Teaching Week 16: More Old Macdonald, and Night at the Theatre

Overall, this past week, I mostly focused on reviewing the farm animals with the help of the Old Macdonald song. In most of my older classes, I started talking about the rooms of the house. We did an activity where each student got a little house and pictures of four animals. They had to put the animals in the correct rooms of the house. Later, they got to work in partners and one partner placed an animal inside the house and the other had to figure out which room the animal was placed in.

On Tuesday, I usually start the day off with the oldest kids, but today they had special guests come in and give presentations about the environment so I taught the little kids (5 year olds) instead. The guest speakers were pretty young and I even made friends with one of them! I never really expected to meet anyone around my age at the school, so it was a nice surprise :).

Tuesday afternoon I had lunch at the high school.

yum yum lunch

Tuesday evening, I had my adult class. I had them watch a tourism video on Atlanta, and then they planned trips with a partner around the city. I gave them each maps and they had to figure out where they wanted to go, what they wanted to do there, how they were gonna get there, and the directions to those places. It was interesting to see what spots interested them most in Atlanta. The majority wanted to go to the World of Coke and the Aquarium. Then, they had to present their trips and give directions to others. At the end, I gave them directions and they had to figure out where I was taking them by analyzing the map. Overall, I think it was a useful lesson for them. And one of the adults brought bugnes, which are beignet-like pastries with powdered sugar. They were tasty!

I had to quickly get to the theatre after I finished the adult class, because I had tickets to a show! I went with my roomies and Fatima. The show was called File Tone and it was a very strange, but entertaining show. It consisted of five men, who seemed to be of different origin. They spoke some Spanish, Italian, French, but mostly English. It must have been hard for some of the older french people to understand, and at some points they were even joking around and telling people to translate jokes for non-english speakers, lol. It was a variety show consisting of juggling (hats and pins), beat-boxing, breakdancing, comedy, cross-dressing, dance, and little skits. Here is a youtube video that gives you an idea of the show: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7NeW42YLoIs

Before the show at the theatre

On Wednesday, I went for a run after my morning classes which felt really good! I ran to the port and next to the river for a bit. I took this panorama near the river.

great day for a run

In the late afternoon, I met up with my friend William (who I had met at school the day before). In the evening, Kate, Kim, and I had dinner at our neighbors. Tim cooked some delicious pizzas for all of us! He made three varieties: a vegetable one, a spicy chicken one, and a lamb one. My favorite was the spicy chicken!

two of the pizzas: lamb and chicken 

On Thursday evening, I left for Switzerland for the weekend and that blog post will be coming very soon!

Magdalena

Valentine's Day, Quality French Family Time, and Quality Friend Time

Friday was Valentine’s Day, but like I mentioned before, Valentine’s day is not celebrated as much as it is in the US. I wanted to do a little something special with my roomies nonetheless :). I proposed that we go to this patisserie and get some tea and dessert. I am glad the girls agreed, because it was so nice to try a new french pastry.

Our choices: I went with the St. Honoré, Kim went with a macaroon variety, and Kate went with a chocolate-vanilla creme giant macaroon

Here I am with my St. Honoré

After our little outing, I hurried back because I was going over to my host family’s house for dinner. I met up my host mom at the school where she works and we did a little grocery shopping on the way home. We went to this french store that had a “Fresh Market” and “Whole Foods” type feel. The products all looked really fresh and they had a candy, nut, and dried fruit bar. After getting some groceries, we picked the kids up from school. 

When we got home, we started cooking quenelles. Quenelles are typical of the lyon region, and I am surprised that I hadn’t already tried them. They were pretty easy to cook, because all we had to do was make a sauce, and rice to go with them. So first, we placed the quenelles in a baking pan. To make the sauce, first, you have to melt about 1/3 of a stick of butter in a pot. Then, turn the heat really low, and add about 1-2 tablespoons of flour and whisk until it is thick and doughy. Then, add milk, little by little, until the sauce becomes thin. Next, add some tomato concentrate (seemed to be about 2-3 tablespoons), and whisk until the mixture changes color to a light pink. Then you are supposed to add some Muscade (nutmeg), but we forgot haha. We were talking about adding it and we picked it up, but them we ended up putting it away, instead of adding it in…whoops! So once the sauce is complete, pour it over the quenelles, and sprinkle shredded cheese (we used emmental) all over the top. Then, it goes in the oven at 180-200 C for about 30-35 minutes. The quenelles were quite tasty! For dessert, we had yogurt and dried dates. 

