Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.

— Albert Einstein

I met the English coordinator who I was talking to prior via email. He is as nice as he was online. He introduced me to all teachers that we saw that morning and as expected I didn’t remember all their names even as hard as I tried. Well at least I was able to remember the names of the teachers that I got assigned to work with. A few minutes later, my co-auxiliaries came. They were all Americans who came from the same university except for one who is an Irish guy auxiliar. I felt a little intimidated by them but I had to trust myself.

School Schedule

I was given the best schedule with my requested Monday rest day aside from the weekends off. I started with a power point presentation talking a little bit of my country. I attached some pictures and did a short introduction about myself. Afterwards, the students introduced themselves. They had tons of questions that consumed the whole period. So pretty much the first week was all about introduction and observation and me trying to figure out exactly how to collaborate in class.

Mainly, I’m with the 6th graders but I have 5th and 4th graders too. I was surprised of the level of English of the children in school given the fact that most Spanish children have little exposure to the English language. I like how each teachers have their own approach and style of teaching. Starting with the 4th grader teacher, he is more of a jolly person and possesses a motivating attitude towards the students. The 5th grader teacher is the one who I like the most as he’s a little bit of everything -enthusiastic, motivating, knows all his students strengths and weaknesses, and strict when he needs to. In addition, I can be more collaborative with him because he gives me tasks, proper instructions, and all the materials that I would ever need. Now onto the 6th grader teacher who I’m with most of the time. In the beginning I was trying to figure out of how to best fit in her class because I couldn’t understand how she tends to be relentless when it comes to classroom discipline. But as time goes by I started to admire her as to whatever her teaching style is, which seems definitely effective. She has this sense of teaching structure that inspires students to push a little more.

Then comes November when people just celebrated Halloween. There was a little party and decorations were set up around the campus. It’s funny how kids are sometimes more creative than me. I also received my first pay.