love to have more student teachers come from SNC! :) (He even said that 5 or 10 student teachers at a time would be great! I'm not sure if we could pull that off, but for any of you considering student teaching abroad, know that you're more than welcomed in Morelia, Mexico!!) Honestly, a student teacher that comes here wouldn't even have to know Spanish, since it's a bilingual school with classes in just English.

I did get a little more used to the grading system here. I think it's a challenging one, since there seems to be a quota for the number of quizzes and homework assignments that are entered into the gradebook each month. This week, I felt like we had a lot of quizzes just for the sake of having more grades to consider in the average. This made me wonder how authentic all of the assessments were. I think I will have to be careful in my teaching to make sure that I plan out quizzes in a way that they are quality assessments and not bunched up at the end of the month.

I'm still grappling with the fact that the worksheet curriculum doesn't allow room for the learning process. Because all of the students must do the exact same workbook pages at the exact same rates, there is very, very minimal room for differentiation. However, I've noticed a huge range of abilities in both classes. Somehow, I'm going to need to be creative with those worksheets and figure out how to integrate more differentiation so that I can meet all of the students' needs. I noticed from the gradebook, that some have consistently low or failing grades and averages. These grades are marked in red pen, and as I flipped through all the grades from the year, each page seemed to have at least a fourth of the page in red!! I think teaching in a way such that all students can reach proficiency will be likely my biggest challenge student teaching here.

This weekend, I'll be exploring Morelia a bit more. I met a girl here, Sonia, from Oregon, and I think we'll be wandering around the city together to see more of it.

P.S.  On the computer at CCL, I wasn't able to see the video on my blog.  Now, on my Mac, I can see my video.  Hmm....so, if some of you aren't able to see my video from the last blog, please let me know (in a comment), and I'll try to figure out what's up.  Thanks!

Relaxed Weekend, Crazy Week Ahead!

This last weekend was a long weekend, due to El Día de las Candelas. This is the day of the presentation of the Christ child, which is celebrated in the Catholic Church. It is 40 days after Christmas. This is the day that Mary brought the baby Jesus to the Church. Before this day, it is believed that Mary stayed at home with the baby to protect him from the cold. As a side note, my host parents told me that traditional Mexicans abide by this 40 day rule. After giving birth to her children, my host mom stayed at home with her babies the first 40 days. Anyway, for El Día de las Candelas, the 2nd of February, many schools and work places close. People go to churches for Masses and to bring candles as a way to celebrate the presentation. In a motion of veneration, some move toward the altar with their candles on their knees the entire way. Mexicans also bring Jesus dolls swadled in white cloth to stores or religious places to have them dressed up for the presentation.

The food used to celebrate this special day is ¨los tamales.¨ This food symbolizes the presentation of Christ, because it is a warm cake-like food wrapped up in a corn husk, just as the Christ child is wrapped up in a blanket like un tamal. (See attached photos.) You don't each the husk...just the inside. Tamales come in sweet or salty kinds, some with meat, fruit, raisins inside, and the sweet ones are often colored either red or green with dye. Whoever finds the plastic baby doll in their cake piece on El Día de los Santos Reyes (the 6th of Jan.) must make tamales for everyone for el día de las candelas. My host uncle found the baby doll, but he must not know how to cook. My host mom had a party for her family with tamales, atole (a drink kind of like chai tea but creamier), and pozole (a soup with pork and corn, to which you can add fresh radish, onion, lettuce, chile, and limón (lemon)). I helped make some of the tamales. In Mexico, the traditional way of cooking is mixing things by hand with a wooden spoon and sometimes even with your hand. My host mom labored over the tamales for hours, because she was stirring huge bowls of flour, sugar, butter, etc. all by hand. I tried it for a while, but my arms are noooot that strong. Her work was worth it, since the tamales were delicious, and we have enough to eat all week long!








This weekend, my family took me to Pátzcuaro, a city nearby to Morelia. It is known for ¨La Danza de los viejitos,¨ which is a dance of the Purépecha, the indigenous people of that region. I took a short video of this dance, which you can see above to the left! The buildings in this city are beautiful, colonial ones, all in red and white trim. The one to the left is part of El Palacio de las Once Patios. This used to be the home of El Rey Caltzontzen, a Purépecha king. Above, you can see me sitting in the bath tub (el baño) of this king. Many of the colonial buildings like this are now used to display and sell the crafts made by artesans. There are many, many more artesans here than in the States.

