My second week of teaching

As the second week here comes to a close, I'd like to reflect on what I have done in the classroom this past week. We'll start with today, Thursday:

I arrived at school at the normal time (8:30 am). Today, instead of going to my normal class, 3B, I went into the 4B classroom. The teacher, Raphael, has been asking me to help teach his students about animals and describing them. So when I got into the class, they all asked me questions (What's your name? How old are you? Where do you live?) When I explain that I live in Missouri, most of the kids get confused. In Italy, they don't have states, they have regions. America is huge and we have states and the kids do not study American geography so they are very confused by this concept. Then it is time for the English lesson. Their book is full of pictures and songs that help them learn the english language. I think it is so smart that kids learn English at such a young age because it is easier to learn that way. However, they learn British English which is more different from American English than I originally thought. For example, today they were talking about whether animals had certain characteristics or not. The book example was a monkey and it asked "Has this monkey got wings?" and answered "No, it hasn't." In American we would say, "Does this monkey have wings?" and answer "No, it doesnt." There were many little differences that I noticed and explained to the class that in American, we say things differently even though it is the same language. When I was done in 4B, it was time for break and so I went with 3B again. It was their break so they ate a snack and went outside to play. The playground at their school is just a little bit of blacktop and then a bigger piece of land. They don't have playsets and swings at the elementary school. But I think this also forces the kids to be creative. They have so many games that they play! I never notice anyone being left out of playing games either. They have such a sense of community in their class, that they include everyone who wants to play. After break, I got swarmed by 4th grade students and they asked me many of the same questions I always get. "Where are you from" "What is your name" "How old are you" "Do you like...." The fourth level teacher left me and my 3B teacher, Antonella with her students! I ended up answering a question from just about every kid. When i finally got back to my class, I helped teach history. Last week, Antonella gave me pictures of Homo Sapiens doing different activities and had me write a simple sentence on them. Today, I presented them, the students repeated what I had said in Italian to see if they understood, and then they repeated what I said in English. We drew a river, mountains, hills, and land on the chalk board and taped the pictures where they would belong. Then each student got a picture to color and they will eventually cut them out, tape them to a poster, and write the english sentence underneath! It is so much fun and the kids love it! They were all trying to guess what the English sentence meant and they were doing pretty well!

Wednesday:

On Wednesday, my teacher, Antonella, was out for the second day with the flu. I worked with Simona, the other 3B teacher. She doesn't speak much English, but she tries her best. I help her with smaller classroom tasks like stringing ribbon through pieces of paper that the kids will wear at their end of the year festival or passing out paper or taping things down. Since I dont know Italian and she doesnt know English, it's hard to do much translating. This day, I helped teacher measurements because this is the theme for science for all of third grade. With Simona's help, I explained that in America we don't use the metric system. Simona provided me with the conversions and together we explained yard, foot, and inch and how they relate to a meter. I tried this on Tuesday and it didn't go over as well as this lesson. I was very prepared for this particular lesson because Simona had the information to show me that a yard is almost a meter, etc, etc.

Tuesday:

Tuesday, I worked with the 3A class and taught measurements. This day, I don't think I was very awake because I kept making mistakes. First thing in the morning, Simona wanted me to write the date on the board...I wrote March. Then while working with 3A, with a teacher that speaks no English, I kept mixing up my measurements or writing the wrong measurement on the board. I was frustrated with myself and I could tell the students were confused. The problem I had was not having the exact measurement conversions written down. Therefore it was hard to show them in relation to a meter, what the measurement was. I may send the school and American ruler just to show them what a foot looks like! Working with a teacher who doesnt speak english was very very difficult. We used a dictionary and she did a lot of pointing and using her hands. This helped some, but really being able to explain things to the students was hard without having someone translate from Italian to English and vice versa. But we did everything we could and for next time, I would remember to come more prepared instead of trying to do it from memory.

