Second to Last Week at BBS

So for this second to last week, I took over just about everything. The students have finally become used to me teaching, though they still sometimes think they can get away with things (yeah right). I've been finishing up a unit on rivers, and (finally) a unit on explanatory texts. On Tuesday in Fashion Design Club, the students have begun to cut out thier patterns! They are so excited about feinally being able to cut and sew thier fabric. On Thursday the head of middle school came to observe one of my lessons. (One on World Rivers). The students were actaually very good for me while he was in there, but they did get a little too excited when I pulled up google maps on the SmartBoard. (They loved zooming in on the different rivers.) One of the boys in the class is from Russia and when we talked about the Volga River he went absolutely nuts. He had so many different facts that he wanted to share that there was no way we could have gotten through them all. Overall, that went well. On Friday, the kids were actually pretty calm seeing as it was the day before half-term break. We finally mad it to the end of the day (It seemed to stretch on forever) and we sent the children off and got ready for our different trips. My cooperating teacher is going to Marakesh (no clue if I spelled that correctly). Some of the students were actaully headed to intersting places. Two to America (one to New York and the other to Miami. One was going to Turkey, a few to England and a whole bunch had family coming to visit from different places.

Still Catching Up.

So that Friday night I went with Soren, Fleur and Elisabeth to Soren's fraternity house. Going to a frat house in Germany is a lot different then going to one in America. Their house is amazing, first. They have two built in bars with taps, a huge dance floor (they swing dance) and everyone drinks out of real glasses (not a solo cup to be seen). I have actually been there before on a Thursday night a few weeks ago, but I could only stay a while becasue I had to be at school in the morning. Well this night, we stayed at the house for a while before heading off to a bar (one of the ones we'd been to before). At the bar we danced for a bit (though the usic was aweful, in my opinion.) By this time it was early (like 5am) so we headed home. We grabbed a doner on our way and I chatted with some guys who told me they worked for the Somalian embassy (they may have been making that up). We got home at 6am and I immediatly fell asleep. Apparently evyone else stayed awake for another hour and cranked up the music, but I heard nothing.

Saturday I slept in till like 3pm and all I did all day was go out and buy a winter coat. (I needed it). After that I came back home and fell asleep. I woke up on Sunday planning to do all my lesson plans for the upcoming week only to realize that the wireless was down. So I headed over to a nearby starbucks and realized that it wasn't an issue with the internet, it was an issue with my computer. Fabulous.

Got a lot of catching up to do......

Anyway so after my Dresden trip I came back to school. That Monday we took all of year 4 on a field trip.

We started up by breaking all the kids up into groups of 6 and placeing each group with an adult. My group was six little boys, oh goodness. We all walked from the school to the S-bahn station and shoved all the kids on the same train. They were really excited about being on the train, but we managed to keep them contained. We then got off the train and walked to the the side of the Rvier Spree that runs thorugh Berlin. My boys decided ti would be fun to pick up all the bottle caps they found. I confiscated the ones they had and then they thought is was an even more fun games to pick them up and present them to me so I could throw them away. We got them all on the boat, which unfortunatley had other people on it. (Forty nine year olds on a boat are not quiet and there is no way that those other poeple could hear the tour. The tour lasted an hour and a half and by the end the kids were stir-crazy with sitting still. We got them off the boat and walked down to the Lustgarten in front of the berliner Dom. We had them eat their luncha nd then let them run free for about half and hour. After that we broke off into our different groups and were told that we could walk around Berlin and have the kids draw different things in their sketchbook, we just had to meet back at Hauptbahnhof in an hour and some. Of course all the other groups made in back in time, but my pokey boys and my confused self were late and my cooperating teacher had to come and egg us along. We shoved them all back on the S-bahn and made it back to school just in time.

That night I helped out with another girls football (soccer) game at Senior School. THe girls didn't win this time but they put up a good fight.

By the end of that night I was completely and utterly frozen. I only had my little purple coat all day and no gloves and I felt like a popsicle. I then decided that I had to buy an actual winter coat.

Tuesday I taught some more. THis week I began taking over all of the subjects, so it was pretty intense.

Then on Wednesday I taught in the morning and then in the afternoon Fashion Design Club went on a feild trip to the fabric store. We once again took the S-bahn, but it was so much easier because it wwas only 10 older girls and one older boy. (Much better than the 40 children from Monday)The fabric store was awesome. The kids had so much fun picking out their fabric for their skirts and in the boys case trousers. They picked out some crazy stuff and I'm really sad I won't be there to see the finished product.

On Thursday and Friday I did more teaching..

Dresden!!

Saturday morning bright and early (at around 5am) I headed to the bus station to catch my bus to Dresden. I was kinda expecting nobody to be out but since it was a Saturday all if the flea market people were out setting up their tents. So even though it was still pitch black outside, the walk wasn't lonely at all.

