POTD 38: Cojușna Students

My first 10 weeks here were really intense because they were the training weeks to prepare us for our 2 years in Moldova. For three of those weeks, we had practice school, where I taught students from my training site, Cojușna. Teaching these students gave me the encouragement that I need to start my time here and develop  the optimistic attitude that I took with me to Criuleni.

The 4 Times I Almost Cried During PST

So far, I have not cried, which I think is a big accomplishment. I thought there would be at least one break down by now. However, I did have my weak moments when I almost cried. And the surprising thing is that for all but one time, I almost cried over something I didn’t think would make me cry.

1. It was during the first week of Practice School (7 weeks into my time here in Moldova) when I was teaching by myself. I had been working until 11:30 every night for 3 nights now, and I was not yet feeling particularly proud of my lessons. It was 6:00 and I had at least 5 hours of work ahead of me. I was walking my 40-minute walk home and feeling overwhelmed by the amount of work we have to do and what is expected of us. I was starting to cry as I was walking, but I still had 10 minutes before I got home and no sunglasses. I did not want everyone in my neighborhood to see me cry as I walked into my host family’s home.

2. My host family was having a masă. I was noticing my host mom and sister interacting, and they reminded me of my mom and me. I was suddenly overwhelmed with missing my mom, which grew into me missing my family and friends. I started to get teary-eyed, but there were 15 people around me and I did not feel like explaining why the American is crying when everyone was being very hospitable.

3. It was 3 days before I was leaving Cojușna. I was walking home when one of the neighbor kids has said hello to me. I had recently learned her name, Mihaela (Cute story: she always says hello to me, and her cuteness stands out compared to the others. One day, she said “hello, Maggie” to me and I said hello back. Her brother was with her and tried to tell her how to say “my name is Mihaela” in English, but she just ended up saying “hello Mihaela” instead. It was very cute. I understood well enough, and now I knew her name). It was very dark, and I could barely make out shapes. But when Mihaela said hello to me, I could easily tell it was her. She giggled when I said “hello, Mihaela”, and I could hear her talking about me once I left. All the sudden I realized that I would not be seeing her or any of the neighborhood kids any more. It took me 2 months to make friends with them, and I walk through a neighborhood everyday. In Criuleni, my house is practically on the main road. I was very upset at the thought of not making friends with neighborhood kids. But I was almost home, and I didn’t want to explain to my host family why I showed up in tears. So I held the tears back.

4. It was the last night in Cojușna, and I was spending it with Holly, Jim, Matt, Lauren, and Cassie at the Cojușna winery. On our way out, I said something about how I was going to miss them. And then it hit me that I was going to be the only American in a 30 kilometer radius, and that I was going to see these guys for several months. My eyes started to water, but Cassie demanded that I stopped because she would start to cry as well. So I did.

Practice School Complete

Wow, I have never been so exhausted in my life. But practice school is finished. I just taught 11th grade for 1½ weeks. I liked it more than I expected. I already know that I like teaching, but I’m used to teachings the young ones. So teaching students who are taller than me is a little intimidating. But I liked it. The material was more fun to teach because it was a higher level of thinking and the conversations were more fun. I think I’m going to be able to do this. 

After class today, we stayed after for youth activities with the students. Jim taught a group of boys how to play American football. My favorite moment was when one of the boys wanted to intercept a pass, he decided to kick the ball away from the receiver. I guess that’s what happens when you teach soccer players a game called “football”. 

We also had a dance room. Here, some of the students tried to teach us the hora. But no one ever really showed us what to do with our feet. There is something about kicking and doing the grapevine. Anyways, I couldn’t figure it out, so I ended up just running around in the circle.

Practice School With 6th Form

So my first half of practice school is complete. What a fun time! I taught 14 lessons (2 lessons a day for 7 days) to the 6th form (grade) over the last week. Overall, it went really well. The girls liked the way I dressed and wanted me to stay in Cojusna to teach. And on several days, at the end of the lessons, the students wanted another lesson. It was really nice to get such compliments from the students. 

My 6th form students and their certificates.

Ms. Magge is Teacher gud, and beautiful.

Overall, I would say the students I taught in practice school weren’t very different than American students. There were many levels of English knowledge among the students. Those who struggled were quieter and less willing to participate. Those who excelled would get impatient with the pace being a little too slow for them, and I would need to provide them with extra work. Sometimes a student would be apathetic towards learning, and I had to work very hard to motivate them to participate.

These students signed up voluntarily to take this class during their summer vacation, so I would guess that most of them want to learn English. I’m interested to see how the dynamics change once I’m working in the school.

Thursday I will begin the second half of practice school. I will be working with the 11th form, and I will be team teaching with my partner teacher from my school in Criuleni. This last week was long and hard, but I’m excited about starting team teaching. Bring it on, Moldova.

Practice School

Practice School started on Monday. Practice school is a 3-week program where the EE trainees teach Moldovan students English. The Moldovan students volunteered, so it’s not 100% accurate to what a really classroom will be like since all of these students want to learn. But it’s good practice. And we teach from the textbooks that are used in all schools, so we start to get familiar with to how to use them.

Each day, we have language class for 2 hours in the morning. And then we teach 2 lessons back-to-back. I’m teaching to 6th grade the first half and 11th grade the second half. After our lessons, we plan with a resource teacher for 3 hours. Then I go home around 5 (remember, I have a 40 minute walk home) with about 5 hours of work to do to prepare for the 2 lessons.

It is proven to be a very busy week, leaving me with practically no time to myself. Who ever told me that being in the PC would involve a lot of free time was obviously not talking about EEs. I may not be able to write very much over the next 3 weeks because of how time consuming planning is. Or perhaps I’ll write more often than ever because when is there a better time to write in a blog than when you have 5 hours of work ahead of you at 6:00 at night?