I
love being a teacher. Of all the names that I have accumulated over the years –
BrookeO, Brookie, Brookers, Awesomecabbage, O’Sasquatch… just to name a few –
‘Miss O’ is by far my favorite. I may
have only found my calling 4 years ago, but I know for certain that I am in the
right field. I am more eager to shop for my students than for myself, and I
will typically back away from a $30 pair of jeans but will drop $100 on
classroom supplies without hesitation. I get overly excited about the lesson
plans I have created before I even start to teach them. I eat, dream, and
breathe my students. So here I am, in a
job that I am animated about every day, starting my second year of teaching in
Honduras.
I
went into and completed my first day feeling eons more confident about myself
as a teacher after one year under my belt. This time I knew my way around the
school and the rules, I knew who all my students would be and what level they
would start the year at, and I knew quite a few of my fellow teachers and was
thrilled to be working alongside of them again. (Put aside working in a new
school, moving to La Unión is an adjustment itself and I’ve already conquered
that transition as well.) I put on my usual navy blue pants and picked out my
finest white button-down shirt (I based my decision on which was the brightest
white and least crunchy), stepped into my new (and yet already slightly dusty)
black shoes, and braced myself for my new batch of kiddos! Man, was I looking
put together and sharp!
These
are some highlights from my first week back at school:
*Since the theme of my classroom is
‘zoo animals’ I bought foam animal masks to make with my students. The pieces were
already all cut out so all the students had to do was help me glue and then
make their most ferocious animal noise! I had one student wear his zebra mask
during an entire math lesson and credit his speedy addition skills to the power
of the mask.
*I am already incredibly
impressed with the level of English that my students are starting at! There is
a large majority of them that understand what I say and/or translate for others
in the class; they are already surpassing my last class with how well they read
short stories and answer questions; their vocabulary is more extensive than I
imagined; and they are very clever and easily pick up new concepts that I
teach. They are contributing greatly to my confidence in teaching since they
are a little bit smarter, they make me feel like I am doing a good job of
teaching!
*Each student got to decorate
a puzzle piece that I will put all together on the wall for a ‘Third Grade’
mural. Innocently, one of the boys decorated his piece like this... all of the
teachers are questioning his intentions but I am fairly positive that he had
(and still doesn’t) no idea of his… eh em… coincidental mistake.
The
main joy of my week rests solely in my students; they really do steal the show.
I greatly miss my students from last year but I am lucky enough to be their
neighbor at school so I see them daily and most of them will not leave school
without giving me a hug. I know they are ready to conquer fourth grade with
Mrs. Turcios as their teacher, and they will surely make me proud more than
once throughout the school year. But now I have a whole new bunch of munchkins
in my classroom and they are tiny vessels ready to be transformed! I have 19
students – 12 girls and 7 boys. I absolutely love having more girls because
they are very well behaved and dominate the classroom with that attitude. Some
of the girls are so itty bitty that they barely reach my hips! Their feet do
not reach the floor from their desks and sometimes I feel like they are dolls
for me to play with. However, the boys are not completely lost in the princesses’
shadows. They are making their presence known, but not in the most pleasant way
– almost every other day one of them is digesting something foul and the smells
that come out of them are toxic. I have been worried about a few and actually
asked another teacher to follow one or two to the bathroom to make sure no
accidents happened in their pants. Boys will be boys.
(I
am posting different blogs to introduce you all of my students. But since I
have so many of them, I figured it would be easier to read about them
separately. Go check out their adorable little faces!)
As well, I
am teaching a couple secondary classes this year. I teach the 8th
grade math class – Pre-Alegebra – and I am a huge fan of that class right now. (I
taught 9th grade math – Algebra 1 – last year but refused to move up
with them to teach Algebra 2 because of how difficult that class was. That
group of students is not very math-minded and I struggled all year trying to teach
and get through to them. I graciously handed that task off to one of the new
teachers.) I have always liked the quirkiness of middle school-aged students
and I get plenty of that in this class. They have a ton of energy and are always
eager to participate – I even have to calm a few down sometimes when they start
bouncing out of the chair trying to answer a question. Sometimes appearances
take priority over math and I have to confiscate mirrors, hairbrushes, lip
gloss containers, and spray deodorants just to get my students to focus on
their work. The only thing that I do not appreciate about them is the smell
that trails behind them when I teach them immediately following lunch on
Fridays. We are working on solutions to this problem.
I
also supervise the 12th grade students when they teach English at
the public primary school once a week. These students are teaching because they
are required to complete a social service project over the year, and they are
doing a phenomenal job. Originally they were going to rotate in groups and just
teach to the 4th, 5th, and 6th grades but
since the original ten have been performing so well, the public school
requested that all of our students come and teach every section of grades 1
through 6. They have been generating really helpful and creative ways to teach
their lessons. I even find myself learning from their teaching style: for
instance, when introducing the alphabet, they wrote out the alphabet based on
the phonetic sounds in Spanish. I really hope they are learning to appreciate the
job teachers do and are feeling the satisfaction of giving back to their
community through these little kids. Big things are going to happen through
this social project!
I
am truly looking forward to what this year holds for me as a teacher back in
Honduras. I get to teach a phenomenal group of 19 little 3rd
graders, an enthusiastic group of 18 quirky 8th graders, and a
life-changing group of 27 determined 12th graders. Without a doubt,
each class will teach me new things as a professional and as a person. I know
the Lord has big plans for me to grow in great ways because of each student
that I get to interact with. Will you be praying for me this year? It’s time
for me to start my prayer requests again because I know that I need international
support. I cannot do this alone. I have encouraging coworkers and incredible
students, but I am nothing without my loving Father and the prayerful support
of people back home. Thank you in advance for sending your love and protecting
me through your prayers :) This week I am asking for prayer for my fellow
teachers. For the returning teachers, buttons are being pushed and tempers are
rising as if we never took that summer vacation. For the new teachers, the
school, city, and students can feel overwhelming more often than desired. Pray
for patience, perseverance, endurance, and most importantly, love, in the heart
of every teacher at our school. We are all in this for the long haul of 10
months and we need to start strong. I am not ready to start seeing my coworkers
defeated. We need the strength of our Lord.
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