Monday:

Earthquake Day! We didn't have school Monday because this past weekend, the Carpi area saw the worst earthquake it had ever seen. A 6.0 on the Richter Scale, the earthquake caused a lot of damages to towns like Bologna and even some in Carpi's main piazza. The building are very old and not regulated so they couldn't withstand the tremors. My house is a new house (build within the past five years) so there wasn't a single bit of damage. But some houses aren't so lucky. Old, historic churches in towns near Carpi fell down and all of their history with it. It was sad and scary for many people in this area. Thank goodness I was in Florence when it happened! and Thank goodness my family was safe! The schools were closed Monday so that thorough inspections could be done to be sure that the buildings were safe. On Tuesday, I explained to my class that I have felt an earthquake in Missouri, and they all thought that was neat.

Some last musings:

There are many little difference between Italy and America that I want to point out as either ideas for future classroom, things I am missing about home, or things I am noticing. First of all, the students in my school all write on graph paper and everyone writes in cursive, even third graders. Their handwriting is very good. I think this is because of the graph paper. I'm beginning to think that I may use graph paper in my Special Education class to help the students work on handwriting without really knowing that they are. The boxes help making lining up the letters and making them appropriate sizes very easy. Graph paper is also great for math class because the students can easily line up their numbers! Kids also take notes while the teacher orally tells them what to write. I find this strange because I think it would be difficult to remember what the teacher is saying. The teachers also help them organize their notes by using different colored markers for titles or key words or important parts. I'm definitely going to integrate this into my class! The students also rarely do worksheets. They create a lot of posters and do a lot of work on the board or individually in their notebooks. I've noticed how interactive class is and I really like that!

Some things I am currently missing:
1. My starbucks travel mug.
2. Big, normal sized coffee.
3. Starbucks and coffee or tea on the go.
4. Dinner at 6pm.

Florence, Firenze, or as I call it....Awesome.

A group of us at the rest stop

This past weekend (Friday through Sunday), all of us Americans went to Florence! It was a three hour bus ride that left Carpi at 7:30am. Although I was tired, I couldnt sleep on the bus so I enjoyed the beautiful views surrounding me. Once we got to Florence, we had to stop and get a pass that would let our bus get closer to the city. Buses and other large vehicles have to have permits to go through the city because the streets are litte, there are a lot of people, and no room for too many big buses. We were dropped off near the train station and had to walk ten to fifteen minutes to get to our hostel.

Amazing view from the bus!

At the hostel, we were told check in was at 2:30. However, it was only about 11 when we arrived. They let us lock all of our belongings in a back room to keep them safe until check-in. Thank goodness, because my bags were heavy. All of the girls in my room stuck together and decided to find food and come back and check in at 2:30 and rest. So we were off! We walked by several cute places with outside eating but we didn't like the prices or the food, all we wanted was pizza. Eventually we found this cute little place called "The Red Tomato" or "Pomodoro Rosa" They had an extra menu in english so we could read the ingredients. I got a four cheese pizza that was pretty good. We also got the cheap house wine. When we were brought the bill, it didn't come separately like they do in America and we couldn't split it so we all had to pay cash and figure out who owed what and how to split it at the table! It was stressful but we finally managed to figure it out.

In Italy, lunch (and any meal, really) is very leisurely i.e. it takes forever. It was around 1pm when we had finished lunch and Lauren wanted to find the Duomo or the church. We could see the dome from our restaurant and thought we would walk that way to find it. We ended up walking through the market as well! That was so much fun! The streets were lined with stalls filled with scarves, purses, leather goods, and nick-knacks. We browsed for a bit and then went in search of the dome. We used our little map as a reference and found it! When we walked around the corner and saw it, we all stopped dead in our tracks and our mouths hit the ground. I have never seen a more ornate, more grand building in my life. This church is massive. The biggest building ive ever seen. The majority of it is made of white, green and red marble. I later learned that these colors represent something special related to Italy. We stood for a while and just admired this masterpiece. I had to tilt my head all the way back to see to the top of it. It has three huge doors on the front that people were talking pictures with. There is so much detail and so much work was put into making this church. It is something I recommend everyone seeing at least once in their lives!

The girls and I in front of the Duomo!

The girls in my room +Melissa N.

