El Kiwi en Sudamérica

Life at the Grange and other stuff

Hola locos,

OK, I've been working at this school here (The Grange) for just over a month now, and I haven't really been able to tell you all about it (despite saying I would a few posts ago).
Work here for me consists of... Hey why don't I talk you through a fictional typical day!
So, I get up (far too early for my liking- like 7 in the morning-after a late night) have some breakfast, then head off, onto the Metro to School; a trip of about 25 minutes mas o menos. I walk into the rather posh school grounds, look at my time table, and lo and behold I see that I have a class with some grade 5's (about 10-11 I suppose) helping them with maths. So I head off to the class, sit beside one of the slower kids, and help them focus and figure out what the heck they are supposed to do.
So after 40 minutes of that I take three girls from grade 6 (about 11,12)to the library to work on their maths. The first classes with this lot was a bit of a mission/giggle fest, but they've learnt that Yes, you can't laugh the whole time and get nothing done, but I'm not a kill joy either. The libarians seem to be happy with how we're going today, they're all fairly quiet- until one of them asks me 'what is an isoceles triangle' which is something I know I learnt back in the day, so, in a flash of brilliance I asked 'what do you do when you don't know something?', 'you look it up in a book!' . Anyway, I think she clicked that I had completely fogotten- but who cares! It was a great learning experience!
Then I went to the Upper Prep staff room (it's got a way better vibe than the lower prep- I guess it's the 'kindergarten teacher' vibe that many of the teachers have) to grab a coffee and check my email.
So, next up I had a class in first prep (the little ones) and the teacher had a little bit of reading for me to do with them, then a load of cutting out and laminating (sometimes when I'm sitting in the staff room cutting out cards, glueing things together, making cards from stuff the kids have wrote- so much so that I feel as if I am, with lack for a better phrase, 'emasculating myself' for the sake of the school.
So, after that ordeal, it's off to lunch- and I mean lunch. A full on canteen lunch,
Sometimes it's pretty shoddy, but in general it's fine canteen cuisine. Today, some mean kebabs, rice stuff and more...
After this it's off to help with P.E. Because it's book week (and near Halloween) the kids (and teachers) have all dressed up as characters from books (I didn't know that Darth Vader, Indiana Jones and Ronaldinio featured in books, learn something new every day I guess).
So with the first class (about 6 years old) we played some kinda octopus game... Captain Jack Sparrow has some great skills of evasion, as does Indiana Jones.
The next classes played 'protect the cones from being smashed over with squishy balls' (for short) which was a riot. I played on one team and James played on the other... and, of course my team won both times... brrooohahahaha.
After the class I made the mistake of doing some fake Kung Fu to a kid who was dressed as a Ninja. Unfortunately the kid just said 'not funny' but another kid thought it was hilarious, so he unleashed a furious super combo of punches, mainly below the belt- Memo to self: Don't do fake Kung Fu fighting around 6 years ever again
The next slot was cruisy, I arrived and the teacher said 'I have nothing for you to do...' so, off to the staff room to surf the net.... then off to another class, More Maths- at least it wasn't geometry.
So, that was my fictional day... Actually all that stuff happened at different occasions- so you could call it 'historical fiction' (if you get confused in what I've wrote it's probably because I had no idea what tense to right it in...)
So, that's how a normalish day here goes, luckly for me I'm going on some more field trips next week (i've been to a park and a museum already)- twice to a vineyard (how cool is that for a trip) and back to the museum again... should be good times- It was such a misson keeping the kids behaved on the Metro, some had never been on it before (or had only been on the subways in London, NY and Madrid!! Hahahaha, it's crazy teaching the uppercrust, and as you'd expect (sic) I fit in very well, due to my good breeding and social circles back home.

I'll put up some photos soon, look after yourselves.

Nathan

posted by Nathan Sinclair @ 9:11 AM