(Home)sick

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I've got my first case of homesickness. It just hit me yesterday while I was at school. I guess it makes sense for it to first hit me about now. The longest I've been away from home on my own is about 2 weeks and I'm usually ready to head back home by then and I've been gone now for 2 weeks. It still seems surreal to think that I have almost 7 more weeks until I'll be home again. It doesn't seem like a long time but it feels so far away. I think it should go by fairly quickly but that won't make it come any sooner. Right now I miss my family, friends, school, and everything else about home (especially Yoshi). I miss being able to drive myself places when I want to and not having to rely on taxis and going everywhere with 3 other people. I especially miss clean air. I'm sure it will pass in a couple of days but right now I wouldn't mind being home instead of being here. Oh well. I knew I'd get homesick at some point, I guess I just didn't expect it to be this soon and for it to hit me this hard.

As far as school is concerned, I taught my first mini-lesson yesterday. It was a 5-10 minute lesson on note taking skills to help the kids while they're researching for a paper they have to write. My coop thought it was great. He asked me to add a couple things for when I teach it to the other class on Monday but otherwise he really liked it. Personally I wasn't thrilled with it. I thought it would be good when I initially made it but during and after I taught it I felt like I sped through it and that it could have been much more simplistic and easier to understand. I think the kids still got some good pointers out of it but I just didn't feel good about it when I was done. I looked over it again when I was done to see if I can alter it but I think the power point I made for it is actually really good. It could just be the way I presented it that made me feel that it wasn't that great. Once I do it again on Monday I'll be able to get a better idea of whether it was effective and it actually was a good lesson or if my thoughts after I finished it yesterday were correct. Even if the kids thought it was horrible, it was a lesson on note taking. I can't think of many things to teach that would be more boring than that. Except for maybe math (sorry Kristin). Even if it was horrible, that's why I'm a student teacher: so I can make a lot of mistakes now while I've got constant guidance so I can fix them and learn to be more effective with my pedagogy.

I'm still having a hard time adjusting to my coop. I really like him and I think he's a great teacher and I'll learn a lot from him, but I'm still trying to get used to how he does things. He's a very hands on teacher, which I really like, but I'm still used to the way my last coop was. My last coop was extremely laid back and gave me very little guidance on anything. He just sort of left me to find my way in the classroom. My current coop is always asking me to help him out and to be involved in the class when I can, which I really like, but is just a huge contrast from what I was used to last year. I'm also still learning how he interacts with his students and runs his classroom so until I get comfortable in the classes I am sort of staying aloof and only getting involved when he asks me to. This should begin to change in the next week or two as I take over more responsibilities in the class and get comfortable with the classes and students.

I sat down with both my coops yesterday and we made a schedule for what I'll be doing during my time here and I should have full responsibility of at least 2 classes beginning this coming Tuesday. They've just finished one section of their unit on Chinese history so I am going to step in now with their next section on modern Chinese history which will last end in the first week in February. Then I'll begin teaching the unit on Thai history until I leave. We didn't make a schedule for the other 2 classes I'm in because the students are working on a research paper for the next couple classes so there's not much for me to do there. I think once they finish their papers I'll step in and take over those 2 classes as well.

Today we visited the Chatuchak weekend market. It's an enormous outdoors market that's open every weekend. Pretty much it's just an enormous flea market. We didn't spend much time there and I didn't buy anything, but I'm planning on going back because I can probably find a lot of gifts for people back home.

The photos posted are the ones from Siam Paragon, the enormous mall I visited last week that I said I would post pictures of. I also posted a couple pictures of the school I'm teaching at.

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Photos

Aquarium in the mall basement
It was expensive so we didn't go in

Lotus
Lotus dealer inside the mall

Parrots
These are parrots that they have inside a different mall we were at

Canteen at school
The canteen (cafeteria) at school

School
One of the many courtyards at school

Morning Assembly
The elementary school's morning assembly. Each school (elem., middle, HS) has an assembly one morning a week and then every Friday the whole school has an assembly. They just use it to go over important announcements and other happenings at the school.

Comments

[cassie]

i'm sorry to hear about the homesickness. but the school sounds good! and it's nice to have a solid schedule for what you are going to be working on. i think it's also nice to have different experiences to be able to compare the two and learn more about yourself