I've become involved in an internship in which for five hours each week I act as a teacher's aide in English classes in a Chilean school. My school, Liceo San Gerónimo, has all age ranges from kindergarten to seniors in high school. I am working with two teachers in three classes, one class of seniors, one class of juniors and one of third-graders. Today was the first day I'd spent at the school. What an experience.
It turns out that Chilean children are even more prone to staring and astonishment when confronted with a tall blonde than Chilean adults. As I walked through the campus I could feel every pair of eyes on me. One of the first students I met immediately began speaking to me in English and telling me that her parents are from Manhattan. Once inside the class the students were either so shy they didn't want to look at me directly, but just took sideways glances and giggled, or they started bombarding me with a million questions in Spanish. "What is your name? Where are you from? Do you like Chile? How old are you? How tall are you? How do you make your hair look like that?"
For the first class the teacher assigned them into groups of six in which they were to A) go over a dialogue and ask questions about pronunciation, and B) Come up with ten questions to ask me. It became abundantly clear to me that their English, for the most part, was very limited. I almost always had to repeat myself in Spanish. When I read the dialogue aloud for them they admitted that they didn't understand a word I said. Amidst all this I had my hair touched a number of times, was asked if I was married, was asked where I bought my jewelry and was asked for my phone number multiple times. These were the seniors. I had no idea what to expect from my next class, the third-graders.
If you were to ask me to sum up in one word what the class of third-graders was like I would honestly reply: "chaos." As soon as I walked in the room I was confronted with thirty wired, screaming 10-year-olds running back and forth across the room. Running up to me, then running away. Asking me hundreds of questions that I could neither hear nor understand. Holding my hands, hugging my waist, and kissing me on the cheek. Their task was to cut out pictures of school supplies and label them. This group of children seemed entirely impossible to get to stay on task. I answered questions about the same words about fifty times before I just started writing them on the board. Among that were also cries of "Tia! Miss! She pushed me! He's crying! Someone stole my scissors!" The teacher I was working with seemed to be about on her last nerve while I was just completely overwhelmed trying to maintain my sanity and speak Spanish.
After that hour and a half of insanity I had lunch with the two teachers I work with. It was fun sitting and chatting with them, occasionally in English and occasionally in Spanish. They both speak English very well. After lunch was my last class, the juniors. This was another class that I walked into and was immediately greeted by twenty pairs of eyes boring into me. Two boys in the front immediately because asking me questions about myself. The teacher then paired everyone up to come up with more questions to ask me and a dialogue to read aloud to me so I could help with their pronunciation. The thing I like most about this experience so far is their willingness and eagerness to learn. The classes are all rowdy, but they seem aware of the fact that having a native English speaker in their class is a privilege and they really take advantage of it.
By the end of that class one young man asked me to take him back to California with me, to which I replied "Creo que no."
I can't wait for next Tuesday! Even though I am completely exhausted after today.
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