After this, it was almost 2:30 so we headed back to the hostel to unpack and relax. Our feet were already killing us and we were tired from our early morning. We had to use our passports to get out keys (we each received one even though the professors said their might be one per room). We picked our beds and sat down for about an hour. After we felt rejuvenated, we went out to explore again! We walked through Accademia where the actual statue of David is housed. We wanted to see it but didnt want to stand in line for hours and pay money for it, we wanted to find the fake David statue that was shown on our map. We walked through the market and we each bought some scarves and leather bracelets and other little things that we had seen earlier that day. We went into some shops and walked past the Duomo again. We looked at the octagonal building infront of the Duomo and looked at the golden doors that are said to be the doors that sparked the Renaissance. It's hard to believe these buildings are so old and hold so much important history. It makes me wonder if the people building and creating these things realized their impact and importance for the future. After the Duomo, we saw some of the nicer, more modern shops and clothing stores then we began to see big, name brands like Gucci. We finally found the statue of Fake David (We refered to it as Fake David the rest of the trip) in front of the Uffizzi Museum. We took pictures and walked on. We eventually made it to the Ponte Vecchio which is a bridge that has many expensive jewelery shops. The scenery was beautiful! There were so many people and so many sparkling window displays! By the time we were done, we were exhausted! We walked back toward the hostel and ate dinner at a restaurant down the street. Then we showered, laid in our beds, and talked for the rest of the evening.

Saturday:

We got up early on Saturday and walked past the Ponte Vecchio to meet up with a big group of people to go to Tuscany on our Accidental Tourist group outing. Half of this group would be hiking, the other half would be cooking. But first, we took a sketchy, bumpy, van ride up through hillside to this really neat house. The story is that a rich family in Milan owns it, but only goes there once a year. Which, to me, seems ridiculous because its huge and the view is amazing! This is where we were given a tour of the wine cellar, showed how olive oil and wine are made and then given a wine tasting. We tried two red wines and a white, dessert wine that was as thick as syrup. We also were given bread and olive oil. Delicious! and so much fun! When this was over, we were put in a car and taken a few miles down the road to learn how to make pasta! The process is quite simple and im excited to do it at home. We made the dough, kneaded it, and pressed it with a pasta machine. We made a fettucini like pasta and angel hair. Our group was sent up to the tower to hang out in the sun while the family who owned the house cooked the meal using our pasta. When we came down, the woman who owned the house told us this story:

When she was a little girl, she had a huge crush on the neighbor boy who babysat her. He didn't notice her because she was 5 years younger. When she was in high school, he finally noticed her and they dated a little. Then she went to study in America and they lost touch. Many years later, her father was sick and she came back to the area to help him. But the boys house was empty and he was no where to be found. After her father passed away, she was cleaning out the house and found a box. It was full of letter that the boy had written her for her first two years in the US. They had all been dated, but the boy hadnt been sure of where to send them. She tried to find a match and was going to light them on fire and forget about her past and start new. But she couldnt find one so she kept them. Then, she was on her way to another country and ran into this boy in a airport in Denmark. And they've been together ever since! HOW ROMANTIC. and it's a true story!


We got done eating and back to the hostel around 5pm. I was beyond tired and so i rested a bit. Then the girls who went to Tuscany with the group decided that we would get something light and fast for dinner. So we decided on McDonalds. We ended up getting a little lost but found it eventually. When I got back to the hostel, I showered and then slept my life away.

Sunday:

Sunday we toured the Uffizi. The Uffizi used to be the offices of the important people in Florence many many many years ago. Now, it's an art museum that houses famous work from Michelangelo, the Birth of Venus, and many more. However, I wasn't feeling well and my allergies were acting up. The tour was supposed to be over by 12:30 but by then, we werent even a fourth of the way through the museum. A few girls left early with me and we went and ate and I had a nice pot of hot tea to sooth my throat. Before we left that morning, we had to check out of our rooms and put our things back in the same locked room. We all ended up going back to the hostel and sat and relaxed until 5pm when we walked back to the bus and had our three hour bus ride back to Carpi!


Florence was a beautiful city full of rich history! I had so much fun and saw so many things while I was there!

Afternoon Trips!

Pizza before Bologna!