I got to the bus early and managed to convince the grumpy bus driver to let me on(I don't blame him for being grumpy it was very early.....and he didn't speak English so I had to resort to hand motions to get my point across) The bus ride was roughly two hours but I slept most of the way. I did wake up and watch the sunrise which was very pretty.

The bus dropped me off around 8:30am at the main train station on the new side of town. This was only a 10 minute walk to my hostel. (Which I accidentally made a 25 minute walk by going the wrong way down a vital street.)I checked in to the hostel, though I couldn't get into the room just yet. They gave me a map so I was able to go exploring. I first took a tram down to a flea market nearby. It was really more of a large yard sale and I didn't see anything I absolutely needed.

Then I walked a bit along the side of the river Elbe. The water is apparently so clean that in the summer the locals just go swimming in it where ever. From the side of the river I got a pretty good view of the old part of the city (Altstadt). This has an old Palace of the Kings of Saxony, an older church, an opera house among other buildings. I headed over one of the many bridges and went to take a look, but first I stopped for some lunch. I had the usual vendor bratwurst and tried 'a local Saxony specialty' called Ballchen, which are basically fried pieces of dough covered in sugar.

I walked around a bit and looked at the outside of many of the historical areas. Most of these old buildings have been turned into museums that show off porcelain works or various artifacts from the Kings of Saxony. I didn't really feel like going in any of them as I really have no interest in porcelain or armory and the one that might have been interesting (showing off the Saxony treasury) was entirely overpriced and teeming with tourists.

Porcelain is very big in Dresden, because a couple hundred years ago one of the more violent Saxony Kings threw an alchemist in a dungeon and told him that he wasn't going to be let out unitl he found the recipe to create gold. The poor guy never created gold but he did find the recipe to create the only European porcelain. (They never tell you what happened to the alchemist, but I certainly hope the King let him out..) Porcelain made Dresden rich and is all over the place. There are porcelian shops everywhere and right on the side of one of the buildings is the largest tiled wall or porcelain. It's thousands of feet long and depicts all the Saxony Princes on one great procession.

I debated going over to the Hygiene Museum (which is not what it seems). It's shows exhibitions all about the human body and is actually supposed to be extremely interesting and interactive. The exhibition while I was there was on 'What is beautiful?' Unfortunately by the time I found where it was and got over there, it was too close to closing time for me to get in. So, I grabbed another bite to eat as I wandered back over to Neustadt where my hostel was. I headed up to my room, which was decorated most interestingly. (Ken dolls from the lamps and line drawings all over the walls).

I took what was supposed to be a quick nap, but what ended up being all night. So I didn't get to go out that night. (I guess that's what happens when you get up at 4:45am)

The next day I really wanted to take the hostel trip to Saxony-Switzerland. Saxony-Switzerland is not actually in Switzerland, instead it is a huge forest and mountainous region right near the Czech border. Unfortunately, there was only two of us that had signed up to go, and the tour needed four people. I REALLY wanted to go, so I chatted with the hostel staff and borrowed a map. (which I forgot to give back, whoops) And headed out by myself.

I had to take a train about 45 minutes to get there. Buying my ticket was a slight ordeal because the stupid ticket machine was not cooperating. I had to go to one of the counters to buy it. (One of the things I really liked about Dresden was that not everyone spoke English. I had to try out my German skills because otherwise nobody understood me. Not like in Berlin, most everyone here is practically fluent)

Took my train and got off at the small town of Rathen. In order to get to the foresty bit I had to first cross the Elbe River. And the only way across was by way of (very slow) ferry. You had to pay 70 tsents and wait in a fairly long line to get across. (The ferry guy had a nice monopoly going). We landed on the side of this very picturesque town. There were two little food vendors and a whole bunch of cute townspeople out doing things like raking leaves in their yards and hanging up washing to dry.

I had no clue where to go, so I just ended up following some people that looked like the type to climb a mountain (boots and big backpacks and such. And it worked! I started up a trail but then my camera batteries died. SO I trucked back down and was forced to pay 2 EUROS A BATTERY! good lord. So I headed back up. There were some really good outcroppings and views. I came to a huge stone bridge built right at the top of this mountain. It was crazy scary to look over. I also walked through the ruins of a medieval castle. All was left was a few cannonballs and the water cistern and the places where the rock had been bored away for ceiling beams and door frames, but it was still really interesting. I headed back down and took a bit of a side route to look at a small mountain lake created by a dam. I hiked around it. I was so happy to be in some real wilderness. I love Berlin, but I'm not really a city person and after I while I just need to get out and be near some trees and such.

So then I headed back on the train to Dresden, checked out of my hostel (this one was ehhhhhh, nobody really talked to each other. I tried being friendly at breakfast but was basically ignored). Then I went back to the bus station; the stupid bus was late and kinda packed, but we made it back to Berlin on time.

My brain is fried......

SO I've been sitting here the past ten minutes trying my hardest to figure out what in the world I did in school last week. I know I taught a whole bunch of lessons but can't for the life of me remember any (and my file and timetable are all at school right now)...... I think that means I've been working too hard. haha.