Although the weekend was rather long and relaxed, this week at Varmond is rather crazy. All of the teachers are stressed, because this is the week of open classes, when parents are invited to attend class. However, they´re not just coming to a normal class to see it. We are putting on special presentation-type classes for the parents, and moreover, we need to make gifts to give the parents. The theme is recycling and helping the environment, so we´re making the Varmond insignia out of egg cartons and stryofoam balls. I have a lot of painting to do tonight to prep materials. All these gifts need to be finished by the 6th grade open class this Thursday. To add to this, grades are due soon for January. Varmond´s AMCO curriculum has monthly issues. Since the English classes are a bit behind in the January book, we´re trying to squeeze the last of it into this week, and my cooperating teacher and I are doing lots of grading to finish up the month. This makes teaching hard, since the focus is mostly on just getting all the workbook pages done and graded instead of focusing on student learning. This will be a good lesson for me in curriculum time management.

My main goals for this week in the classroom are to help keep everything running as smoothly as possible and learn the ins and outs of the grading system. I am doing a little less teaching this week, since the majority of class time is getting ready for the open class and breezing through the workbook as fast as possible. In the meantime, I'm trying to brainstorm ways to integrate process into the curriculum, since most of the contents focus heavily on the answers and final products. From grading some of the students´ work, I can tell they need more guidance and direction in certain areas. Their compositions had many, many grammatical errors, spelling problems, and often needed organizational help. I think that it may help in the future to give them a rubric, so they know exactly what is expected of them. I would also like to introduce them to the idea of writing outlines and rough drafts even though the book only gives room for a final draft. I brought up the idea of putting up some grammar rules on the walls as reminders for the students, and my teacher seemed to like this. I might work on that this week if we have time. If not, then this weekend for sure.

Another challenge I forsee in the classroom is that my teaching and classroom management styles are quite different from the two 6th grade teachers. The students are accustomed to teachers who raise their voices to get their attention, point out their academic and behavioral mistakes, and teach via oral lecture the majority of the time. I don't naturally have a loud voice, so this simply won't work for me. I will probably introduce either some hand signals, songs, clapping, or some other form of getting the students' attention while I teach. I also prefer classroom management that is silent (eye contact with students, walking toward students who are talking, hands motioning toward work that needs to be done, etc.). While teaching, I prefer to have the students talking more than me, so that I´m more of a ¨guide on the side.¨ I think it may take a while for students to get accustomed to my teaching style, but I hope I can figure out how to integrate my style in an effective way. That´s a bigger goal I have for the duration of my student teaching.

And...well...if you haven´t had enough to read yet....

Here is some random cultural info to entertain you:

• If I ever miss the U.S., there is a Sears, Sam’s Club, McDonalds, Applebee’s, Burger King, Subway, KFC, Pizza Hut, and Domino Pizza here.
• My family took me to la Plaza Morelia Sunday night, which is essentially a mall. It is much like American malls, except all of the shops are smaller than ours, and there is live music (and sometimes dancers) there performing free of charge every Sunday night.
• Many of the trees here are painted in white on the bottom half of the trunks to protect them from diseases.
• It is also “winter” here. I get a kick out of seeing people bundled in scarves, hats, gloves, and winter coats when I leave for school in the morning.
• At the stoplights, the “walk” sign figure moves! First the figure is walking. When you’re running out of time to cross the street, the figure starts running, and a count down begins. When you’re out of time, a still, red figure displays.
• Breakfast is in the morning, “La Comida,” the biggest meal of the day, is between 2 and 4p.m. (3:30p.m. for me), and la cena, a light dinner is between 8 and 10p.m.
• There are rarely any stop signs here, so you have to just slow down at every corner if there isn’t a stoplight. A common way of slowing cars down when necessary is “los topes,” what we would call speed bumps. They’re everywhere!
• All toilet paper goes in the garbage can, since the sewage system can’t handle it.
• The most common greeting/farewell here is a handshake with a kiss on the cheek or a hug with a kiss on the cheek. (Sometimes, this just means touching cheeks and kissing the air. It depends on the person.)
• Only purified water is safe to drink here, so work places and homes have large jugs of water.
• Some of the music here is American music translated into Spanish, for example, Elvis songs.
• Here, it is customary to eat with your arms and elbows on or above the table and eat with your hands (things like a piece of steak or fish). I'm trying to get used to this so that I don't come across as a snobby American.

Wow, well this was long. Bless your heart if you read this all!!