Thursday, January 22, 2009

Day 22 Thasatui School Blindside.....




New School today on the other side of the river.   Thasutui is a middle school in a fairly affluent neighborhood.  BUT T.I.T hit me...I went to my presentation on advanced English when I was told that my age group had only BASIC english..I suspected when I was told they were 8 years old .  ...So we are talking colors and numbers only...hardly able to handle Lately and Recently...I have hard time with it and I am suppose to speak English...well American English anyway...My friend Matthew tells me I talk funny.  What does he know, he is from the UK and I remind him all the time about strength in numbers  326 million as opposed to 62 million in UK .   So I had to dump everything and go with a VERY VERY basic English class.   Simple sentences present tense....Not even past tense...So we are talking See Spot run...See Spot chase Puff.....This is Mom this is Dad...really basic stuff here.  My coach was John from California..Yea this program here is run by the American English Mafia.  So we use Color, Not Colour, Center , Not Centre.
Anyway, he told me I did a great job of taking it down to the lowest level possible.  
The kids were great but their English was MINIMAL.  But as usual they stood up gave said GOOD MORNING TEACHER and then  in unison all sit down.   I find it amazing even after  6 times that they have such a high level of respect.  Once the class was over we were invited to lunch...Pad Thai...my favorite...was outstanding...then back in our truck and back to campus.   We got an early release today after two hours of grammar articles and conditionals.   The big 3 hour grammar test is on Monday morning.   I have not taken a 3 hour test since I took the SAT for college at 17...I constantly feel like I am in Mrs. Findley's third grade grammar class...I am waiting for her to smack me on the back for dipping Nancy Leichenfelts hair in the ink well.
Anyway, all is excellent my end.   Here are some pictures of my KIDS today...they were amazing to work with...even if their English was not so hot.  The girls were shy, would not let me take their picture....
BBQ lady coming later.   I am off to see the street sewing lady to get a shirt fixed.   She has her shop sent up on my corner.   She is lovely.  


3 comments:

  1. Well the land of the SMILES -- and do you expect that when you return back to class at the college that your students are going to address you with "GOOD MORNING TEACHER" (in unison?) And after Friday -- (which starts in about 5 more hours from this posting)you are down to the last wek of class. Time is quickly moving forward. Still waiting for the picture of the MASK that you purchased much earlier in this trip..

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  2. Yeh -- well you have to admit that he is a bit "older" than you are... back in the days that I started school -- there were still the "ink well holes" in the desk -- but the inkwells had been gone for a few years.

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