I finally feel I am settling into this new way of life. I've past my 1 month mark, I have a place to live for the next 7 months, and the mound of paperwork is beginning to dwindle. That doesn't mean I don't miss everyone back home, I just feel I'm beginning to seep into the French way of life and become more camouflaged as a faux french native rather then an american tourist lost in France. I have lots to tell this week (when do I not?!) so sit back, relax and enjoy this blog :)
To begin I am going to go back two weeks ago to my trip to the art museum in town (Beaux Arts). I went with my friend Emily on a Sunday afternoon to check out the permanent collection and the two exhibitions about Babel and Flemish fairytales. On the first Sunday of the month admission into the museum is free so we made sure to take full advantage of that! The art museum was pretty big and has a lot of diverse pieces of artwork. We walked through the main rooms with all the paintings dating back centuries ago. Basically still lifes of nuns and bowls of fruit (not my favorite to say the least). There were a couple Roudin sculptures (he's my favorite) and some really neat chinese pottery and dishware. My favorite part of the museum was the Babel exhibit. For those of you who aren't familiar with Babel, it is the name of the city constructed by Noah and the surviving families after the great flood in biblical times. Within Babel the largest tower was constructed, which would become a symbol of power, wealth and dominance. This same idea of needing the tallest tower to symbolize the same things still exists in the world today (ie. The World Trade Center, Burj Khalifa in Dubai and So all the paintings, photo graphs and sculptures in the exhibit were depictions of different representations of Babel throughout history. There was also a main piece of the exhibit consisting of a tower of books in all different languages. This was meant to represent the need to ensure that english does not become the dominant and only language spoken, but rather to preserve all the languages that still exist today and the cultural significance of these languages. See photos below. It was all really well done and very informational. The flemish fairytales exhibit was not nearly as fascinating, so I didn't even take any photos.
On Monday of this week all the teaching assistants who have been placed in middle schools had a training day. The first part of the day was just further explanation of our roles in the classroom and how we should be presenting culture nuances to the classroom rather than teaching grammatical structures and grading homework and tests. The second half of the day was spent discussing different types of activities that can be played with the different levels of students to not only get them to use english but by using english freely through playing a game or doing an activity. Pretty much fooling them into having fun and speaking english at the same time. We got free lunch again at the school cafeteria where the training day was held, and I've come to the conclusion that I will not be eating in the school cafeterias anymore because they only seem to serve red meat entrees and very seldom to they serve chicken, fish or a vegetarian option. The training day went really well and turned out to be very helpful and worth our while.
On Wednesday Janine (my new housemate) and I went into town to do some administrative work changing our addresses with various offices. We also took some time to check out the Beffroi or Belfry (in english) that is attached to the city mayor's office. On the first and third Wednesdays of the month there is free admission to climb to the top of the tower to get a 360 degree view of Lille. We were given the option of taking the elevator or climbing our way to the top. Of course we took the elevator! Even though it was raining it was a pretty spectacular view. See photos below.
Later that day I moved the rest of my luggage to the new house with my 4 new housemates. Our french housemate, Max, offered to drive our stuff from the residence hall to the house so we wouldn't have to lug everything on the metro. Such a sweetheart. I spent the night at the new house and loved every minute of it. I am now living in Roubaix, which is rumored to be a not so nice part of the region, but we are more on the south side of the city and closer to the neighboring city of Croix, which has been just lovely so far. I'm living with 4 other housemates: Janine is from Nottingham, England, Jack is from Leeds, England, Deliece is from Trinindad and Max if the from the Brittany region in France. We make quite the international house. We were over joyed when we found out we'd have a french housemate. Funny story: I had saved up my months worth of laundry to do at the house (because we have a washer and dryer!) rather than paying to do it at the residence hall. Well I struggled with learning about a european washing machine and ended up running one load of clothes through the washer 3 or 4 times before moving it over to the dryer. Then after my 3rd load through the washer it decides to no longer work... I am trying to contact the landlord, but of course I'm getting no response to get it fixed. Oops!
My classes this week have gone well so far. I got to work with the SEGPA (a class of students who struggle with learning, not just in english). They couldn't produce much english besides "hello, my name is...", but they were the most attentive and well behaved students I've seen thus far. The teacher who works with them is fantastic as well and commands respect and attention in the classroom but treats her students with so much respect in return. I'm hoping I can keep working with this class, but I'm afraid that might not be possible since the school wants me in more advanced classes where the students can already produce a fair amount of english. In another class I spent the hour doing 5 minute conversations with students out in the hall, while the teacher taught a lesson. After class she told me that the following Thursday the class would have an oral test over describing themselves, and she wants me to conduct the oral tests and take notes to assign grades to each students. It has been strictly outlined to us that we are not allowed to give grades or marks to the students, but in stead take notes over what was discussed so the teacher can make a decision on grades and marks. I told the teacher about this rule and she said, "oh it'll be ok we can just discuss how it went after the class and I can change grades where I see fit." This will prove to be a problem... I actually look forward to going to school on Friday afternoons because I get to work with my really nice school, but this week proved to be a challenge. My responsable or contact teacher (the person who gave me my schedule and helps me with administrative stuff or anything else I need help with) he will be out of school for the next two weeks on paternity leave so he has a replacement teacher taking over his classes. First thing on Fridays I go with one of two teachers, my schedule has me switching between the two classes each week. One of those teachers was out absent and in this level of the french school system they don't get substitute teachers. The class is just canceled. So I went to find the other teacher I'm scheduled with at that time, but after talking to the secretary we found out that there is an error in my schedule and that teacher doesn't even have classes at that time of day. So I had not class to go to. For my next class I taught with the replacement teacher, who I quickly found out is one of those mean substitute teachers. She kept rudely shushing the students and eventually threatened the rough draft of their big project (which is really due in a month's time) to instead be due next Wednesday. She didn't like the noise level of the class and went ahead and assigned the rough draft to be due next Wednesday and it will be graded. I felt so bad for the students, and they looked at me to get help, but in my position there is nothing I can do. My last class of the day was supposed to be with the teacher who was absent that day. After running around the school trying to fix a messed up schedule and work around a class that had been cancelled and deal with a mean replacement teacher, I figured there was nothing more I could do and just went home early. Hopefully next week will prove to be a little better.
Now that we are all settled into the house and loving it, Janine, Deliece and I went exploring a little and found this gorgeous park just a 10 minute walk from our house. The trees were beginning to turn and it made me feel like I was back in the US. Big cities in France don't often have parks like this, so it was really nice to enjoy the little bit of nature we could find. We even came across a wedding celebration. See photos below.
Hope you enjoyed this incredibly long blog post! Thanks for sticking around :)
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