Tuesday, September 2, 2008

First Days of School


This is a picture that I found while cleaning out my room that I decide to put up to remind me of the pedagogical skills and style I'm aiming for.

School is officially in session. In Russia all the schools start on September 1. Always, no exceptions. All the schools try to have these elaborate opening ceremonies, so my walk to work was much more interesting. There were all these little kids in their suits and frilly dresses, carrying flowers for their teachers and parents following with camcorders. Thankfully, the first day at IA was fairly low key. We had the traditional ringing of the first bell by the youngest and oldest student at opening session in the chapel room and then the students went off to their separate rooms where school policies were explained to them. I was out of school by noon.

Today, Tuesday, we got down to actual school. I always feel bad for my first class because I use them to figure out what works and what doesn't. Today was no exception. My classes are divided as follows: 6th (which has 5 Koreans, 1 American, 1 Finn, and 1 Russo-American) 7th+8th (1 American, 1 Japanese, 1 Finn, 1 Estonian, 5 Koreans) 9th+10th (1 American, 1 Finn, 1 Turk, 1 Canadian, 5 Koreans) and 11th+12th (I didn't have them today, so I'll let you know later.). Many thanks to the new Hyundai plant here in St. Pete that gave me so many students who have no idea what I said today. I actually will have a few more Americans but they are still en route for various reasons.

The school is really great from a teacher's point of view because of the small class sizes and I have the lattitude to do pretty much whatever I want. For example, there is no written dress code for teachers. The headmistress, Tammy, who is fantastic, said that as long as we looked professional she doesn't really care. And Friday is casual day. This is like the promised land after teaching at Liberty where I had large classes, 5 preps, a pretty restrictive dress code, these hulking, surly basketball stars, and no ESL teacher. 

I'm really feeling incredibly blessed here. So many little things just work out for me here, like how I don't have a class before the lunch period and can take a long, leisurely lunch; or, how there is a kid here from Missouri who is here to play hockey professionally and misses 3-5 period every day for practice, which doesn't effect my classes at all! All the other teachers are jealous of my location too. I only walk about 20 minutes to work, while most have to catch a bus and/or take the metro. Another thing that worked out was that we found a 6th grade Bible teacher so Aaron (the science teacher) and I don't have to do it, although we do have to cover it this week. My day is Friday. What does one do in 6th grade Bible? I guess we'll figure something out by then.

Oh, Aaron (who's from Arkansas) was really good friends in college with a guy, Paul Burank, who graduated from Liberty that was friends with my sister Annie. Amazing the people you run into in St. Petersburg.

1 comment:

noah! said...

joel, everything looks cool. i can tell by your lack of cynicism that that this situation is far better than liberty. congratulations, you've made it.