I'm officially a teacher (or Professor as they like to call me here in Spain)

I have just completed my second full week of classes (both as a teacher during the day and a student at night) and I absolutely love it! I never thought I would like teaching so much but it is great.

Okay to explain fully...I am doing a Masters program here in Madrid and a big part of it is called "la practica" which is basically like an internship teaching at a local school. I use the term local loosely because my particular school assignment involves an almost 2 hour commute for me, each way. Everyday. I take the subway to the train station then take a train to Alcalá where I walk to a bus stop and ride on the school bus with the kids for another 25 minutes. It is fine though because I am very productive on my commute - I always use the time to study and read for my Masters classes and also to plan my lessons for my classes. In my Masters Program there are 64 students and we are all assigned to work at different schools in Madrid and the surrounding communities. My school is small compared to a lot of the ones they are working at so therefore I am the only foreign "language auxiliary" at my school (while many of them are with other Americans from our program). It is fun to be the token foreigner because I am unique. On the first day everyone knew who I was and all the kids knew my name before I even met them. They all seem to think I'm pretty cool and fascinating which I don't mind too much ;) So I teach a different class every hour so I teach 18 different groups ranging in ages from 3 to 18. I teach all three levels of pre-school and 3rd-12th grades. The only grades I don't teach are 1st and 2nd because their teacher is from England so my particular and highly valued skills (speaking English) are not needed. Every class I has is different but they are all some sort of English class: English Grammar, Phonetics, Reading, English Conversation, and whatever you would call trying to teach English to 3 year olds. I will be so happy if they can count to 10 and tell me the colors by the end of the year.

Since I am not actually trained as a teacher I am supposed to always be with a teacher and just assisting them with English. My school is very good about always making sure a teacher is in the room to help with discipline and lesson structure and such but I have pretty much been given freedom to teach and input whatever ideas I have. They are really open and interested in my opinion and really want me help with the lesson plans and grading so it is fun. It is so funny how I found myself thinking back to all of the teachers I have had throughout my life and I find myself remembering and using various techniques and teaching methods of theirs.

I really love all the ages but so far my favorites are 3rd and 4th and high school. The high schoolers are just because they aren't that much younger than me so I can really relate to them and talk to them and just hang out. They class I teach the seniors is English conversation so they really don't care what I do as long as I get them to talk. So my plan is to teach them new and practical English that they will actually remember and learn to correctly pronounce through popular music. They are pretty excited about that. I tried it out last Friday and they loved it. I even had a group of girls volunteer to sing a Beyonce song for the class and it was so fun! I have learned a great deal of Spanish from music and it has always been my favorite and most effective way to learn.

The 3rd and 4th graders are so great because they are old enough to know how to be at school (unlike the 3 year olds who just cry and cry and cry for their moms) and have a pretty decent level of English so I can actually teach them (unlike the pre-schoolers who look at me like I am an alien speaking this crazy language to them). Plus they are still at the age that they are very innocent and love to learn and all want to answer every question and are always volunteering to read, etc. Plus they still love their teachers at that age.

The number one rule of my program is that the kids can absolutely under no circumstance know that I speak Spanish because then they would just speak Spanish to me. At first I found it really difficult to have to pretend to not understand what they are saying (especially when they tell jokes...I laugh without even thinking because it is a subconscious reaction) and I hated having to lie to them when they directly asked me if I really didn't understand Spanish but I have since then seen the huge benefit of them believing that I only speak English. The thing is they really want to talk to me or answer me when I ask them a question so they go out of their way and try so so hard to speak English and figure out the word in English, even when it is very difficult for them. If they knew I understood Spanish they would just tell me the word in Spanish and would learn nothing. Its just funny though because I always understand exactly what they are saying but have to sit there with a blank look on my face and say "what? in english please?". They are even getting better about speaking English with each other if I am around because they know it is rude to speak a language I don't understand in front of me.

All the teachers at my school are really nice and fun. Luckily at my school I don't ever have to do lunch duty (unlike poor Jordan) so I get to relax with all of them during lunch in a private teacher's lunchroom. It's also a great time for me to get to speak Spanish and not have to pretend to be the idiot who is living in Spain for a year but doesn't understand a word of Spanish. I met a couple of other teachers who are close to my age so I hang out with them a lot now so thats fun.

As for my masters classes (it is so strange to be a teacher and a student at the same time...not to mention exhausting), they are going well. I am currently taking two classes and they are on Tuesday and Thursday nights from 4:00-9:00pm. So Tuesdays and Thursdays are really long days because I leave at 7am to go teach, go directly from the school I teach at to the campus where I take my classes and return home around 10pm. Monday, Wednesday, and Friday I leave at 7am, teach all day, and return home around 6:30 pm. So all in all I love it but having any ounce of free time is a simple memory of the past, haha. It's fine though because at the end of the day I feel so happy and fulfilled after interacting with so many kids and seeing the smiles on their faces and the little light bulbs in their heads light up when I teach them something. Plus I'm learning a lot about technical Spanish and Spanish and Latin American history at the same time. So my brain is on overdrive, but I like it. Now I must go work on a paper so I will leave you all. But coming soon will be many funny stories about my kids since they are pretty much all I talk about now. Jordan and I get home everyday and spend about an hour talking about what our kids did that day. Thank goodness we are both teachers because I don't think any of my other friends would understand or want to listen (just like I'm sure that no one has made it to the bottom of this long blog except my grandma and mom, haha).