We had an eventful weekend! Saturday, Kate and I went to Epsom to go shopping, then walked up Box Hill and did some reading. Such a relaxing afternoon! Then we cooked dinner and hung out at home. Sunday, we went to Windsor Castle with Megan's parents. Windsor is a much more impressive place than Buckingham Palace, in my opinion. It is massive, and so much more like a fortress than Buckingham. We toured the State Rooms and saw Queen Mary's Dollhouse, so that was really interesting. St. Georges Chapel was closed because we went on Sunday, so that was really a bummer. It's gorgeous inside. We seriously considered going to a service there just so we could see the inside but we decided that might be disrespectful. Very sad we didn't get to see the inside though.
Today, my supervisor came to observe me teach a PE lesson (the subject that seems to be the bane of every British teacher's existence). It's just such a chore because they have to change out of their uniforms into their PE kits. That is no small feat when you have a class of 25 five-year-olds! Most of them can't even unbutton their top buttons themselves, so changing takes a good 10-15 minutes. So, once they're finally dressed, I have to get them into the hall. The hall is only about 10 feet from our classroom, but since they have to step outside to get there, they can't go barefoot, so they have to wear plimsolls. Then, we have to figure out the best way to take their plimsolls off and where they can find them, because they needed bare feet for the lesson. THEN, England has this rule that children have to learn how to take out their own apparatus. So, for example, we used benches, stools, mats, and balance beams today. So, technically, the children should have set up all of those things. My children are not at all ready for that, so we just tackled the mats today. Teaching them how to carry the mats from the rack to the floor took (I'm not kidding) 20 minutes. That is our whole PE slot right there. Changing, walking to the hall, and getting mats out. I let them jump off the apparatus for 5 minutes (we just ran over time) because I didn't want them to have wasted all that effort getting the mats out and not using them.
All in all, PE is the worst subject to teach in England. Also, the apparatus they use would never be okay in America. Literally, the balance beams are wooden benches turned upside down, and they were jumping off of benches and tall stools today. And that was perfectly fine with everyone. Good thing I don't want to be a PE teacher because I don't think I could handle it! Managing them is also so much harder once they get into PE mode. I think my supervisor thought it went okay though, so that's good.
My teacher was sick today and will be out tomorrow as well, so our head teacher has been teaching our class. It's a much different atmosphere with the head in the classroom. She has this power over them. It's amazing! I'm sure it helps that she's been a teacher for a bajillion years, so she knows what she's doing.
We also had parent consultations tonight (aka conferences). Always an interesting experience, especially being on the teacher side of the conference. Some parents have such interesting views about their children. That's all I'll say about that =)
Time to plan!
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