https://padlet.com/carolinaanticev1/dxahaagu44qp (should've been Kindergarten but I've got bigger and advanced students) en-us 2018-09-04 23:14:45 UTC 2023-10-06 08:27:43 UTC hello@padlet.com https://padlet-assets.s3.amazonaws.com/icons/Apple.png carolinaanticev1 https://padlet.com/carolinaanticev1/dxahaagu44qp/wish/277782223 My first observation

I went to Primo Capraro Institute and I was greeted by the teacher. She was nice and introduced me to the class, who had 18 students.
I felt very welcomed, students would come and hug me, ask me questions about myself and just interact with me any chance they got. I never teached children that little and seeing the teacher made me a bit anxious since I realized I had to dance and make silly faces for the students, which I never did in my entire life (my cousins and me are the youngest members of the family). Dealing with little kids was going to be very challenging, at least I thought so. 
There was one student, Ian, who spent the entire class crying, getting angry, being anguished. The teacher didn't seem to care and wasn't very nice to him. That caught my attention. The activities were nicely presented and as the students had different rythms, some of them finished while others didn't even start. 

]]> 2018-09-04 23:17:38 UTC https://padlet.com/carolinaanticev1/dxahaagu44qp/wish/277782223 carolinaanticev1 https://padlet.com/carolinaanticev1/dxahaagu44qp/wish/278168463 The teacher told me that her idea was to introduce a new topic (rooms of the house) so I would be in charge of doing so. 
She had some material that she was planning on using with the students so I picked some things (copies) and found a good stack of flashcards that would be super helpful at the time of explaining since little students are very visual.]]> 2018-09-05 19:27:28 UTC https://padlet.com/carolinaanticev1/dxahaagu44qp/wish/278168463 carolinaanticev1 https://padlet.com/carolinaanticev1/dxahaagu44qp/wish/278217313 The night before my first class I was looking at every detail, trying to look where things could go wrong, making a plan b, c, d (up to the z).
I went to work at the office and at 14:00 I had the class. I spent all morning with my stomach closed, I was so nervous I can't even explain it. When I arrived, the teacher greeted me and so did Stephie, the Lenguas Vivas tutor that was going to observe me. 
I greeted the students and we went to the back of the class to have the "circle time". We sang the hello song and I asked them how they were doing. 
One thing that really caught my attention is that the teacher, from being very nice and helpful, became very possesive of her students and would have a very straight face during the whole lesson. That made me feel very anxious and uncomfortable. Anyhow, I somehow managed to ignore that and the students were lovely, they finished their activities and got really surprised when I gave them a smily face sticker while correcting their activities.
It was a very interesting experience. ]]> 2018-09-05 22:38:59 UTC https://padlet.com/carolinaanticev1/dxahaagu44qp/wish/278217313 carolinaanticev1 https://padlet.com/carolinaanticev1/dxahaagu44qp/wish/278218230 I dreamt about the hello song, the activities I chose and even the straight face of the teacher.
I woke up, had coffee and thought "I can do this". I went to the school and entered the classroom, greeted the students (who were hugging me and telling me silly things about them and their day) and started pasting the flashcards on the board. 
Remember I talked about this student Ian? well, when I got there, his father was yelling at him and mistreating him because he took a stuffed animal to the class. He was being really mean and Ian's face was between fear and sadness. It broke my heart. Then, the spanish teacher came in and started yelling at him for whatever other reason. I thought the school doesn't realize that this is a very sensitive and (in my opinion) abused child. I guess some people missed the pedagogy class.
This time I felt so lose, it came so natural to me to explain, be around the students, help them when they needed and just be there in general.
The class really flowed. I smiled at everybody at all times, especially to Ian, which was at first undecisive on trusting me I guess, but by the end of the class he was laughing and didn't cry the whole time! I was so happy about that.
This is just a commentary off topic but before being students, they are human beings, little fragile human beings. We are not only academic teachers, we must teach them how to be nice, how to respect and be respected, we must always speak from a non judging place and with a warm heart. Students can feel this, school is like their second home. We can't be stone cold or careless, not about them nor about their performance.
Anyway, the class ended and they hugged me and wanted me to go play with them but I had to say goodbye so I hugged them back and went my way. It was a very fullfilling experience. I will remember them. ]]> 2018-09-05 22:46:57 UTC https://padlet.com/carolinaanticev1/dxahaagu44qp/wish/278218230 carolinaanticev1 https://padlet.com/carolinaanticev1/dxahaagu44qp/wish/278223357 These are some of the name tags I collected. I made them do it the first class during "circle time" and I made them stick it on their clothes so I could call them by their names during the class. They re-used it the second class.]]> 2018-09-05 23:21:27 UTC https://padlet.com/carolinaanticev1/dxahaagu44qp/wish/278223357 carolinaanticev1 https://padlet.com/carolinaanticev1/dxahaagu44qp/wish/278223997 This was the song we sang the three clases during "circle time". We sang it and we did the dancing.

]]> 2018-09-05 23:24:35 UTC https://padlet.com/carolinaanticev1/dxahaagu44qp/wish/278223997