After dinner, the kids went to bed, and we, the adults, watched some French music awards show. We saw Stromae win a few awards and we saw him perform as well. Stromae is pretty popular here in France, I wonder if he is known in the US??

On Saturday, Luke, Kate’s friend, and Stefan, Kim’s friend came to visit! It was nice to see the two of them again. We all went out together in the evening, and we had a great time dancing the night away :). One place even gave out roses to all of the girls, probably because the day before was Valentine’s day. Anyways, it was so nice to get a flower :). 

Me with my rose :)

On Sunday, I went ice skating for the first time in my life! It was so much fun! I only fell twice, which I thought wasn’t too bad. I skated for about an hour. I had fun with my host family, and I am so happy that they took me ice skating. I skated around the rink and I even pushed the kids around in these little sleigh things. 

The rink is separated for little kids and older people

First time ice skating!

Ice Age painting in the room where you put on your skates

After skating, I came home and had some pizza for lunch with the roomies and guests. After lunch, I went and saw my first Rugby game ever! Our neighbors have been asking us to come watch them play for a while, so we finally had time today. The Roanne team beat the Paris team! It was cool to be there for a win, but throughout the game I got kind of lost. I am not really familiar with the rules, but it was still interesting to watch. There were quite a few fights on the field and some players just got hurt during the game. One boy broke his wrist, and another seemed to have dislocated his shoulder or something. Rugby can get pretty dangerous for the players.

After the game, we got home, and I planned a few lessons before dinner. Tomorrow I have yet another day off, and I am happy I can sleep in after this long, busy weekend.

Love having Mondays off,

Magdalena

Teaching Week 15: Old MacDonald Had a Farm...

So this week, the majority of my lessons revolved around the song, “Old MacDonald.” I taught kids of various ages the names of the farm animals as well as their sounds in english. The difficulty levels of the activities varied with the age of the students. For the very young ones (5-6) I showed them flashcards and wrote the sounds on the board and had them repeat after me. Then, they learned the song through lots of repetition. With the slightly older kids (7-9), I added on a worksheet where they had to match the sound and picture of the animal. They also had to write the animals name next to each picture. For the oldest kids (10-11). They had some partner activities in addition to learning the song. They each received some riddles that described the animals, and their partners had to guess which animal was being described. The riddles were simple and helped review colors and parts of the body, which we talked about earlier on in the year. Then, each partner received a different set of pictures of farm animals and they had to describe their pictures to their partners. For example, one student had one cow in their picture while the other student had two. Then, I had pairs come up and present in front of the class.

Funny side notes: When talking about the animals, all of them knew the word duck already, because of "Donald Duck." I am guessing that he is pretty famous here among the children. Also, they had problems with the word "sheep." Every time they said it they would giggle because it sounds a lot like they are saying "chips" in French. And as soon as I said, Old MacDonald, they all started laughing and talking about McDonald's... haha. Never a dull moment with these kids :).

Other little lessons I taught this week were pretty random, but they were a nice break from “Old MacDonald.” In one of my Tuesday classes, I presented a Powerpoint on San Francisco. I showed them pictures and I even played them a music video of the song, San Francisco by PH Electro, because it does a good job of really showing off the city. After this presentation, the kids were asking when they could start packing their suitcases, haha. On Wednesday, I had two small groups of four kids from my 3rd class. Usually, this class as a whole is a little hard to handle, but in small groups they were great! I have never seen them so focused! We played Guess Who, and afterwards, the kids told me that they really had fun! 

