My Classroom: Before and After

Once a storage room...now a classroom!

Art, Computer, and English Class OUTSIDE!

My classes start this week! I can't wait to be challenged to teach these children in Spanish on my own! I have so many fun art projects planned, and I have a fabulous computer program to use with the children....but teaching them English is going to be a challenge. A lot of our students still do not know their numbers 1-10 in Spanish or their colors. My goal is to make it as interactive and fun as possible! Art class will be broken up into three groups of about 8, English class is two big groups of half the class, and Computer will be small groups of 3-4 students at a time! I am going to be very busy, but busy in the best way possible!! After one week of school, I am already falling in love with these children. They are truly amazing! Their love and excitement for school really drives me and motivates me to be the best teacher I can be. I came here to teach them, but every day they are teaching me something new. One student this week, was not wanting to come to school. This boy is one of my favorites, he is SO little and such a cutie! But, he is rather stubborn. His mother is very young, and barely can be a parent for him. It is like a child raising a child. Therefor he comes to school and acts animalistic. He was thrashing himself, and crawling up the door like a monkey. Diane and Jackelyn were with the other students in circle, so it was up to me to tame this child. Using everything I possible could think of, I was finally able to calm him down and he was able to have a great day. But one thing he was doing was using his nails to claw me like a cat. I ended up with the tops of my hands completely scratched and swollen. I couldn't believe it, I have never seen anything like it. Later in the day, I went up to him and I showed him my hands. I asked him, "My hands hurt, and are very sore. Do you know why my hands are like this?" He looked at my hands in awe, and did not say a thing. I then said, "You did this to me. You caused my hands to look like this and to hurt. This is unacceptable at school, and you will not do this to me or anyone else again." More silence. One thing about this culture is that the children are rarely every scolded or told what to do. Because of this, the concept of an apology is foreign to them, and they absolutely refuse to apologize sometimes. I looked at this child and I said, "Is there anything you have to say?" And he looked at me, with the biggest brown eyes and said Lo siento Seña. I was expecting him to refuse an apology or not even know what to say. I was so impressed, and was able to get past the scars on my hands and the rough morning. He was then loving, gentle and kind the rest of the day.