+1 up

I'll start by apologising once again for the appalling lack of pictures.
I have got these two though...

Sunrise from my bedroom window...

Sunset on the way home from school...

If there's anything that I really have fallen in love with in Monistrol, it's the sky. 

It's just so expansive, it's beautiful any time of day. 

Being in a rural French valley does have it's positives. Spectacular views all round. The view from my bathroom window is one of my particular faves. But I haven't yet ended up in there with a camera... 

People are really friendly too which is lovely, it feels like they're all overtly concerned for my well-being which makes a change from Buenos Aires which felt pretty ambivalent in comparison (apart from a few special peeps obviously!). All you have to do is mention that you're thinking of fulling some need which is lacking and people are already offering to lend you the thing you need or help out! So you can imagine what happened when over lunch with a teacher I mentioned how it was a shame the February holidays weren't sooner as I had some friends going skiing not too far from here.....

....

....

...Guess who's got time off to go skiing!!!!! Well excited. Though everyone keeps telling me not to break anything... And I've never skied in my life. 

Another of the teachers is lending me some ski gear too which is nice of her. :)

I think it helps that I've been working my arse off doing cover lessons and just generally being keen and eager, I "deserve" some time off I reckon. ;)

No really... I'm absolutely exhausted. Going out on a Friday night just isn't going to happen. I came home today and just lay in bed for half an hour. Lycée teaching is the hardest I've done yet and that's saying something... (can anyone back me up from Conviven?). Try getting a class of 20 or more adolescents to shut up for a minute and learn a language they don't really care about (Mum, I know you know), oh yeah, and I'm pretty much their age. Hmmm. 

That said, I'm really glad I'm not at the collège. At least at lycée they're mainly at a high enough level to talk about some interesting things and some of them are actually motivated to learn. I think my classes are going better than they were too, now that I'm learning how the systems work, what gets them motivated and just generally gaining some authority through having been there a little while. 

This morning I had a few breakthroughs. Which was shocking as I had planned the lesson that morning over breakfast. 

Opening with the question; "who wants to be rich", then throwing a ball around for people to answer was great to get everyone involved!

I was slightly worried for one of the classes as I had had a bit of trouble with them the week before, however I had refused to give names to the teacher when he'd asked me as I thought they deserved a second chance (If I dob them in they don't get to have class with me for the rest of the year, as had happened the year before), so you can imagine how proud I felt when I could tell him after the class that it had gone really well and everyone had participated! Plus points to me!

Part of my replacement this week included acting as the responsable for a class from the lycée on a trip to the theatre in Lyon with a couple of classes from the collège and their staff. We saw an English adaptation of Gulliver's Travels which was excellent. Very political and extremely satirical, I thoroughly enjoyed it and felt smug to be one of the few audience members laughing at every joke. My students invited me down to the back of the bus for the way back too so that was fun.

It's tricky managing relations with my students. The terminales (final years) are only a year younger than me mostly, so it really wouldn't be that weird for me to hang out with them... But that could bring a whole host of difficulties. Not least with tu and vous, I've already had one student told off for tu-ing me within earshot of other teachers. I'm more used to being tu-ed and I'm not really sensitised to it so I didn't even notice!! I think the rule's should probably be pretty strictly vous within the lycée though or I'll risk losing authority in the classroom. Eugh. Why are the French so complicated?


Had African dance again Wednesday which was great... It's a proper workout though! Get all sweaty and exhausted. Then meditation, or "mindfulness workshop" again yesterday which is always good for sorting your thoughts out. The guy who runs it is American-Vietnamese married to a French woman and the crowd is just too friendly. It's a shame it's only every other week.


Aims for the weekend:

• Go to Saint Etienne
• Get a haircut that isn't a bob and doesn't look shit
• Buy a French railcard
• Get train tickets to Cluses
• Work out a space themed outfit for Saturday night 
• Finish marking the papers I've been given (bahhhhhh!)
• Other necessary admin