On Tuesday night, I had my adult english class. We started off by a grammar sheet as usual, and then finished talking about the Friends lesson from last week. Next, I told them about the movie, The Wizard of Oz, and I showed them the trailer. Then, we started to just zoom in on the song, “Somewhere Over the Rainbow”, and I had them watch the clip from the movie. After watching it once, I had them fill in missing lyrics while watching it a second time. Then, I played them the same clip but with subtitles so they could check their work. Once they had everything filled in, we discussed the song and what we thought it was about. Next, I talked about covers of songs, and played them IZ’s version of the song. We compared the two and talked about which we preferred and why. During this discussion, the adults taught me two french words: cul cul (which I think means wishy-washy/ludicrous) and niais (which means simple, naive.) I had to look them up on word reference, because I had not heard these words before. At the end of class, we discussed Valentine’s Day and how the US celebrates it versus how France celebrates it. Apparently it is not that big of a deal here in France, especially at the elementary schools. The kids don’t bring cards, candy, and treats for teachers or their classmates. The adults told me that in France, couples might go out to eat at a restaurant, or the guy might buy the girl some flowers. They said it’s not very common to give chocolate to each other or other gifts. For most people in France, Valentine's Day seems to be just like any other normal day. It's very interesting to have these cultural difference talks with French people and I hope I can have more of them with my adults. 

Random highlights from my week:

The Tuesday lunch at the high school had to be one of my favorites ever! I just really enjoyed it all, even though I wasn’t even quite sure what I was eating. I think the main dish was a sausage type thing. 

yum

On Wednesday, it was one of the teacher’s birthday, so she brought Mars bars for her students and she gave me one as well! It was solo good! It was like a milky way but with caramel added.

On the way back home from work Thursday, I saw a really nice rainbow! It was probably one of the fullest rainbows that I have ever seen; it was really a full arch.

Rainbow over la Loire

On Thursday night, Kate, Jack, Camilo’s girlfriend, and I went to this free french rock concert at a youth center. We were hoping to meet some younger french people and we wanted to check out the music. The group was called La Jarry. We were not expecting it to be very good, but we were pleasantly surprised! The group wasn’t half bad. There was a variety of ages there, and some of the older people were having the best time lol. They were dancing and one lady even knew all of the words to their songs.

La Jarry

Enjoyed another good week here in Roanne,

Magdalena 

Weekend in Lyon: Party and Parc de la Tête d'Or

Saturday evening, I took a train to Lyon because there was a party at Tony’s and Flavien’s place. Also, Kathie was visiting for the weekend and I really wanted to hang out with her as well. Before the party, Kathie and I had a cup of english tea while we caught up. Then, we had some dinner(a bolognaise) that Kathie and I prepared so perfectly :P. For dessert, I brought a praluline, because I know the boys love it lol. I wanted Kathie and Magalie to try it as well, and they both liked it! The praline is a hit everywhere. Magalie let me try a specialty of Lyon called, Oreillettes, and they were so good! There are different kinds, but this one was basically thin, crispy pastry with sugar on top. They only sell them during this time of year (Carnaval time). Next came the party, which was to celebrate Tony’s and Flavien’s new roommate, Magalie. She is so nice, and I believe I had met her in October at Tony’s Birthday party. During the party, I had a great time catching up with Kathie! It was so fun to spend time together again! We did some white girl dancing and reminisced about the good ol’ UGA days. I also had a good time hanging with Kim (she came to the party a little after I did). Throughout the party, I enjoyed hanging with Tony, Flavien, Magalie, and all of their friends. They are such a fun group! I really enjoyed dancing at the party :). It was so fun, and it reminded me of the UGA dance parties that I would attend with my sisters and friends.

Kathie and I 

Kim and I slept over at the apartment, and Sunday, we all had some breakfast together. It is always so fun to hang out in Lyon at Tony’s and Flavien’s place, and I hope to be back there again sometime soon! After Kim and I said our goodbyes, we headed off to the Parc de la Tête d’Or. We found the bus (C6) that we needed to take, but during the short trip we stopped paying attention, and we forgot to get off at the right stop lol. It’s alright though, because we just got off at the one after, and there we found a little asian food restaurant where we got some lunch.

Asian food

After lunch, we walked over to the park, and explored it a bit. It’s a huge park with multiple areas to visit. We were mostly interested in seeing the animals, so we headed to the zoo part of the park. Before we got there, I spotted the “ONLY LYON” statue that I have been hoping to see for months now! It was so exciting! I think I was more excited than the kids who were climbing all over it haha. Kim and I had an amusing photo shoot there. At one point Kim had hidden inside the “O” in “LYON” and I didn't realize she was there, and she had to call out to me lol. There were also kids everywhere and it was nearly impossible to get a picture without the kids in the background, so we just found humor in each picture with random kids in it. 

