I started teaching the simple present tense of verbs yesterday to my evening class. They seemed pretty receptive, but I need to remember that they are new to every word I teach them, and I can't take it too quickly with them. Nothing to worry about though. The thing that has helped me most is setting clear objective when writing my lesson plan. This brings clear purposes to my classes. Like I want to have them familiar with X today, or introduce vocab X-Z; then the next day make sure they are competent in conjugating only X,Y & Z verbs. Overall it has been rewarding to see myself grow into this leadership role. Growing into this leadership role has so far been very rewarding, and I look forward to the rest of the summer. This has been a new experience for me, but despite the the work everyday, has been a lot of fun.
Last night Orlin and his Boca friends don Vidal and Elling were waiting for me after class. They wanted me to help them write a letter from the Tocoa Boca Club to the Argentine Boca Club. After writing a couple of drafts explaining the history of their club, we went to Orln's brother Marvin's house. Marvin has a degree in education, and is also a good writer. We wrote the first draft that will be emailed/ mailed to Buenos Aires in the coming weeks. But to get recognition for the Tocoa Bocas Marvin thought the only way to really show them what Tocoa Boca is about is to create an official website for their club. So they asked me to create that for them, while I am here. I am really excited to do that, not only because I got done with the 4th course in the Education technology certification at UMD, but also because I bought the ADOBE software to do so before I came to Honduras. Making them a website will be my side project for the summer, when I'm not teaching. I'll keep you up to date on its progress as it develops.
I never thought I would be writing a letter to Boca Juniors!
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
I live on Calle Ocho
the Banegas family, my hosts here in Tocoa, are big fans of soccer. They love soccer so much that the founded their own club here in town. The club is called the Boca Juniors. If you're not familiar with international soccer, Boca Juniors is the biggest club in Argentina. It is the 8th most successful club this year. It was even the club where Soccer Idol Diego Maradonna spent the majority of his career.
This is funny because Boca is the arch-rival of my favorite Argentine club, River Plate. Once I told everyone I was of the Banda Roja (River) and not a Bostero (Boca), ha we exchanged the expected trash talk between teams. River has done fairly poorly this year though (#87 globally, I think). I still think it's cool that they are such huge fanaticos, though. They've gotten sponsors (like Orlin's friend don Vidal), and have their own barra (superfan group). Orlin wants me to help him write a letter to the original Boca Juniors in Buenos Aires so that the Tocoa Boca Juniors can get some international recognition. Maybe some sponsorship??? Even though its my archrival, I like this little club since they're the underdog and just getting started.
They are also for Real Madrid while I am a Barça fan.
Note: We are writing that letter tonight.
My classes have been going fairly well. I have 13 students in my evening class, all in the secondary school range. They all have fairly advanced English textbooks they use at school, but don't seem to be able to construct English sentences without help. The established purpose of this school was to assist with English conversation, so being able to form a sentence would seem to be pretty important.
We're just getting started with nouns and the simple present tense of verbs right now, along with some vocabulary practice. Last week my students made family trees, with key words like mother, father, brother, sister, etc. There is a strong sense of family in Honduras so I figured this would be a practical place to begin. Otherwise we have been reviewing numbers, the English alphabet, and basic phrases, which they seem to already have a basic grasp. I feel like everything is going well in class, and that these kids will make a lot of headway in the next 3 months.
By the way, I found out the street I'm living on is called CALLE OCHO. They called it this because there used to be a big nightlife on this street. Cantinas lined both sides of the street and it got to be pretty crazy. I guess a bunch of people got killed so the government shut it down like four years ago.
This is funny because Boca is the arch-rival of my favorite Argentine club, River Plate. Once I told everyone I was of the Banda Roja (River) and not a Bostero (Boca), ha we exchanged the expected trash talk between teams. River has done fairly poorly this year though (#87 globally, I think). I still think it's cool that they are such huge fanaticos, though. They've gotten sponsors (like Orlin's friend don Vidal), and have their own barra (superfan group). Orlin wants me to help him write a letter to the original Boca Juniors in Buenos Aires so that the Tocoa Boca Juniors can get some international recognition. Maybe some sponsorship??? Even though its my archrival, I like this little club since they're the underdog and just getting started.
They are also for Real Madrid while I am a Barça fan.
Note: We are writing that letter tonight.
My classes have been going fairly well. I have 13 students in my evening class, all in the secondary school range. They all have fairly advanced English textbooks they use at school, but don't seem to be able to construct English sentences without help. The established purpose of this school was to assist with English conversation, so being able to form a sentence would seem to be pretty important.
We're just getting started with nouns and the simple present tense of verbs right now, along with some vocabulary practice. Last week my students made family trees, with key words like mother, father, brother, sister, etc. There is a strong sense of family in Honduras so I figured this would be a practical place to begin. Otherwise we have been reviewing numbers, the English alphabet, and basic phrases, which they seem to already have a basic grasp. I feel like everything is going well in class, and that these kids will make a lot of headway in the next 3 months.
By the way, I found out the street I'm living on is called CALLE OCHO. They called it this because there used to be a big nightlife on this street. Cantinas lined both sides of the street and it got to be pretty crazy. I guess a bunch of people got killed so the government shut it down like four years ago.
Red Card=MP5
Hey I haven't blogged in a week but I will tell you what I know...
