I taught two classes in my first week. In the first class my tutor said I was good but a bit serious. The students responded well to the topic--favorite books. I was pleasantly surprised by the students' choice of books: cheesy romance novels, to "Angela's Ashes," to much more serious books about the political struggles in Chile and finally, one about an American doctor's travels among the Australian aboriginies--sorry, the titles of the last two escape me. In case you wondered, my favorite book is "Love in the Time of Cholera" by Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
Teaching was fun once I got into the rhythm of being in front of strangers and leading the group. I only had to teach for 20 minutes which at some points flew and other points dragged, just like most things.
The students are adults, ranging in age from ~20 to mid-60s. All are fluent in Spanish, though not all native to Spain. We've got two from Italy, one from Peru, and another from Venezuela. The attendance fluctuates from 6-12 depending on the day, so we have to be prepared for an intimate group or a small mob. Their collective English skills are pretty good as this is an upper-intermediate class that we're teaching. At the end of next week I make the transition to teaching beginners. YIKES!
The second class that I taught was on the grammar of expressions of possibility and probability (*YAWN*). I did well although I forgot my answer sheet to the exercise and mixed up the terms. I was working from a weird little exercise in our book and should have been better prepared. The students guessed at how to correct my error and I caught myself misspelling "probability" with two As instead of two Is. Grrrr.
The students really got into doing the exercises and laughed at my explanation of why "bound" is a term for probability--"It's bound to happen--bound, as in tied, meaning no choice because you are constrained or restricted." I mimicked my hands being tied together and pulled along. *YIKES!* My tutor said it went well but I need to smile more...grammar is not something many people smile about. ;)
Have to run now. I've got another lesson plan to work on. This time I'm not teaching grammar, but rather doing production exercises where the students practice creating sentences using the simple past, past perfect, and past perfect progressive tenses. I've also got a 1000-word essay due on Wednesday that I've done research and a quick outline on, but now need to write a draft.
Oh joy!