Awesome statue I have been looking for and it was a perfect day to photograph it!

Me on the lion!

Kim and I in Lyon

After that photo shoot, we went to the Zoo part of the park. We saw monkeys, flamingoes, bears, giraffes, ducks, crocodiles, and deer. We only saw a bit of the Zoo, because we were not in a rush to see it all in one afternoon. We figured that we would be back at some point in the future. 

cute little monkey

pelicans and flamingos 

deer

After seeing some animals, Kim and I decided to get some cotton candy! Here it’s called barbe à papa, which translates to dad’s beard…hmmm appetizing… Well, it was delicious, and we enjoyed it. I haven’t had cotton candy in so long!

This cotton candy is a size mini... I wish I took a picture of someone with the large! lol

Then, we continued to walk around a bit more, and we enjoyed the fresh air. It was so nice to spend some time outside, especially when the weather was so nice. It was nice to see families and friends spending time together at the Park. If I lived in Lyon, I would definitely come here for walks and runs. 

Such a pretty park

In the late afternoon, we took a train back to Roanne. As Kim and I were getting off the train, we noticed Clare (another assistant) getting off as well! We talked for a bit and then, Clare and I went to have a tea before she caught her bus. It was nice to catch up and I am always up for a cup of tea!

Love a good cup of tea, especially with a little sweet :)

On Monday, I slept in, and planned lessons. I think that I may be getting a little cold, but I have been taking my vitamins so I hope to fight it off. For dinner tonight, we had a tartiflette, and it turned out pretty tasty! 

yummy tartiflette

 Also, tonight, Kate painted my nails for me! She has some skills :).

Love my nails! Thanks Kate :)

Back to work tomorrow, 

Magdalena

Teaching Week 14: More Singing and Teacher's Birthday Dinner

Overall this week I did quite a bit of singing again. I taught a few of the younger classes (kids aged 5-7) farm animals and the sounds they make. The kids enjoyed this lesson a lot because some french animals speak differently than english ones apparently, haha. Then, we sang, “Old MacDonald had a Farm” to review animals and their sounds. The kids thought that this song was pretty funny. 

I taught the older kids (8-11) different things this week depending on the school. At one school, I introduced rooms and furniture in a house. With another class, we read a little book called, “From Head to Toe,” which is a story about animals and the actions that they can do (gorillas can thump their chests, donkeys can kick, etc.) and then we sang, “If You’re Happy and You Know it” and I had them do all of the motions from the story. We got up to 12 different actions and at the end, they had to remember all of them, (clap your hands, raise your shoulders, turn your head, kick your foot, etc). It went really well and it even turned out to be pretty good exercise! The teacher was entertained by the activity, and I think she even got some pictures and videos of it. I really want to try to get that footage! With another class, we played Guess Who. It was actually quite a challenge for the kids. The entire class was not ready for this game, but some kids rose to the challenge. I explained everything to them and wrote the questions and answers on the board that they could use while playing the game. They played in partners, and I walked around listening and helping each pair. I listened to two little boys who really seemed to have it down, so I had them play in front of the class. They did a great job! So, I remembered that I had some stickers from the US in my bag, so I gave them some after they presented and they got really excited! I made the other kids kind of jealous, but now they have motivation to try harder next week! 

On Tuesday evening, I had my adult class, which went pretty well! The same eight people showed up, and I wonder if the other 4 on my rooster will ever show up… We did a grammar sheet together as a class. Then, I described the show Friends to them. I myself am not that familiar with this show, so I had to do a little research about it. I explained the relationships and background of the show, and then I showed them an 8 minute clip from the Thanksgiving episode where Brad Pitt guest starred. After showing them the clip, we talked about it a little to make sure that they were sure of who was who. Then, I passed out a little bit of the script with words missing and they had to fill in missing words as they listened to the clip. This took a lot longer than I expected because I had to constantly rewind and replay the scenes. After they tried to fill in the words, I had them take turns and each read a line from the scene. It took a while, but I am glad that I over-planned instead of under-planned! I think that was good for the adults because it exposed them to how fast people talk and different expressions that are commonly used, such as, “give a hand” and “how to handle it.” 

