livin la vida loca

When is spring break? Wait, you're telling me its already over?! How did that happen?!?!?!?!

Well, I somehow managed to get a 4.0 last term. Even after failing a midterm in one class. I'll take it! Not so sure how this term will turn out though...Its the second day of spring term and I already feel overwhelmed with the amount of work looming on the horizon. Just because I'm sure you're dying to know, this is what I have in store for me this term.

On Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, I have Fundamentals of Spanish Literature from 9-10am. This is my only class on MWF, and of course it has to be at 9 am. Oh well, guess it could be earlier! The first assignment for this class involves reading a poem and answering questions like "What is an example of parallelism in this poem?" Or "Where is the decisive point? What is the climax, the conclusion, etc?" Yuck. At least the poem wasn't too bad. This class was held in the "Fourth Avenue Building" on PSU campus. Which is not marked. The outside of the building is called the Something Engineering Building. So after wandering around for a good 5 minutes, I just walked into the building and then found a sign which showed that this was in fact the Fourth Avenue Building. For this reason, half of the class was like half an hour late. And of course they've moved the class since then, so now we'll be meeting in a different building entirely.

Tuesdays and Thursdays start at 8am with a Communication class about Children and Violence. At PSU, you have to take these "junior cluster" courses, and can choose from a list of approved classes. Two of the three cluster classes have been pre-selected because of my Elementary Ed minor. The third was up to me. For some reason I decided to choose this one. The instructor seems like she's in her own little world, but I would probably have to be too if I taught classes about abuse and violence in/towards children. We watched this video today in class. Only watch it if you have no heart. Otherwise you will cryyyyy. Not only is it a really difficult topic, but looks like its gonna be a lot of work. In two weeks time, we have to read a book, write a report on it, plus do a research paper. Thanks, Gisele. I should mention that the book is A Child Called It. I'm not going to lie to you, I couldn't read the whole thing word for word. I had to kind of skim it because it made me sick to read. This is certainly not a book to read for pleasure. It is the story of the third worst child abuse case in California history. (Written by the abused boy himself-when he grew up and was rescued from it). He has since written two sequels, about his life after he was rescued from his abusive mother. I might have to read those so I can read the happily ever after ending to this heartbreaking story.

Next up, Linguistics. The study of language: phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, etc. This class is only 10 minutes after the Communications class. Fortunately its in the same building, otherwise it would be quite difficult! This class is full of what I'm pretty sure are the weirdest students at PSU. Maybe I shouldn't say that since I am in the class...? But let me give you two examples. First, there's the girl who feels the need to share her every thought and comment and opinion on everything. She won't quit talking. Even the professor was annoyed. At one point, she said, "Oh, this reminds me of something I learned in ASL class." And she proceeded to sign something. Uhhh, none of us know sign language. Plus it had nothing to do with what we were talking about. Anyway, then there's example two: We all went around and introduced ourselves. It came to this lady's turn and she says, "My name is so-and-so, but I go by Starlight. I was born in Maryland but my life started here." Okey dokey, Starlight, nice to meet you. Then, later, we are reading an example of a nonsense sentence to show that even if it has no meaning, you still understand the parts of speech. It reads, "Colorless green ideas sleep furiously." The professor is laughing, saying, no one knows what that means!! Starlight says, "I do." Fortunately, the professor ignored her and moved on. Okay, I'm sure these are really lovely people and that they are super nice and great. Maybe they think I'm totally obnoxious.

Last up, Passions and Emotions in Poetry of the 16th Century. Funny story, when I registered for this class, it shows up as "Spanish Literature: Women Writers" (that sounded bad enough). So profesora walks in and says, well, this isn't Women Writers. Soooorry! So, here I am analyzing (I don't like having to analyze anything) poetry (which I don't really get in the first place), from the "Golden Age" (I don't even know when that was), and its all in Spanish (at least that part is okay...until I start reading Looking At Talents for Science...or something like that. The words in the title of this book could all mean like three different things. I don't even know what the title means.....).

So, all that, plus working 20-ish hours a week, will be my life for the next ten weeks. What, I'm supposed to have some semblance of a social life, too?! Well, this should be fun. (?)






P.S. Costa Rica is out, Korea is IN (maybe)! I'm applying for this 5-week program since I turned the Costa Rica one down. Its $400 versus $3000+, and is 5 weeks, twice as long as Costa Rica.

I fell in love. With Pablo, age 4.

Oh I adore him. This was the first week of our "practicum" for the Teaching Development Program. We will each spend 4 hours per week in a classroom at the Irlandesas school, helping teach English. The first five weeks will be spent "observing." We hang out with the kids, take notes on how the teacher ("seño," short for "señorita") does things, help wherever we are needed, and just have fun. I go in two days per week (Tuesdays and Thursdays) for two hours each day (12-2pm). Tuesdays I am in María's class, who is just wonderful and sweet and energetic and fun. Thursdays I am in class with Mari-Carmen, who is sweet and organized and lovely and has endless patience with her crazy kids (I think she got the class full off the super-rambunctious ones). Each class has about 30 or so 4-year-old kids. They are all so lovely and sweet and fun and beautiful and energetic and smart and just amazing. And I don't want to play favorites. But......there's Pablo.

