Täglich Wiederkehrendes Abenteuer

Hey, so, school is fun.  This week, I went to some classes.  For many of the classes, I don’t need to prepare very much.  I mostly look through the workbook that they had for homework so that I’m ready to discuss it with the class.  However, the complicated grammar is left to the teacher, because she’s much better at explaining it than I am.  For example, the students have difficulty with using correct verb forms and tenses:

I have read the book yesterday.

I am knowing that you like pizza.

I have lived in Linz since three years.

I took one grammar course that focused on explaining these kinds of errors, but it was not very in depth.  Since I’m a native speaker, I just  formulate these things automatically, but I can’t really explain them well.  I find it helpful to listen to the “real” teachers explain it.

I’ve also sung some songs and played some games with the students.  It’s neat because I typically get to do fun things with the students, like play games and talk about interesting cultural issues, while the real teachers do the grammar work.  Basically, my goal is to get them to talk, which involves being relaxed while asking compelling questions.

I also get to set up “dates” with the students.  I meet with them two at a time for one hour.  They have to do this to get a grade.  I’ve had a few meetings already.  I’ve been letting them lead the conversations, although I have a few tricks at the ready in case we have trouble coming up with topics.  For example, I have a deck of cards so they could teach me a game.  I have an article about multiculturalism in Germany and a picture story.  The picture story is a series of pictures that fit together and the students have to use English to tell the story.

I haven’t had to use any of my tricks because the students are really very chatty; they’ve all filled up the hour really well so far.  I like these “dates” because it lets me get to know the students better and I think having a little chat with me can give them the courage to speak up more in class, too.

On Wednesday, I’ll go to cultural studies, where some of the students will give presentations about different topics in American history.  Apparently, I’m supposed to make comments and answer their questions about American History.  Better do some research.

In other news, a little while ago I went to see a movie with my language partner.  It was called Die unabsichtliche Entführung der Frau Elfriede Ott (The accidental kidnapping of Ms. Elfriede Ott).  The movie was about a guy whose grandmother had died a few years ago, but he was still cashing her government pension checks.  Unfortunately, on what would have been her 95th birthday, a local politician wants to come to her apartment to congratulate her.  But she’s dead.  So that he doesn’t get caught and so that he can continue to cash her checks, his friend steals an old woman from a hospital to pose as the grandmother.  Unknowingly, he actually kidnapped a famous actress, so people are looking for her and police crawl all over the place.

Unfortunately, the whole movie was in an Austrian dialect, so it was sort of unintelligible to me.  But there were some visual gags and other things you didn’t need language to get.

The last bit of news is my discovery of Rum-Kokos.  They are little hollow balls of crunchy coconut filled with rum and coated with chocolate.  They are tasty, but I can’t recommend eating a bunch before class, because your students might smell the rum on your breath and think you’re a drunk.  Of course, I would probably never be able to eat enough of them to actually get drunk.  I’ll be sure to bring some home.