The Teacher Becomes the Student

I started class at the TEFL Institute, yesterday.  My instructor's name is Gisela.  She is from Germany so I thought it was a bit strange that she was teaching this class on how to speak English.  She has an accent so it helps me focus on what she is teaching.  She told us that she was going to teach us a foreign language so that we would know what a student learning another language would feel like.  She decided to teach us Russian.  I have to say I was pretty stressed and found it difficult to remember phrases and words or get the correct pronunciation right.  Some of my classmates caught on well, but learning a second language doesn't seem to be my forte.  I had lunch with my classmate Ashley.  She's really nice and from Venezuela.  I thought she was probably my age, but she is actually 36 with a husband and 2 kids!  She does not look 36.  After lunch, we continued with learning a foreign language but she had those that could speak another language go up and teach the class.  I couldn't tell you anything I learned it was that confusing.

Today, we went over things like classroom management and grammar.  That was more up my alley, of course.  I felt a little more confident than the first day.  Gisela taught us some more Russian but she wrote the words on the board and told us how to sound out the words.  Being able to visualize it was helpful.  I had pizza with a few of my classmates at a pizza place.  It was really good, but can you believe most places here do not serve Dr. Pepper.  It's mostly Coke or Pepsi...but seriously. lol! We went over parts of speech, which was a good refresher for me and then had to take this insanely long grammar test but it was easy (although do not feel free to correct me on any grammatical mistakes as I'm sure there are many).  I took the subway home and grabbed some dinner and now about to go to bed.

The residence is great! I have a nice room and facilities.  Everyone is really nice and accommodating and its a great part of town.  I like that it is just a few blocks from the park.  You wouldn't believe how many people are there just laying out and resting in the grass...something you don't see much here.

Sweet sleep!