On Tuesday, I had lunch at the high school! This time it was a beef with sauce, pasta, veggies, and cake!

yummmm

On Wednesday, Kate, Jack, Melissa, and I met up for tea/coffee at a cafe. It had a cool atmosphere and it made me miss London! 

Bit of London in Roanne

 After tea, we went to the grocery store and I bought these beignets to try! They were so delicious!

I think I love raspberry anything!

Also, Wednesday evening, Kate’s friend Matthew came to visit and he stayed until Friday. He was so nice and I am glad I got to meet him! Also, Kim’s friend Esther left on Friday, and Kate’s brother arrived Friday! It’s been a busy week at our little Roanne apartment.

Friday evening, too many things were going on! There was a party in St. Etienne, my host family had invited me over, and I was invited to a teacher’s birthday dinner. Originally, I was going to go to my host family, but they messaged me saying that their daughter was sick, so it wasn’t the best time for me to come. One of my teachers really wanted me to come to her birthday dinner, so I ended up going to that. She told me to come around 7 30pm, so I got there about 15 minutes late, and I was still the first one to arrive at her house…lol. She just showed me some family photos, and I met her daughter. After maybe 15 minutes, two of her friends arrived, and their daughter (who is good friend’s with the teacher’s daughter). The girls prepared the dinner and they told the teacher not to even enter the kitchen because they wanted to prepare everything for her! It was so sweet! First we had drinks and snacks (chips). Then, for dinner we had a Raclette, which I have tried before with my host family. So you get potatoes and deli meats and you melt cheese over them. It’s really tasty and filling! Then, we had a brownie cake with English cream, which was tasty. We had some good conversations at the table and my teacher’s friends even invited me to come see their farm! The daughter and her friend were so nice too! We talked a lot together and they had selected nice music which played in the background. Overall, it was nice to chat with everyone and at the end of the night, I realized that this meal lasted about 4 hours! I had a good time though, and I am glad that I went!

 So lucky to have met such nice people here in Roanne,

Magdalena

Weekend and Day Trip to Dijon

On Saturday, Kim, Jenny, Esther, and I took a trip to Dijon! We drove there, and it took about 2 and a half hours. It was a shame that it rained throughout the day, but we still managed to enjoy it!

The city was beautiful and it had an awesome self-guided walking tour! There were golden arrows on the ground which led you around the city! We had fun following the path, and finding the arrows! In front of each important location, there was a bigger golden square on the ground with a number and owl on it. Owls are everywhere in this city.

Dijon

More of Dijon

Follow the golden owl arrows!

The bigger golden owl squares

We saw Notre-Dame cathedral in Dijon. On the side of the cathedral, there is a little owl (une chouette), which you are supposed to touch with your left hand and make a wish! It is supposed to bring you good luck :). We started out tour at this church, and at the end of the tour we managed to get back and find the owl!

Notre Dame de Dijon

Pretty stained glass inside the church

The girls also bought some Dijon mustard, which I guess is famous from this region. After we walked around, we were quite chilly so we stopped at a nice restaurant for some warm drinks and nutella crepes. They were soooo good!! It had to be one of the best crepes I had so far. The presentation was just so nice. The server was really cool as well and he even knew some german.

delicious, beautiful crepe

Sooo happy to have this crepe!

 After we warmed up, we continued walking and the rain stopped! We walked into this nice little park and I asked Julie, a girl from Austria take a picture for us. Later, I started talking to her, and I invited her to come with us to see the lucky owl!

Here's the group!

Hopefully my wish comes true!

We had an interesting ride home… we drove on some roads that seemed to be taking us into the woods, and it was hard to see… but we made it home, so it’s all good.

Sunday, I just had a chill day. I went to mass in the morning. There was a young couple there who are going to bike from Paris to Jerusalem. With them, they are bringing prayer intentions from people all over France! I think that this is pretty cool, and I wrote a prayer intention for them to take with them on their journey :). I wish them the best of luck and the priest said that every few weeks he will update us on their progress. 

On Monday, Kate and I attempted to get in a morning swim at the pool. Little did we know, it was closed to the public until 11 30am, because there were school kids swimming. It was disappointing to come all that way, but now we have a schedule of the pool hours which we can use to make sure we come when it’s open lol. I decided to just exercise in my room, which was good as well. Later, I went into town for a walk and to run some errands. It was nice to be outside today, because it was sunny and a bit warm even.