Monday was a teacher work day so the kids didn't come in. We still had one confused little boy show up; but we quickly sent him back home to his Mum. We attended a few meetings and then got on with planning for the rest of the week.

On Tuesday, I basically taught cooking all day. My cooperating teacher dislikes cooking even more than I do (unbelievable I know). So all day I took out groups to make either flapjacks or chocolate fridge cake. That was an incredibly interesting experience for me because I had never cooked the European way. (They don't measure in cups instead we used scales and measure all the ingredients in grams.) After school, the fashion design club teacher and myself planned out our field trip to the fabric store. We will be taking the club to the fabric store one afternoon to purchase some fabrics. Since we were going to be using the S-bahn system to get the kids there, we had to ride it routs and see how long it would take. It ended up being only a few minutes so we explored the fabric store (It's a wonderful fabric store. I've had to really resist buying anything.)After the fabric store we sat in a little bar and had a few drinks and a chat.

On Wednesday I taught something, but can't remember haha. (I think I introduced the topic of rivers, actually) After school I sat in on a focus group meeting. The one I observed was going over how to make the school curriculum booklets more cohesive and informative. It was actually pretty interesting.

On Thursday I taught a lesson on Explanatory texts. If you have no clue what those are, no worries I had no clue before I started planning the lesson. (basically non-fiction texts that tell you how or why something works) I signed up for the staff samba club on Wednesday afternoons so after school a bunch of the staff herd into the music room and the samba guy has us all bang away on these big drums. I am absolutely hopeless and can barely follow a simple one-two beat without confusing myself, but we actually sound pretty good at points. And its incredibly good stress relief!

On Friday I taught something or other, but I can't remember right now. And then I headed home and packed for my trip to Dresden!!

The weekend!

On Friday I had a nice quiet night in. Saturday morning I woke up bright and early to head over to Senior School to help out with the Cross Country Race. Every Fall BBS hosts other international schools from all over Germany. Everybody comes and all of the students participate in a 2k. Schools had come from places as far away as Frankfurt! There are awards given to the fastest girls and boys in each grade.

My job was to collect the 12 Year 4s who would be participating from BBS. I was supposed to keep them contained and get them to the starting line at the appropriate time. (easier said then done as they were all excited out of their minds and running around everywhere). I got them to the line and they took off... It was great except for the little girl who did a nose dive into the pavement. (but she picked herself up and ended up finishing the race!)These kids are crazy fast and it was only a few minutes later that they were huffing and puffing their way through the finish line.

This was a really cool way to spent my Saturday morning. The kids were all really excited and all of the parents and teachers were really involved. There was a bake sale and (of course) bratwurst on the grill.

Saturday night, myself and a few teachers went to the tacky little Oktoberfest set up at Alexanderplatz. The little bar stand had this sign above the window that read "Ficken 3euros" (If you don't know what ficken means google it. Heaven forbid I say bad words on the blog....) We were really curious as to what you received if you paid the three euros but we were all too chicken to ask. I didn't stay out too late and ended up heading home around 12:30.

On Sunday it was the 20th anniversary of the German Reunification Day and there was a big festival right by the Brandenburg Gate. I went and saw some street performers (a juggler, a crazy drummer lady, and strangely enough, some American Indians) There were food and craft vendors everywhere. The whole of Strasse des 17. Juni was blocked off and there was even a huge ferris wheel. A stage was set up with various bands and performances going on throughout the day. I walked around and listened to a few bands for a couple of hours and then decided to pop by Mauer Park on my way home.

Mauer Park is where the huge flea market and karaoke goes on every Sunday. I had a bratwurst and a Becks mit Lemon and listened to some really awful singing, before heading home to work on lesson plans.

I didn't have any pics for this post anyway....

So last week (September27th through October 3rd) was a very busy school week for me. By now I have been taking over many of the daily lessons. I've been teaching lessons in maths (the English put the s on the end), literacy, science, art, and topic.

On Wednesday my supervisor came for an informal visit. He sat in on one of my lessons and of course that lesson happened to be the one where the students went absolutely wild. Fabulous. Oh well at least when he comes next time and the students are behaving normally, it'll look like I've improved or something. After he left, I had to take a few minutes to unwind myself. I was so stressed and so tense, that I had to take a break for a minute.

My supervisor always buys dinner for the student teachers when he visits, so later that day I met up with him and we had dinner at a Indian place near his hotel. The food was wonderful despite the lame restaurant name: The Taj Mahal.

Thursday was back to teaching. Thursday after school I helped out with the 9 to 12 year old girls soccer (or as the call it football) team. Me, the teams coach (the middle school gym teacher, and all the girls hopped on a bus and drove over to BBIS (Berlin Brandenburg International School) which is like 15 minutes away. They have a fabulous soccer field there. It was the girls' first game and despite their inexperience, they actually won! 2-1.

Then we skated through Friday. I'll talk about that net post. (When hopefully I can upload pics)