Goodbyes and guilt trips

This has been the week of the guilt trip. I had my last day at each of my schools and every day I accumulated more and more drawings and cards and "pourquoi-tu-dois-partir?"s. Here is a small sample of the going-away cards I've received. 

"Thank you for helping us to learn English vocabulary, names of animals, and song lyrics. We hope that you have a good return home."

"Thank you for helping us with English. Thanks to you we know lots of English things and with you we remember the English words. Thank you very much, Katrina. Happy Birthday."

"Thank you for the English classes with you. I would like for you to stay with us, but I can't even stay away from my parents for four days so I understand you want to go back."

"You are the best teacher in the world."

"Katrina, goodbye and thank you for everything and also happy birthday!!!!! I'm going to miss you!!!!!"

"Hi Katrina!!! I hope you have a happy birthday (early). Thank you for coming on Thursdays and one time on Tuesday. And I hope that you have a good (???). And thanks again for coming and working with us. I couldn't buy you a present. Goodbye, Happy Birthday" 

"Arizona, Funny, Smart, Darn? too bad that you're leaving, Unique, Don't Leave, Arizona"

"Katrina, Arizona, Very Pretty, Funny, Unforgettable, Don't leave, America"

"Thank you Katrina for being there for English, it was great. I'm going to write the names of cities and that way you can go visit them. They're United States cities: Dallas, New York, Los Angeles, Denver, Chicago, Detroit, San Francisco, New Orleans, Philadephia, Miami, and the capital: Washington."

"Thank you Katrina for your help with English. I'm marking the cities where you can visit: New York, Havana, Mexico, Dallas, Washington, Los Ang, Canada. See you soon Katrina"

"Katrina, Adorable, Very Beautiful, Funny, Smart, Don't forget us, Arizona"

I'm going to miss these kids.

No Olympic flame, no Olympic games!

Monday was my second to last day at one of my schools. The CM1 (4th grade) class has been working on a set of English lessons for weeks revolving around a 'quest' and the upcoming Olympics in London. In short, one of six suspects stole the Olympic flame and during this week's lesson, they finally eliminated the last suspect and discovered who stole the flame. Surprise, surprise, it was Jessy, the character with the most suspicious-looking mugshot.

"Jessy" wrote the class a letter that the teacher asked me to read to the class... in French. Turns out that Jessy isn't a Brit at all... she's French! She was upset that the Olympic games were going to take place in London instead of Paris and so she stole the flame so that the Olympics couldn't happen at all. However, after the wonderful five weeks of learning about London and its tourist attractions, Jessy had a change of heart and decided to return the Olympic flame. Aww...

"On te pardonne, Katrin--euh, Jessy!"
"Mais non, elle avait raison! Il faut la voler!" 

("We forgive you, Katrin--er, Jessy!"
"No, she was right! We should steal the Olympic flame!")

Then the teacher proceeded to tell the kids that not only was Jessy a French girl disguised as a Brit, but that I was a French girl disguised as an American. They believed him for about five seconds. Greatest five seconds ever.

Wenlock, Olympic Games Mascot

Turkey Day Part II

Happy Thanksgiving! I am so grateful for my family, friends, the opportunities I've had, the generous people I've met here in France, my upcoming trip home for Christmas, and technology. It would have been a sad Thanksgiving indeed if not for the internet and skype.

On Wednesday I had the Thanksgiving dessert gouter with another American family and the other families that live in their building. We had pumpkin pie, cheesecake, carrot cake, banana bread, cranberries, popcorn, and cider, and I brought home some leftover cheesecake and carrot cake for my host family to try. They weren't crazy about the concept of carrot cake but cheesecake is right up their alley.

My actual Thanksgiving day did not start out well at all. I've been coming down with a sore throat for the past couple of days now and yesterday I could barely speak when I first woke up. I had to go teach in the morning, so I chugged some tea and managed to find a single Hall's cough drop in my toiletries bag before heading out the door and resolving to go to a pharmacy and get some cough drops afterward. 

Work was entertaining because, as I've mentioned before, French people know next to nothing about Thanksgiving. I had my CE2/CM1 (3rd/4th grade) classes make paper turkeys and write what they are thankful for on the feathers. A few of them were still a bit confused about the point of the task even after I'd explained that it was a very typical Thanksgiving activity for kids in the US, so it was pretty funny to me when their teacher just told them "Taisez-vous" ("Shut up") and that "today they're pretending to be Americans." Then one kid, a trouble-maker by French standards but to me just a regular silly boy, decided he would color the feathers with green and orange polka-dots and blue stripes. The teacher just rolled his eyes at him like he was a hopeless case, but I thought it was creative and asked him if he was making an alien turkey -- he thought that was pretty hilarious and kept calling me over to check his progress on the "dinde ovni." 

I went straight from work down to the pharmacy to pick up some cough drops but I couldn't find them and when I asked for help, it turns out they keep the cough drops in the back (?). So the lady brought out this box and warned me not to take more than four to six in one day, so then I was a little confused. What kind of cough drops need to be kept in the back and have specific dosage guidelines? 