Back to work tomorrow,

Magdalena

Teaching Week 13: Learning Through Songs

This week at the schools I taught about variety of things using songs and other activities. On Tuesday, some of my classes went to the movies, so I got to sleep in a little. With my younger kids, I reviewed the days of the week and food vocabulary. I taught them a little song to help them learn the days of the week. It just involved them repeating the days of the week twice, lol. With the Skype classes, I reviewed parts of the body and clothes vocabulary again with flashcards. I had one group of three boys that were a little out of control… they had trouble listening and repeating the vocabulary in english. They would get up and walk around away from the computer. It’s pretty hard to get them to focus when I am not physically there…. At one point, I showed them a picture and asked them to repeat the word, “glasses”, and one kid said “gracias." We did get a little laugh out of that, but overall it just distracted these kids even more. Oh well, with teaching, there are better days and worse days… It’s good to try to find some humor in the worse days. 

On Tuesday night, I had my 2nd adult class. I had a new student join so now I had 8 people. The new lady seems promising… I started telling her to sign the sign in sheet in english and she responds with: “Huh? I don’t know english…” Well, she might be at a disadvantage to the other students already, more than I originally thought, lol. Anyways, we started off by completing a grammar sheet together as a class. Then, we played a game where I handed each student a celebrity identity card and everyone else had to guess which celebrity they were. The card had a picture of the person and a bullet point description, so that the students had to create the sentences on their own. The adults seemed to like this activity and they even added extra sentences on their own to help others guess their person. Afterwards, we talked about time, and we discussed what time we usually eat our meals. Then, I had them do a partner activity where they had to complete a chart with times around the world. There were two versions of this worksheet so that between the two partners, they had all of the answers. They just had to ask each other for their missing times. Next, in partners, they solved some time riddles, where they had to figure out what time it was in a certain place given a certain time in another place. 

On Wednesday, I reviewed school supplies with the class through a game of bingo. Then we sang, “Old MacDonald Had a Farm”. The kids had to figure out what animals they heard in the song and the sounds they make. In another class, we reviewed sports and actions, by having the students mime the actions when I said the word. Then, we got them in small groups, and they took turns telling the others what to mime. In the last class, we reviewed how to ask the following questions: “How old are you, where are you from, what city are you from, etc.” I had placed identity cards on the board and the students had to ask me questions and figure out which person I was. 

On Wednesday afternoon, we (Kate, Kim, and I) met up for drinks with Fatima and Jack. It had been a while since I have seen Fatima, and it was great to catch up with her again!

mmmm hot chocolate

On Thursday, the first two classes completed the food chart I created last week, by listening to my directions. In this way, they reviewed the days of the week and food vocabulary. With the last class of the day, they wrote sentences based on the food chart. So, they had to follow the chart and write about what the people ate and what day they ate it. Then, they got to be creative and write their own sentences. I told them they could write about any food, they could choose the day of the week, and they could choose any person. I told them that they could even use my name if they wanted to, so I got a few interesting sentences: “On Friday, Magdalena ate a pickle. On Thursday, Magdalena ate chocolate. On Saturday, a crocodile ate Magdalena”…..uhhh what?! lol and “On Wednesday, a bear ate a moose.” We also sang, "If you're happy and you know it" which was a big hit! The kids really enjoyed singing and playing along by doing the commands. 

During our tea/coffee break at school, one teacher brought a kings cake for us. It was an interesting one that I hadn’t seen before. It was pretty good though! I even got the fève this time! There actually turned out to be two fèves! The one in my slice was a little shepherd. 

King Cake

Also, during my lunch break, Kate and I had banana fritters again! Mmmm, they are a great way to use up old bananas! All I used to make them is ripe bananas, flour, sugar, and cinnamon. 

banana fritters

Friday was pretty relaxed. I got a package from home today which was nice! I got some real teriyaki sauce now and some postcards of Atlanta for some of my students. Two of Kim’s friends arrived to visit today. Also, I ate my chocolate frog from the Harry Potter Shop and there was a wizard card that came with it.

chocolate frog and wizard card

Can't believe it's already been a week since I went to London,

Magdalena