It's been a while.
Well, it's been quite some time since I've taken the time to blog. My last entry was right before Erin & I went to a barbeque at Murray & Astrida's. The barbeque was good fun. Basically, I had my first faculty drinking party. Murray is the Head of School here and his wife is a 2nd grade teacher. They're a couple of good Aussies who are two of the greatest people I've ever met.
So, what's been happening with me? Basically, school started. I've been spending a lot of time just trying to come up with lessons for each day. It's kind of tough since I wasn't really left with much to work with. Here I am, a brand new teacher & I'm in charge of creating a 7 - 10th grade drama curriculum from scratch, with virtually no resources! It's been a challenge, but thank God for the internet. I think I've got some stuff figured out, plus I've found some books on the internet, so now I just need to buy them & get them over here!
I'm not sure what Erin's said about her homeroom kids, but for the most part, the students at this school are wonderful. Of course, every school has the occasional troublemaker or kid who wants to be a pain in the butt, but I've never seen such and overwhelming amount of kids that are not only willing to learn, but excited about doing so.
Thus far, I've had the most contact with the 8th & 10th graders. I teach a section of 8th grade English, so I see those kids for 5 periods a week. I teach all of the 10th grade religion, but those classes only meet once a week, as do most of my drama classes. My 10th grade drama class meets twice a week for an hour and a half, so I've gottent to know quite a few of them pretty quickly. I also have a 10th grade home room, so there's 9 kids from that class that I see twice a day every day.
Good grief, learning kids names is hard! I guess that's why there's seating charts, huh? Now if only I could figure out what to do with the 7 - 9 drama kids I only see once a week...
Erin & I quickly learned that there are some things that if you live without them, it can just make life a pain in the butt. One item that we recently purchased that was very nice was a printer. It doesn't seem like a big item, but for the first week of school, Erin & I were passing the laptop back and forth between our classrooms, reading stuff we'd typed out off the computer. Since our laptop doesn't have a floppy disk drive, only a CD burner, whenever we wanted to print something, we'd have to burn a CD, then go to school and try to find a computer that's hooked up to a printer so we could print out a copy, then take it down to the photocopy center to get copies made.
There are some things at this school that are quite handy. One is the copy center. Essentially, our school has a little office where a couple guys from an Indonesian company similar to Kinkos come in and do all of our photocopying. We just have to give them the original with a little form that says how many copies, if we want it coalated, staped, and anything else we want done. They seem to be pretty effecient too. The teachers are told that we're supposed to give them a day or two to get something done, if it's a big thing, but I've found that if you do spring something on the guys, they can get it done in a couple of hours.
The school also has office boys. Basically, what these guys are here for is to assist the teachers, doing things like running to get copies made, getting stuff laminated, cutting stuff out, etc. Unfortunately, the office boy assigned to the classrooms where Erin & I teach is the head office boy. Harun, this fruity little chipmunk of an Indonesian, is so busy with his other tasks that he doesn't have time to do stuff for us. This isn't really too big of a deal, since our classrooms are both close to the copy center & the office, but there have been times where I wish he would have been available for me to use. I think I'd have a lot nicer looking bulletin board if he'd have done it. As it stands, right now, it's got some black paper that I haphazardly stapled onto it and then a bunch of pages things that are quick reference for me, so it's nothing too exciting. Some day I'll send some pictures of my room.
That's actually the next big thing that Erin & I will probably be shopping for; a digital camera. Luckily, the printers here are cheap (we got ours for around 500,000 rp. which is more or less $50, and it wasn't the cheapest one!) however, it seems that for a nice digital camera, the price is pretty much the same no matter where you go. But, hopefully within the coming months, we'll have one & will be able to fill your screen with cool pictures from all over.
Well, I've got some papers to grade, so I'd better get working on that. Hopefully, I can get back in the habit of writing a little more often.
So, what's been happening with me? Basically, school started. I've been spending a lot of time just trying to come up with lessons for each day. It's kind of tough since I wasn't really left with much to work with. Here I am, a brand new teacher & I'm in charge of creating a 7 - 10th grade drama curriculum from scratch, with virtually no resources! It's been a challenge, but thank God for the internet. I think I've got some stuff figured out, plus I've found some books on the internet, so now I just need to buy them & get them over here!
I'm not sure what Erin's said about her homeroom kids, but for the most part, the students at this school are wonderful. Of course, every school has the occasional troublemaker or kid who wants to be a pain in the butt, but I've never seen such and overwhelming amount of kids that are not only willing to learn, but excited about doing so.
Thus far, I've had the most contact with the 8th & 10th graders. I teach a section of 8th grade English, so I see those kids for 5 periods a week. I teach all of the 10th grade religion, but those classes only meet once a week, as do most of my drama classes. My 10th grade drama class meets twice a week for an hour and a half, so I've gottent to know quite a few of them pretty quickly. I also have a 10th grade home room, so there's 9 kids from that class that I see twice a day every day.
Good grief, learning kids names is hard! I guess that's why there's seating charts, huh? Now if only I could figure out what to do with the 7 - 9 drama kids I only see once a week...
Erin & I quickly learned that there are some things that if you live without them, it can just make life a pain in the butt. One item that we recently purchased that was very nice was a printer. It doesn't seem like a big item, but for the first week of school, Erin & I were passing the laptop back and forth between our classrooms, reading stuff we'd typed out off the computer. Since our laptop doesn't have a floppy disk drive, only a CD burner, whenever we wanted to print something, we'd have to burn a CD, then go to school and try to find a computer that's hooked up to a printer so we could print out a copy, then take it down to the photocopy center to get copies made.
There are some things at this school that are quite handy. One is the copy center. Essentially, our school has a little office where a couple guys from an Indonesian company similar to Kinkos come in and do all of our photocopying. We just have to give them the original with a little form that says how many copies, if we want it coalated, staped, and anything else we want done. They seem to be pretty effecient too. The teachers are told that we're supposed to give them a day or two to get something done, if it's a big thing, but I've found that if you do spring something on the guys, they can get it done in a couple of hours.
The school also has office boys. Basically, what these guys are here for is to assist the teachers, doing things like running to get copies made, getting stuff laminated, cutting stuff out, etc. Unfortunately, the office boy assigned to the classrooms where Erin & I teach is the head office boy. Harun, this fruity little chipmunk of an Indonesian, is so busy with his other tasks that he doesn't have time to do stuff for us. This isn't really too big of a deal, since our classrooms are both close to the copy center & the office, but there have been times where I wish he would have been available for me to use. I think I'd have a lot nicer looking bulletin board if he'd have done it. As it stands, right now, it's got some black paper that I haphazardly stapled onto it and then a bunch of pages things that are quick reference for me, so it's nothing too exciting. Some day I'll send some pictures of my room.
That's actually the next big thing that Erin & I will probably be shopping for; a digital camera. Luckily, the printers here are cheap (we got ours for around 500,000 rp. which is more or less $50, and it wasn't the cheapest one!) however, it seems that for a nice digital camera, the price is pretty much the same no matter where you go. But, hopefully within the coming months, we'll have one & will be able to fill your screen with cool pictures from all over.
Well, I've got some papers to grade, so I'd better get working on that. Hopefully, I can get back in the habit of writing a little more often.
posted by Travis @ 8:40 AM
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