Happy Friday! It’s about 3:15PM here (8:15AM Nebraska time) and I’m done for the day! I went to school today at nine and got home about an hour ago at 2:15 (which is the whole Spanish school day right now)…it was only about a five hour day, but for some reason, I’m super tired! Maybe because I wasn’t planning on being there the entire time. Today was supposed to be the official “orientation” day, but I went to school Tuesday and Wednesday, so we pretty much had covered everything orientation-ish previously. So, I went to several of the classrooms and met a lot the kids today.

Aurora wasn’t there today (she’s out of town) so another teacher, Pilar (she’s a sweetheart!), was my go-to person today. When I got there, she had a free period, so she figured out my schedule for the day (which was different from my regular schedule, since I won’t normally work on Fridays). I felt bad interrupting her because she was trying to grade notebooks…I know how precious plan time is!

At 10:00, I went to Rocío’s room; she’s the head English teacher, the director of the department, if you will. She’ll be coming with me to Ciudad Real on Monday for regional orientation. I can’t remember the exact age of the class, but they were younger, I’d say maybe first grade. She introduced me and again, they were all like “Corni, Corni!”…it’s so cute when little kids say it! They’re working on learning the alphabet, so I spelled out my name and read the alphabet for them and they repeated it. At 11:00, I went to María José’s fifth grade classroom. They spent the entire hour asking me questions after she introduced me. Questions like “How old are you? Who is your favorite soccer team? Who is your favorite soccer player? Do you like to watch soccer?” Catching the trend here? They’re totally into soccer…don’t even get them started on the world cup, they could go all day! At 11:50, it was recess/lunch time. I guess they don’t actually have a lunch time right now, so students and teachers alike walk around with sandwiches and drink boxes. At 12:20, I went to Francisco’s second grade classroom. Again, they asked me questions the whole time. Different questions this time, like “Does chocolate exist in the United States? Do cars/dogs/phones etc… exist in the United States? Every question was about things existing! But I guess that’s what you get when you’re talking to 20 seven-year-olds. At 1:10, I went to Pilar’s sixth grade classroom. That was nice because they know more English and so we were able to expand our introductions a bit. Instead of just telling me their names, they were able to tell me about their siblings, pets, favorite foods, etc…At 2:00, it was time to go! All the kids (and teachers too, I imagine!) were happy it’s Friday!

I’m not sure what the weekend has in store for me. I’m sure we’ll go out for drinks later on, in which case, I better take a siesta! Gunita and Teodora talked about going shopping in Albacete tomorrow, since there are no really shops here. I think it’s about an hour away, so we’d be busin’ it. I’ll letcha know!

Xoxo,

Court