Que huevos!

Hey All,

I finished my first week of teaching this week (...well, I start another class tomorrow, but that´s a story for later on), and I believe I´ve pulled it off quite well, thank you very much! It turns out that both my classes are teenagers, and not adults like I originally thought. However, I quite like teens...Once you get past the judging and the "I´m too good for this" act, they have a lot of potential. As I mentioned before, I´m teaching an intermediate class and an advanced writing class, and it´s actually really close to where I´m living. The intermediate class is all boys, between 13 and 16 years old, and they are quite enthusiastic and funny. They do tend to get out of hand, being all boys, so I have a plan of action for Monday, since it´s only one or two trouble-makers who rile up the rest. My favorite is Fernando. He´s quiet and sweet and very smart, and he has a bowl cut. My advanced writing class is mostly girls with one boy. They are a lot of fun once I get them chatting about stuff they´re interested in, but they can hardly conceal their boredom if I start lecturing about essays or something. They´ve taken a shine to one of the other teachers with whom I share a classroom. Everytime they see him, they start giggling and acting quite silly. I think he´s kind of a dork, but he´s blonde, so I guess I can see his appeal...

Anyhow, I also have a Saturday class from 8:30 to 12:30, which was supposed to be an intermediate class as well, the same curriculum as the class I´ve been teaching. However, just as I finished lesson planning this morning, I was informed that that particular class was canceled because I only had one student, and they gave me another class to prep for, which is NOT one I´ve been teaching, and so I have to spend my day off prepping for a 4 hour class tomorrow. I´m not very impressed, but it´s such a gong-show here, so I´m also not that surprised. Ack! Welcome to Ecuador!!

Last night some of the new teachers got together and had a rant-session and a gossip session about CEDEI. It was quite nice to know that there are others who are as frustrated as I am, and who feel like some of the returning teachers are treating us like children without brains. Also, it was awesome to get to know them, because they are all so nice, and we all live pretty close together along the river. There are two girls from Toronto, a few Yanks, and a few Brits, and I think they are all great.

I´m trying to figure out my Christmas plans. We get 3 weeks off in December/January, and I would like to actually like to see another part of the world than Cuenca, Ecuador. I am tentatively planning on going to Bolivia for that time, but some of the other teachers are talking about going to the coast of Ecuador to this surfing village for awhile, and also there is an island not too far away that is refered to as "poor man´s Galapagos" (because seeing the Galapagos is really expensive, and out of most of our budgets), so I might join them. It would be nice to spend Christmas with people I know rather than random hostelers.

Anyhow, off to work on my lesson plan for tomorrow´s class! Yippeeeeee....

Always,

Emily