Okay friends and fam, we were bound to have at least one uneventful week during our time here and turns out this week we really don't have much in terms of travels and sight-seeing to talk about. Hayden has been feeling a little under the weather so we spent some much-needed time relaxing after a couple of crazy weeks working and tourist-ing. So, I want to write today a little more about why we chose to do this internship and what we do day-to-day as English teaching assistants.
Hayden is a Latin American Studies major, and as part of his program, he needed to do some sort of internship to gain cultural and language experience. He wanted to do a Self Reliance teaching internship somewhere in Latin America, but because neither of us speaks Spanish fluently (that's what Hayden usually tells people bc he's so nice but really, he speaks just fine and I'm the one who was holding us back), Dr. Scott Alvord in the Spanish language department suggested this program for us. When Hayden presented the idea of moving to Spain to me about a year ago, I could hardly believe he was serious. Six whole months in Europe? What a dream! The more we looked into it, the more we realized what a fantastic opportunity it would be, not to mention possibly the most economic way we could see Europe.
So, in April of last year, we submitted our applications and got accepted! BYU was so so awesome to help us with the whole process of getting our visas and giving us tips on how to get around once we arrived. We also applied for a few scholarships and we were so blessed to be awarded the Global Opportunities Scholarship, which has really made this a financially worry-free experience for us.
I remember back in September when we booked our one-way tickets to Barcelona...that was a completely surreal feeling. Like, even though we'd already been through a really long application process and our visas were already pending, it didn't seem real until that moment. As scary as it was, though, there's no place I'd rather be right now. This really has been such a blessing, and so many things have fallen into place so we KNOW this is where God wants us to be right now.
So what's it's like teaching English in Spain? Wellll I had a bit of culture shock my first couple of days teaching because schools here are very different from those at home. First of all, students call their teachers by their first names...I don't think I ever even learned the first names of my teachers in elementary school! Also, the students greet their teachers every day with hugs and kisses, which, in the states, could turn into a lawsuit really quickly. Several times I've nearly fallen over from being swarmed by groups of second or third graders, which would likely never happen in the USA. I think it's really nice, though, that the students always have somewhere they can receive love and affection, especially for those who may not get it at home.
Instead of a bell ringing to signal the beginning and end of school, the security guard picks a different song every day to play over the loudspeakers. Some of my personal favorites have been, "Dust in the Wind," "The Ring of Fire," and "I'm On My Way," (The Proclaimers). The school day is split up into 6 class periods with a 30-minute coffee break at noon. I bounce around between 5 different second or third-grade classes and basically just do what each of my teachers asks me to do. About half of the time I'm in front of the class teaching pronunciation and the other half I'm in the English lab going over the questions they'll be tested on at the end of the year. At the end of each day I'm so exhausted from speaking so slowly and simply all day that I just crave having an intelligent conversation with a native English speaker so...Hayden usually gets an earful after school.:)
After school each day, Hayden and I meet up at the University of Alcalá library and work on our homework. Starting tomorrow, though, I'll be taking Spanish classes after school so that hopefully I can leave this place with much better language skills than I arrived with!
It really is such a fun job and I really love the little kiddos I work with. I also just got a calling to be a primary teacher in our ward so it looks like SOMEBODY in the heavens thinks I need some serious practice learning how to relate to children;).
If you're interested in doing this program next year and want to know more about getting funding to study abroad, PLEASE reach out! We feel so lucky to have been given the help and financial aid we have and we'd love to pay it forward and help anyone else. Sorry for the boring post, I hope to have more exciting things to report next week!
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