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Tuesday, September 20, 2005 

Day 19: What can I do with the Mexicans?

I was approached by one of the nuns at school about whether I can welcome 25 Mexican girls in either a biology or technology class in the 3rd week of October. The 9th graders I'm teaching are into their 3rd year of Spanish, so most can hold a basic conversation and make themselves understood.

At first, I said "Sure, no problem" - not realizing that these lovely Mexican girls, who are here via a student exchange program, do not speak a single word of French or English. My Spanish is pretty good, albeit a little rusty, but more than fine to have a casual conversation or discuss a simple topic.

Finding something to do in class, in Spanish and for 50 minutes, relating to either biology or technology, is a whole different story.

I've been lucky so far every time I've had to improvise - it even allowed me to bring the students to corners of my brain I had never been to myself.
It allowed me to shape the way I present things to them differently than if I had taken the time, like a REAL teacher would have, to plan out the lecture.

The only thing that keeps popping into my mind is that we could watch an episode of The Simpsons - the DVDs have Spanish as one of the available languages.

I can't however think of a single episode which would relate to the subjects I'm supposed to teach...

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  • I'm Lolita
  • From Canada
  • Challenges... don't we all love a good challenge? University, married life, a mortgage, kids, keeping my sanity while we cruise through life at 100 MPH... why not try my hand at teaching for a year. After all, a school year is only 180 days - anyone should be able to survive 180 days, right? Well, I'm about to find out - follow my journey and enjoy my trials and tribulations as I embark in this 180 day rollercoaster ride of teenage hormones and drama, spiked with discipline, homework, exams and surprises I'm sure...
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