So, on the afternoons when we don't have meetings or visits, or practices for various things, we get free afternoons. On said afternoons, we can get groups together to go to various towns near by (Verona, Bologna, Modena, etc). I've used two of my free afternoons thus far to travel with my American friends! On Thursday of the first full week here (May 17th) a big group of us went to Bologna. It's a little less than an hour train ride away from Carpi. So, my host mom Marcella took me after school to one of the middle schools (Focherini) to pick up Katie, Camden, and Ashleigh. Then she took the four of us to the trains station! We grabbed a quick lunch of pizza and coke right outside of the train station because we had a little time to kill.

Our first train experience was interesting. Luckily, one of the moms was there and told the man where we needed to go. He spoke a little english and helped us figure out where we needed to switch trains and what platform we would be on. Before you get on the train you have to punch your ticket. Us Americans really struggled with how to works the machine that was in all Italian. A nice man came over, grabbed a ticket and showed us how to use it. Then we waited for the train!

We recieved two tickets that were exactly the same. It was hard to figure out which to use! 

 

 

 

 

Fountain of Neptune

After switching trains in Modena and getting into Bologna, we asked a man sitting outside of the train station where we needed to go. He gave us the wrong directions and probably thought we were silly Americans. When someone finally gave us the correct directions, we walked through the old city of Bologna. It has the oldest university in Europe and one of the biggest (If i remember that correctly.) My host mom took the train to go to that university a long time ago. Our main goal was to find the shopping area as well as the Fountain of Neptune and the Two Towers. After a lot of walking and searching we finally found it! Neptunes Fountain was really neat. Behind it, there were dozens of signs explaining the fountain and the area around it. There was a piazza in front of it that had a church that was being rebuilt. In this piazza, Katie, Lauren and I ate gelato and dodged creepy men selling sunglasses.

<---This church was being rebuilt, but the walls hiding the construction has a picture of what the church would look like when it was finished. It was so neat!






<----The Piazza in Bologna!

<--- Delicious gelato. Pistachio and chocolate! YUM!


After we spent time in the piazza, we walked around and did a little shopping. By then, it was almost time to leave (We have to be in Carpi before dinner.). We met up with two others at our designated meeting place, waited 15 minutes for the others who never showed and then made our way to the train station. We wanted to make sure we had plenty of time to get to the train so that way we wouldnt miss it. When we got there, we checked the depatures and realized we told everyone the wrong platform to meet at. A few of us were worried that the others were on the wrong platform or they were lost and wouldnt make it back. However, once we got off the train in Modena, we found them! Thank goodness!

Emily, Lauren, and I at the park in Parma.

This past Tuesday, a group of twelve of us went to Parma. When we got to Modena to switch trains, we were getting off of the first train as our second train was pulling away. We were lucky enough to catch the next train at 3:25. So we waited around for a bit just talking to each other. A few of us were sitting on a ledge around the stairs when a single train car came barreling through and almost knocked us off the ledge! Ten minutes later and entire train did the same thing! Id never seen a train going so fast, especially though a place where there were people standing out in the open! Because we missed the second train, we only had about two hours in Parma. Our first stop was to get gelato. I had chocolate cake and mint chocolate chip. I think it was the best decision i've ever made! It was delicious! After that, we walked around a grassy piazza and looked at the buildings. We meandered around Parma, looking at the scenery. It always amazes me how old building in Italy still seem to look beautiful. A few of us walked around and ended up walking through what I liken to a big garage sale where people were selling trinkets, antiques, you name it, they sold it. Then we stumbled upon a public park that was beautiful. There was so much grass and so many trees as well as an big old house. Luckily, the train ride home was harmless and by the time we reached Carpi, we were all exhausted.

Gelato in Parma

Lauren, myself, and Katie in Bologna!

Me by the Fountain of Neptune!

One week in!

So, it's almost Friday...i.e. almost time to leave for Florence! But before I tell you about Florence, let me catch you up on my first week in Italy!

