My first week.

I would say that my first week at Herbert Hurd Primary School went quite well. All I did was observe, but I'm there full-time for 10 or 11 weeks, so there was no need to jump into teaching immediately. The students, however, kept asking "When is Miss Brodnax going to teach us? Can Miss Brodnax teach us English tomorrow? Why is she so quiet?" To which my mentor teacher replied, "She's going to teach you in three week's time. She's just watching all of you right now, writing a report about you for her university." That made all the kids sit up a bit straighter :)

The layout of the school day is really different from the layout I'm used to in America. Here, there are no set times for lunch or specials. They have a different order of lessons every day, and subjects like art, music, and P.E. are worked in one day a week. There are two fifteen minute breaks - one at 10:40 and one at 12:50. Those are the times that teachers and students can be away from each other and eat. There is also no cafeteria. Students either bring their lunch or buy food from the tuck shop (I got a yummy toasted tomato and cheese sandwich there one day). I actually really like this setup. It seems less stressful than taking your students to the lunch room, making sure they get their food, racing back to your classroom to gobble your sandwich before you have to go get them again.

Oh, and did I mention the school day is shorter? :) Learning time goes from 8am to 2pm, and I haven't heard any complaints from any teacher about there not being enough time to teach something. Plus, their school year is about 20 days longer than ours with lots of breaks throughout. I honestly think more American schools should look into that.

But, now, I have a 4-day weekend in which I plan to do hardly anything but keep on re-reading the Harry Potter series (I'm on book 2). I'll be observing some more the three days of next week, and after that, I start helping out more. Can't wait!