What to call this?
Well, where to begin. I had a pretty good weekend, despite the fact that a good friend (Terry, the Swedish guy who was in the same youth hostel as me in Paris) moved off to nowhereville, France (OK, it's like 1.5 hours from here, but the bus goes like 2 times a day, even though it's only 20 km away). I went out with the Italian (Maria and Stefania) and Chilean (Claudia) girls on Friday night. We went to a not too interesting place first, then we found the Latino club. I ended up dancing until 2:30, which probably wasn't too good for my cold. Not to mention all of the smoke because the French smoke like chimneys (part of the reason I had to take a lung Xray I think).
On Sunday I went to the market and bought myself a roasted chicken, then had part of it with mashed potatoes, mmmm. That was my mini Canadian Thanksgiving dinner.
I started observing at one of the schools yesterday. It takes me about 1.25 hours to get out there, so the school has arranged for teachers to pick me up in Lille and drive me out! The school is fairly small, and out in the country, but the kids seems quite nice, if not a bit crazy (like everything else in this country, LOL). I might get to go on a field trip with the school in the middle of April to the south of England! I've never actually been there (the airport doesn't count), so I hope that it all works out. I'm going to talk with the teacher more on Thursday.
Today I observed at the other school. The kids were, um, a little more out of control. There were two girls (in grade 8 or 9, so 13 or 14) in one of the classes who have a crush on me. There were asking the prof if I needed a place to stay, how old I am, etc. LOL
The teaching style is very different in France than in Canada. I'll have to elaborate on that more in the future. I don't remember the last time I heard a teacher dishing out insults to the kids, and reading out their marks in front of the class so that everyone knows how everyone else did.
I'm still waiting to get a password so I can access the internet at the school.
I work for 3 hours on Monday morning, 3 hours on Tuesday morning, and 6 hours on Thursday. I think that I'll be teaching grade 6 through grade 9. From what I understand, I'll be rotating classes, and working with half of the class at a time. I'm not sure though, because one of the schools still hasn't come up with a schedule for me yet.
I'm also hoping to get some photos up online, but that might take a while. I've taken almost 350 to date...
I get to pick up my carte bleue tomorrow!
A+ (A plus tard, until later)