Student Stories

So here’s a little video I did some filming for last month, and which we got to see just yesterday. It’s already doing the rounds on facebook and other places but I thought I’d share it here too. It’s called ‘Student Stories’, which I think pretty much describes the contents.

Watch it, share it, get involved.

Word-Warriors and The Usual for Lunch.

I’ve got two bits for you today. The first is a tid-bit on one of my students, and the second a snap-shot of the everyday. I asked my father for advice on what he thought people wanted to read back home and these ideas are from those suggestions. I’m going to try to do something similar once a month; one thing about a student, one thing about the everyday.

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Word-Warriors.

One of my children has a habit of picking up things I never meant to teach her, words and phrases I never deliberately endeavoured to have the students learn. She’ll say them at odd moments, not all the time, and I find myself constantly surprised by it. “What are you doing?” she’ll say, a phrase I think I’ve only ever used as a quick jolt for when they’re being silly or naughty. Their attention will come back to me with a guilty giggle or smile, and mine turns to her pleasantly shocked yet again. I don’t think I’m ever doing anything particularly interesting when she asks, but she still seems to delight in ambushing me with this unexpected English phrase.

Lions and Tigers and Warm Woollen Mittens.

It has been an awful long while since I wrote anything for you, for a variety of reasons which I mostly forget; probably because they were along the lines of ‘Don’t really feel like it at the moment – too busy – do it later’.  That and there is a problem with the internet at our house which may-or-may-not simply be something to do with us not paying the bill. And we have been busy. Honest. I’m about to write all about just so you can see.

Well, I’m about to write about one bit. If I wrote about all of it you might not finish before tomorrow. You know what I’m like; I start writing something that took five minutes in reality and should consume no more than a paragraph, and somewhere along the line it turns into a page or three and in reading devourers a few hours. So. Baby steps.

This is what I started writing on December 14^th, and never quite finished until now.

You’re all probably thinking of turkeys and roasts and eating Christmas cookies/cakes/it-contains-sugar-things people have made, pulling out the woolly hats and gloves, worrying about frost and hoping for snow. I’m having a ridiculously sweet coco ron (Hot coco) in a small 20p cup, deciding I want sticky rice and chicken with as much sweet chilli sauce as I can handle instead of a Subway and lamenting anytime the weather dips below 20˚.

When 3 became 4

I’ve got an introduction to make.

Back right, the kid not in green? This is my new student. You'll know him as Jude.

He joined Grade 1 over a month ago, just after the October break, speaks the tiniest amount of English, and is very, very sporty. He has also been pseudo adopted by the oldest boy in the school, who plays basket ball with him and jokes with him and insists they sit next to each other in fun reading. Given that this older kid is by turns cheeky, rude, apathetic and really very smart (If a bit lacklustre in applying it) all the teachers are finding it mildly hilarious.

Jude is also a great advocate of cuddling. Which would be fine. Except, as I mentioned, he’s very sporty. And always seems to have a jacket or jumper on that he can never be persuaded to remove.

It’s always a slightly sweaty cuddle.

But he is the only kid in Grade 1 or 2 who can do a decent unassisted sit-up with any speed. Tradeoffs, I guess.