It turns out that these are no ordinary cough drops. In my opinion, they didn't actually do much to soothe my throat. I still felt congested and although my throat didn't hurt per se, it was slightly numb along with the back of my tongue and having had negative experiences with oral surgery and numbing in the past, I don't associate numbness with happiness.

I spent most of my Thanksgiving coughing, reading, waiting for my family to wake up to talk to me on skype, and sitting directly next to the radiator. Everyone seems to think it's their job to tell me that the weather is usually much, much colder this time of year, but that doesn't make me feel any warmer.

That afternoon I did a google search for how to watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade online and did a small victory dance when I found it on earthcam. Unfortunately, they make the parade look way more exciting on TV than it actually appears to be in person, but Mindy recorded it so I'll be able to watch it with her and my mama when I go back. It's just not the same without seeing the Broadway numbers and other performances. I did get to see the giant balloons though before I got bored and turned it off.

Sock monkey

Uncle Sam

Sponge Bob

Energizer bunny

Dough boy

Ice cream cone?

Ronald McDonald

Pikachu

Snoopy

Mickey

Chatouille decided to watch the parade with me, but I think all she really wanted was to be in the room where the radiator was on full blast. And to add to my sore throat by aggravating my allergies.

Around 9 am Arizona time my parents put on skype so I got to spend Thanksgiving breakfast with everyone, chatting and being jealous of their bagels and cream cheese.

Today I'm off to Pierrelatte for a French/Friendsgiving with the other language assistants and then a day trip Saturday. We're substituting rotisserie chicken for turkey but at least there will be mashed potatoes!

Qu'est-ce que c'est Thanksgiving?

My teaching in France has been a far cry from teaching high school English. I feel like I'm only just now starting to actually teach, and I've been here for nearly two months!

During the first few weeks, I introduced myself and observed each of the different classes for about an hour. I'm working in nine classrooms in three different schools, so there is a lot of variety in classroom behavior and English proficiency. For example, at one of the schools there are several kids from American and British families and even though I'm used to working with bilingual kids at the ISA, I'm still blown away by a child's ability to master languages. However, in other classes, it's a struggle just to get them to distinguish between the French pronunciation of spider (since they know Spiderman) and the English pronunciation of spider. They struggle with the long 'i' sound and have the typical francophone tendency to put more emphasis on the last syllable of a word, so the English pronunciation of spider becomes 'spee-DAIR.' They're making some progress, but there's only so much I can do when I'm only in the classroom for an hour, thirty minutes with one group and then thirty minutes with another.

 
 

images via pinterest

Most of my lessons so far have revolved around Halloween. After teaching the same two or three lessons nine times over the course of three weeks, I am so burned out on Halloween! The French have started celebrating the holiday over the past ten years or so, but their schema of Halloween costumes is limited to the scary. When I showed the two kids from my host family some of the typical kid Halloween costumes, their reactions were quite hilarious: "C’est nul, ça!" roughly translating to "Well that's useless/What's the point of that?" Why wear a princess or superhero costume when Halloween is supposed to be scary? However, I learned that the French dress up in costumes during the Carnival season before Mardi Gras, so there you have it.

Thanksgiving is an entirely different matter. The kids and the teachers know next to nothing about the history and traditions, so I've had the rough task of historian thrust on me. Luckily I brought along a couple of books with illustrations that have helped me to explain pilgrims, the Mayflower, the New World, Squanto, etc. A few of the sharper kids have asked me why the pilgrims and Native Americans are friends in the story of Thanksgiving when they actually fight and kill each other -- that hypocrisy is hard enough to explain in English already, but I'm doing the best I can. 

Me circa 1994 (?) -- An elementary Thanksgiving

Talking about the current Thanksgiving traditions has been more lighthearted. Everyone loves to discuss food, but apparently pumpkin pie is not a typical dessert. I showed them a picture of a pumpkin pie and had them guess what kind of pie it was.

- Tarte aux pommes?
- Tarte au citron?
- Des mandarines?
- Des abricots?
- Tarte aux cérises?

They know not the deliciousness of all things pumpkin-flavored, peuchères. 

I'm going to have some Thanksgiving desserts with the American family on Wednesday and hopefully have a Thanksgiving get-together with the other language assistants in Pierrelatte. I wish I could have some of Mimi's delicious mashed potatoes too, but that will have to wait.

Le stage d'accueil - Grenoble and Autrans

This Monday and Tuesday I went to Grenoble and Autrans for a welcome orientation. Normally assistants go to orientation in the first few days of their arrival to take care of paperwork for immigration, social security, and pay, but since 95% of us had already mailed our documents, the overview of paperwork and the French school system wasn't very helpful or necessary. The most worthwhile part of orientation was meeting other assistants and coming away with some practical activities for teaching in the months ahead.

Unfortunately I continued my streak of being a terrible picture-taker. Not only are there hardly any pictures, but the pictures I do have are a bit random and slightly out-of-focus. 