Monday morning, I started school! At ten after eight in the morning, I joined my host mom, brother, and sister in walking to school. The parents in the neighborhood have developed the "pedibus" which consists of ten kids with rolly backpacks and two parents walking to school. The minute I walked through the front gate of the school, I was greeted by the saucer-sized eyes of the children who have been expecting me! They all practiced their English by saying "Hi, Brooke!" After I was introduced to the English teacher (the teacher I am working with), I was introduced to the kids in my third grade class. They each came up to the teacher's desk and were given a name tag. The teacher made them say "Hi, my name is.... It's nice to meet you." I could tell that they had been practicing and working very hard on this phrase. Once that was finished, the teacher had the students ask me questions such as "Do you like...(insert sport, food, game, etc)" or "Do you have...(a car, a house, any sibling, etc)." I had to speak very slowly and with very simple sentences otherwise they could not understand me. Sometimes they had trouble because they learn British English, which is very different from American English.

 I'm the only American at my school. Apparently, the teachers passed around a picture of me and the whole school was looking forward to my arrival! They made me this banner that hangs in the main entry of the school.

Two girls in my class, Emma and Elisa (who are seriously the most adorable children on the planet) made these notebooks for me!

Around 10:30, the students get a break for snack and then recess outside. All of the little girls flocked to me, each fighting for a chance to hold my hand. At one point, I'm pretty sure I had five or six little girls trying to hold my two hands. They tried to teach me words in Italian, especially words they knew the corresponding English word to (butterfly, flower, hair, etc). Sometimes they would ask me what the english word was for certain objects. They tried to have conversations with me in Italian, but of course, I had no clue what they were saying. One girl kept telling  them that by saying "Non capisco, non capisco!" She's a fiery little girl.

The girls all picked me flowers on the first day during break!

After break, we came back inside and I sat back and watched the teacher teach. This part was especially insightful for me because now, I feel like I can understand how it feels to be at a new school where nobody speaks your language. This is the case for many ELL (English Language Learners) students. What made me feel better and less timid toward the situation was when the little girls came and wanted to play with me. They made me feel like I mattered and that they cared enough to make me feel welcome. When I become a teacher, I am going to go out of my way to make the ELL student in my school feel less scared and intimidated because they cannot communicate. It may require google translator on an iPad or the smartboard or the computer, but I will find a way to communicate with these children and make sure that they are included as often as possible. 

Well my friends, the rest of my week was pretty much  the same. I went to school, meetings (with my American friends and another with the third and fourth grade english teachers), spent time with my family, and even went to Bologna on Thursday afternoon (More on that later). But for now, I have to go to bed. I have to be up early for my trip to Florence tomorrow! 

Ciao!

Ciao Italy!

So, I have made it here. I have survived 22 hours of travel, meeting my wonderful host family, biking through Carpi, seeing a castle, and a restaurant! Whew! It has been a very busy few days! We arrived in Carpi just before lunch. My family had signs and they were waiting for me. I was very happy to know that my father speaks very fluent english and my mother is pretty fluent as well. When we arrived at our house, they gave me a tour, showed me my room that has an amazing view (pictures to come later) and a balcony. Then we had lunch!

I was beyond excited for my first REAL Italian meal. We had spaghetti with tuna. It was delicious. My goal was to stay awake for the rest of the day until after dinner and then go to bed so that I could get acclimated to the new time zone. After lunch, we took bikes (I know my parents are laughing at this because at home, I dont ride bikes. But it's Italy and therefore way cooler to ride a bike through such a picturesque place.) to Carpi (a ten minute ride)and went through the piazza and saw the library that is a castle, the church, and a super old (14th or 15th century old) church.We ate gelato at a new gelato shop on the way in. I had chocolate and "creme", which was fantastic.

When we got home, I realized that I had never felt grubbier in my life. After 22 hours of travel and a full day of riding bikes, I needed a shower before dinner. So I showered and changed clothes and sat on my bed. I fell asleep a few minutes later. After a short, 20 minute, nap, I woke up to a knock at the door with my adorable host siblings telling me it was time for dinner. Leonardo, who is 8, is excited to practice his english with me so he said ( in an adorable Italian accent) "Brooke, it is time for dinner" only it sounded more like "Brooooke, eet ees time for deener." I love him. He is adorable and always trying to impress me with his english. He is very good with words but sometimes has troubles putting them into sentences. But he is doing well!

Well, it is time for bed! I have a long day of orientation tomorrow!