Two Days of Training

For the last two days I was at training for my position as an Auxiliar de Conversacion. The first day was pointless. Typically trainings and orientations are by definition rather boring, but when the ladies in charge of the program began to explain the application process to a room of people who had been accepted I got the feeling this would be no different. We went over the duties, rights and responsibilities of an Auxiliar; they include working no more than 16 hours per week, not (officially) grading children, always speaking in English and justifying absences. The highlight of day one was the free steak lunch, even if it was a little more rare than I like. The low light was waiting around for an hour and a half for them to pass out the health insurance information, only to find the cards missing.

Day two was surprisingly more interesting. This time we listened to presentations by a director of one of the bilingual schools outside of the city and another man who teaches in a different bilingual school. The first presentation included many examples of projects previous Auxiliares had done to teach rhymes and stories to little kids. She did a great job explaining how to make things interesting to kids, but at the same time I felt slightly ill-prepared. No where along the preparation process did it come up that I should bring things from home, yet in these orientation sessions the idea of showing the kids things from your home country was repeated. Great, now where am I going to find pictures of Oregon or Washington DC. Sure the embassy did say they had a few resources, but I doubt that Oregon is an in-demand topic... though this might change since Rudy Fernandez now plays for the Trail Blazers. I smell a lesson plan brewing...

The second session went over more of the methodologies of teaching English. While rather technical it did provide some great insights about how Spanish kids really respond to physical praise like a pat on the head or shoulder as opposed to just telling them "good job". This notion really stirred up our class, as those of us with previous experience working with kids in the states were shocked at being encouraged to touch the kids. I remember when i started working at Boys & Girls Club we were encouraged to avoid most physical contact with kids, por ejemplo (for example in Spanish) when the kids try to hug you front-on you were supposed to slide them over into a side-hug, just to avoid any possible allegations of sexual touching. Here some of the kids kiss their teacher good-bye at the end of the day. This is going to take some getting used to.

Tomorrow is my first day of work, and in typical Spanish style I had to pry information about start times out of my coordinator. I emailed him yesterday, pointing out that Wednesday would be the first day of work and I didn't know where to meet him or even what time to be there. In even more typical Spanish style he responded with

For the first day, you shouldn´t worrry very much about the time you should be at school. Take your time to get used to the public transport you have to take everyday to get to the school. We start our classes at 9 am, and we have our break from 11 to 11.30 am, thats a good time to arrive to school. You can ask for Eduardo at the entrance of the school, there are 2 people at conserjería and they will tell you where to go. We will have a meeting at 12, midday. Hasta mañana.

Really? between 11 and 11:30? meeting at 12? I wonder what the full time schedule is going to be; Show up when you feel like it?! Oh well, it could be worse, they could ask me to be there at 9 am sharp, wearing a business suit. I get the feeling this is going to be a relaxed position. Now if only I could find some side teaching gigs to support my extravagant Coca Cola Light and Principe cookies habits...