Let's start at the beginning. I went to the school on Tuesday to begin my first "shift." My class starts at noon, and from 11:30-12 the kids are outside at recess. So if I get there early, I just am supposed to go play with them. The "playground" at this school consists of a fenced-in area filled with yellow-y sand along with some primary-color-painted tires half-sticking-up out of the ground. Pretty much the kids just run around and yell and have fun. I walked in the first day and they weren't really sure what to think. At one point, this adorable little boy came up to me and started talking. He spoke very quietly and wouldn't really look at me. With all the noise in the play yard and his super-soft voice, I couldn't understand what he was asking so I kept asking him to repeat it. At one point I figured out he was asking how old I was. After a few minutes of me asking him to repeat himself, he walked away for a minute. At that point, his teacher came up to me and told me he was deaf. Well. That made much more sense. He's not completely deaf. He can hear you if you speak loudly, right into his ear. Which is how the other students talk to him when they want to.

Anyway, he just wouldn't give up! He came back over and just kind of stayed by my side until it was time to go back to class. He kept asking questions, I kept not knowing what he was saying. But he was just so cute I kept trying to understand. The kids loved playing in the sand. They would bring me handfuls, then put it on my leg...at one point, one of the boys showed me a stick he found. I started drawing in the sand with it and they wanted me to draw more things. Well, I'm not an artist. So a smiley face, a heart and a rainbow was about as creative as I got. Anyway, by the time we were done, my hands were filthy and my jeans were tinted yellow from the sand (thanks for doing my laundry, Angeles!)

So then, it was time to go to class. Pablo grabbed my hand as we walked up the stairs to the classroom. The kids all sat down in their chairs as María played some classical music to calm them down. When everyone was quiet and still, she turned the music off and they moved to the corner of the room and sat down in a circle. I joined them in the circle (amongst the sand covering the ground that they had dragged in) as we played some games, sang some songs, and learned some English vocab. All the while, Pablo was sitting right next to me. Every time we moved, he made sure he was right next to me. After all the lessons, it was time to play again. Each child gets to choose the area of the room they want to play in. María calls them one by one, and they tell her where they want to play. When Pablo's turn came around, he just said he wanted to play with me. Oh it just melted my heart. So we played with some play-doh.

Today I went to the second class. The kids were playing outside again (though I didn't get there as early as I was hoping to avoid the filthy, sandy pants again), so I joined them. This time, I knew a little better who some of the kids were. The kids I didn't recognize, I knew would be in my class today. Again, there was another little boy who kind of latched onto me. José Joaquin. Super-cute. He was quite talkative. Again, hard to understand with all the noise going on. And my lack of fluency in his language. But he was showing off his knowledge of English to me, naming all the colors he saw. I met a few of the other kids in my class, then it was time once again to go in. But not before Pablo found me. He came running up so excited and grabbed my hand and started talking. We walked upstairs and got to the door of his classroom. He would not let go of my hand. I told him that I was in the other class today. That I would be back in his class next week. But he wasn't letting go. He just kept holding on until his teacher pulled him away. I almost cried. Not really. (But really.)

Now, like I said, all the kids are incredible. There is a little girl named Claudia who is just beautiful and who would just come up and squeeze me as hard as she could and kiss my cheek. There is Daniel, who is perhaps the tiniest 4-year-old I have ever seen. He's so little! There is Sergio, who is a little trouble-maker. There is a little girl who will not speak to teachers. She speaks to other students, but won't talk to teachers. And there are 50-some other kids who are just fantastic and who I can't wait to get to know better and teach English to.

But still, there's Pablo. If I come back to the states in December claiming to have gotten pregnant and given birth to a 4-year-old deaf boy during my four months in Spain, it's because I couldn't bear to leave him and I brought him back with me. Just be warned.

yikes.

I just got out of Spanish class. I was kind of excited to take Spanish this summer since it's an accelerated term, much more intense. I thought I'd like it. Only its hard. Really hard. Like, "I just got a D on a quiz" hard. I don't get D's. I don't think I've ever gotten one before, even on just simple quizzes. Ay yi yi. Fortunately they drop the lowest score. And if I get a score lower than that at some point, I shouldn't be going to Spain anyway.

Guess who's doing a butt load of studying this weekend?!?!

One good thing that has come out of this class so far? The best word ever, in any language. "Pipirisniquiris." Just say it. "Pipirisniquiris." Oh so fun! I tried looking it up online and can't find a definition for it. So it may not be an actual real word and maybe my professor just made it up. According to Oscar, it means like a picky person. Persnickety maybe. I don't even care if its a real word, I love it!