Every morning for the last 2 weeks I have been waking up at 7 AM to a gratefully cool 82 degrees, and enjoy my coffee. By 9 AM we're back up to 89 degrees or so. I have an air conditioner in my apartment and am loathe to shut it off when I start my day. At 8 AM I teach a small group of 4 sisters. We play word games, practice vocabulary, and work on pronunciation in the morning. Their ages range from 7-12 years old. One of their favorite games to play is big karuta. I hide flashcards around the Banegas compound, shout them out in English (one at a time) and the girls have to sprint around the yard looking for the right word. This activity usually tires them out enough so that they will sit through a quick grammar lesson. Even so, they are fountains of energy and are ready to leave by 10 AM, when classes end.
After that I usually eat breakfast, tough it varies. Today for breakfast I ate an omlette, some kind of fried bean/chile, crumbly white farmer's cheese (not my favorite) and some sort of fried banana/maduro/platano/verde. I am a pitiful judge of what kind but I know its served at every meal! By 11 AM I amsettled down into one of the five hammocks hanging from varying mango trees on the Banegas Compound. I usually prepare my lesson for the night class at this time, though I usually nod off for a bit during the midday sun. There is a breeze right now, but at a price: the majority of the roads in Tocoa are dirt and as such blow a lot of dust into the air. Sweeping is a regular chore.
1 PM is usually lunch time. I don't know what we will be having but maybe I will blog about it tomorrow. Banana!
My associate/hostess Diani has a 4 year old son named David. He is a precocious and energetic little boy that made friends with me the night I got here. David calls me Elik. He likes to show me everything, like food, tables, hammocks, locks and explain how they work. He also likes to ask questions and He invited me to his birthday party. Which happened on the 28th of May, haha. The goodwill was there though.
For the last two Sundays I have been hanging out with my host brother Orlin. I go with him and his friends don Vidal and Joel Caballero to Sava to watch the Division 3 soccer playoffs. His club, The Boca Juniors, were knocked out a couple weeks ago so Orlin was there merely as a fanatico of fútbol. This last Sunday was the championship, between Juventud of Sava and Trujillo, a coastal city an hour north of Tocoa. After 90 minutes Sava was up 1-0 and gameplay became continually more agressive. In the end, a Trujillo player unsuccessfully tackled a Juventud player from behind. They started fighting and the Trujillo player got the red card. So the T. player charged the Ref and started roughing him up. 2 cops came onto the field to subdue this guy. One of them had a pistol and the other held back, brandishing an MP5, making sure the teams nor the fans started getting too rowdy. I have never seen automatic weapons on the soccer field, so of course I thought it was awesome/hardcore/ messed up.
Every morning for the last 2 weeks I have been waking up at 7 AM to a gratefully cool 82 degrees, and enjoy my coffee. By 9 AM we're back up to 89 degrees or so. I have an air conditioner in my apartment and am loathe to shut it off when I start my day. At 8 AM I teach a small group of 4 sisters. We play word games, practice vocabulary, and work on pronunciation in the morning. Their ages range from 7-12 years old. One of their favorite games to play is big karuta. I hide flashcards around the Banegas compound, shout them out in English (one at a time) and the girls have to sprint around the yard looking for the right word. This activity usually tires them out enough so that they will sit through a quick grammar lesson. Even so, they are fountains of energy and are ready to leave by 10 AM, when classes end.
After that I usually eat breakfast, tough it varies. Today for breakfast I ate an omlette, some kind of fried bean/chile, crumbly white farmer's cheese (not my favorite) and some sort of fried banana/maduro/platano/verde. I am a pitiful judge of what kind but I know its served at every meal! By 11 AM I amsettled down into one of the five hammocks hanging from varying mango trees on the Banegas Compound. I usually prepare my lesson for the night class at this time, though I usually nod off for a bit during the midday sun. There is a breeze right now, but at a price: the majority of the roads in Tocoa are dirt and as such blow a lot of dust into the air. Sweeping is a regular chore.
1 PM is usually lunch time. I don't know what we will be having but maybe I will blog about it tomorrow. Banana!
My associate/hostess Diani has a 4 year old son named David. He is a precocious and energetic little boy that made friends with me the night I got here. David calls me Elik. He likes to show me everything, like food, tables, hammocks, locks and explain how they work. He also likes to ask questions and He invited me to his birthday party. Which happened on the 28th of May, haha. The goodwill was there though.
For the last two Sundays I have been hanging out with my host brother Orlin. I go with him and his friends don Vidal and Joel Caballero to Sava to watch the Division 3 soccer playoffs. His club, The Boca Juniors, were knocked out a couple weeks ago so Orlin was there merely as a fanatico of fútbol. This last Sunday was the championship, between Juventud of Sava and Trujillo, a coastal city an hour north of Tocoa. After 90 minutes Sava was up 1-0 and gameplay became continually more agressive. In the end, a Trujillo player unsuccessfully tackled a Juventud player from behind. They started fighting and the Trujillo player got the red card. So the T. player charged the Ref and started roughing him up. 2 cops came onto the field to subdue this guy. One of them had a pistol and the other held back, brandishing an MP5, making sure the teams nor the fans started getting too rowdy. I have never seen automatic weapons on the soccer field, so of course I thought it was awesome/hardcore/ messed up.
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