For example, this picture was taken in the twenty seconds that I stood waiting for a stoplight on my way to the first meeting in Grenoble. Open purse, take out camera case, camera out, camera on, take picture, camera off, camera in case, camera case in bag, bag zipped, done. And that's why the lighting is awful and why I chose the worst view of the mountains from the city. Yay me.

I would have liked to take more pictures of Grenoble, but unfortunately I spent the majority of my time in meetings until taking a bus to a town called Autrans. We spent the night and the next day at a ski lodge/summer camp type place and I managed to snap a picture of the mountains on the way up.

Here are the grounds of the place we stayed at.

After throwing my bags into my room for the night (along with two English girls, one German, one Italian, and one American), I foolishly left behind my jacket and scarf before going on a walk down to the town center.

I don't think the town is used to tourists at this time of year, so the one cashier at the supermarket definitely seemed overwhelmed when we formulated a line of about forty people to buy snacks and drinks.

I like this sign because it reminds me of old Disneyland ride posters.

Sorry for the extreme lack of detail in this post. Tomorrow I'm leaving for les vacances Toussaint and I'm not sure how long I'll be gone for. I promise to come back with more pictures and better stories!

La fin de ma premiere semaine en France

I have officially been in France for a week! Although I expected the first week to go by quickly, it actually has felt quite slow -- more like one month rather than just one week.

I forgot to mention in my last post that I went to Privas on Monday. To get from Bourg-St.-Andeol, I had to take a bus at 6:45 am, make a transfer in another town, and then arrived at the l'Inspection Academique (IA) by 9. My second bus driver was extremely friendly, partially because I chased his bus down and frantically knocked on the window, thinking that it was leaving me behind when it was actually just going to the stop on the other side of the road (where I'd been standing before) to pick up other people (me). After I made it quite obvious that I was not from the area, he kindly asked me where I was from and we proceeded to have a very pleasant conversation for the rest of the ride. He pointed out various sights and towns of note that he insisted I visit. Biggest lesson I've learned so far: Sometimes you have to embarrass yourself to meet people and make sure that you don't get lost!

Our meeting at the IA didn't start until 10:30, so I walked down to a cafe to pass some time and wake up with a cup of coffee. We mostly just took care of administrative paperwork during the meeting so there isn't much to say about that aside from the fact that it was overwhelming. Past assistants weren't kidding when they said that I'd need about ten photocopies each of every document. Madness.

At lunch we (2 American boys, 1 Canadian girl, 5 English girls, me, and JN, the conseiller pedagogique) went to JN's house for lunch. I volunteered to ride along with one of the British girls (L) in her car and follow behind JN. Within three minutes of following JN, we lost him. L wasn't comfortable driving as fast as JN and I don't blame her -- I'd be a little more cautious too if I were all of a sudden needing to drive on a new side of the road! We tried to guess which way he might have gone and made several wrong turns before deciding to simply return to where we'd lost him and wait until he came back to pick up the rest of the assistants from the IA. Sure enough he came back, but we ended up losing him again on our second attempt. Luckily his house wasn't much further and he was able to flag us down.

Here's JN's backyard:

We had pasta, sausage, cheese (compulsory), bread (also compulsory), and grapes. Every time I have grapes in France, I forget that they're not seedless. And the seeds are bitter and unpleasant. Just trust me. We went back to the IA afterwards to make more photocopies and then I began my trek back to Bourg-St.-Andeol.

Tuesday afternoon I visited the two other schools that I'll be working at, but it turns out that they won't need me quite as much as the other school that I've started at. The plan is to be at the main school for a full day once a week, and the other two schools for a half-day each. The teachers at the other schools weren't nearly as friendly as the other teachers I've met so far, but we'll work on that. Hopefully they'll be able to see that I'm just there to help out, not take over.

Yesterday was fairly uneventful. I made my appointment to open my bank account, had a raspberry ice cream with the little girl (P) in my host family and her grandmother, played various board games, got destroyed by P in an Asterix & Obelix themed memory game, and tried this fish pot pie food that I can't remember the name of. Today I observed more classes at L'ecole du Centre (the main school I'll be at) and got to see a thoroughly-entertaining English lesson! The teacher was so nervous that I was in the room but I assured her that I was not going to judge her accent. The kids had to listen and sing along to a song that repeated things like What's your name? What's your address? Where do you come from? What is your nationality? How old are you? etc. I had a hard time not laughing out loud because the person singing on the recording was so monotone and robot-like.

On my way back home, I met the mother of two American students at the school. They're from North Carolina and insisted that I come over for dinner sometime. Although I'm enjoying all of the French practice I'm getting, it's such a nice feeling to be able to listen and speak without needing to concentrate so much.

Next week I'm just doing more observation and going back to the other two schools again. I have some tentative weekend plans to go to some other towns, so hopefully that works out. I'm starting to feel a little trapped in this tiny town because there isn't much of a bus system and I haven't met many people near me yet, but that should improve soon.

Here are some random pictures that hadn't made the blog yet:

 French board games in my room

 Random bird decoration above my bed

 Chatouille

Bridge to Pierrelatte