A peek into the magical world of Kindergarten...

I love my Kindergarten class. Don't get me wrong. They aren't perfect by any means. Sometimes they drive me crazy despite their cute little faces. However, I have a lot of fun teaching them too. One thing that I appreciate in them is their love of learning. They just get so excited when they learn something new of figure something out. I don't have to motivate them by telling them something is worth a big part of their grade to get them to work hard...they are so excited to learn how to read. That is their motivation for doing things in class.

We are working on letter sounds and reading words. Every day, we do an activity where the "word lady" on our white board gets hungry for a different letter. I write the letter in her mouth, and then the kids have to shout out all the things that she can eat that day. On the day we did the letter 'm' one of the boys told me that the word lady was going to go to the United States and eat my mom! (Watch out, Mom!). We always get a good laugh out of it!

The other day, we did the letter 'n.' Not only was the word lady going to eat noodles and Nick, but she was also going to eat New York City! The kids said "that is a LOT for her to eat!"

As you might have noticed in the above picture, I took our 'n' day as an opportunity to teach my class what a narwhal is. They couldn't believe there were whales that had unicorn horns! They laughed so hard :)

(And, yes. Perhaps I do enjoy drawing on the board a little too much...)

We are also learning to read short words. It is a process, but they are getting so good at it! I love the look on their faces after they have sounded out the letters of a word and realize that it creates a word that they know. Their eyes light up and they usually end up yelling it out loud before high-fiving me as hard as their little hands can (but, really, sometimes it hurts!). It is cool to see the progress they have made from not even knowing the sounds of letters, to finally being able to read words.

They can get pretty distracted, which at times is entertaining and at other times is just frustrating because I am trying so hard to get them to remember something. I'll leave you with one of my regular moments with these distracted kids. I was working one on one with a little girl in my class so that she could learn her sounds.

me: "Ok, what sound does this letter make?"

her: "Oh! Look at my finger! There is a glitter on it! I didn't know there was a glittler on me...It is so pretty!"

me: "Ok, but what sound does this letter make?"

her: "Oh...umm, 'mmmm'."

(At least she still got the letter right :)

PS: Pictures of my class to come in following blogs I hope!

Crazies!

Teaching always comes with its surprises and funny moments. So does living in the DR. This week alone I (Katie, again) have had some pretty interesting experiences.

It all started when I was in my classroom and started hearing music. Now, hearing music in the DR is pretty normal. Generally, however, it is Bachata or some other very Latino-sounding music. This time, it sounded like someone some sort of Irish melody being played on a flute or some other woodwind instrument. Strangely enough, I looked out my window and saw a man walking down the street playing a flute-like instrument. I don't think I have ever seen a Dominican playing an instrument on the street, let alone playing an Irish song on a flute. Let's just say it was a pretty good way to start of my week.

Later the same day, I was in the 5th grade English class providing ESL (English as a Second Language) support for students who need it. There I was, going innocently about my day when...BAM! I am asked the one question no teacher (other than maybe a health teacher) wants to be asked:

"Mrs. Katie...what is 'sex'?"
"Umm....Well (awkwardly pauses...trying to think of what to say...) maybe you will learn more about that in 6th grade.."

Don't judge me, Lizzie. Don't you dare judge me! (Ok, sorry, I had to quote Pride & Prejudice for a second while defending myself). Turns out, she found the word 'sex' in their reading today because it was talking about "race, sex, religion." So apparently I was the one with my mind in the gutter, and the students were asking an innocent question about a synonym for the word 'gender.' Sheesh. Dodged a bullet there, though.

Also, I began teaching four Kindergarten students this week. They all speak English as their first language, and they are basically adorable. And so smart! They told me that 'Flamingo' starts with the letter 'f' and that flamingos are pink and tall and can walk on water!! (That last bit was new information for me, too haha!). I realized, however, how easily Kindergarteners get distracted. Oh dear...I tell you something. It is crazy. Show them a video about the alphabet, though, and they will be in a trance. I am looking forward to some fun moments and lots of good quotes from this group though.

To sum it up...I love my job! While things are far from perfect, I still am so glad I get to work at an awesome school like Doulos. I look forward to all I will learn this year as a first year teacher. It promises to be exciting!