Hhhhaunted Hhhhhouse

This morning was my first day back to school since October 21... and although it was a little rough getting up so early and switching my brain back into French, I had a great time at school with my kids and colleagues.

With les CMs (my oldest group, the combined CM1/Cm2 class), we went back over some Halloween vocabulary (ghost, bat, witch, broom, haunted house, mummy, skeleton, etc.), and played the game memory (which they love... and subsequently cheered "ouaaai" upon finding out the activity for the day). It was weird to be doing Halloween again, after Halloween was over, but I guess the teacher didn't want to start right off the bat with something new (since I was their very first lesson back at school). They had to match the picture with the word and pronounce the word when they flipped it over. Listening to them try to say "scarecrow" and "haunted house" was so funny. I tried to tell them at the beginning of the lesson that in English we pronounce the "h" sound at the beginning of words, whereas in French you do not (at first they were all saying "aunted ouse"). So they ended up saying "Hhh, hhhaunted Hhh, house." They couldn't get the "h" out in one full breath lol. And "scarecrow" was just hard because they had nothing to connect it to. At least the other words are sort of similar in French or are familiar from American movies (skelete=skeleton, spider reminds them of spider man, bat reminds them of bat man, broom sounds like the sound a car makes... and a witch rides a broom, etc.). But, I couldn't think of a good way to help them remember scarecrow... even after explaining that "scare" is like scary and a "crow" is a bird, they didn't get it. Oh well, maybe I'll show them the Wizard of Oz sometime:)

In the next class, we did essentially the same activity. These kids actually remembered the vocab and could pronounce the words better than the older kids for some reason. (Except, they were even cuter trying to pronounce "hhhaunted hhhouse.") The kids were so sad when the bell sounded for the mid-morning break.

At the break, Murielle, la directrice, reminded me that the CP class was on a field trip this morning. So... I did not get to teach my lesson on numbers after the break. Instead, Murielle asked if I had brought anything for Thanksgiving. She decided that she'd rather take advantage of me being there than have me just sit and observe a lesson in French, which I thought was really nice of her. Thankfully, I had brought the 2 books my mom sent me for Thanksgiving, just to show her and the other teachers at the lunch time. I showed them to her before we went back inside, and she and the other teachers were so funny... they thought the pictures of the pilgrims and Native Americans were great and enjoyed hearing about what we eat at Thanksgiving.

Although I hadn't really prepared for how I would explain Thanksgiving, I did so in French first because I figured the kids would be completely lost if I had just started with the book in English. My explanation was probably painful to listen to... it's hard thinking of the words for pilgrims and religious freedom and starvation and squash... but we got through it. Then my 9-11 year olds all gathered around my little board book, the kind you read to really little children... and they were so engaged. I thought, hah so funny. This book is so simple, but then again, even the simplest explanation of Thanksgiving in English is really, really difficult for them. They thought the pictures were cool and asked if we still dressed up like Pilgrims and Indians. (Murielle actually asked if I'd be dressed up on Thanksgiving lol).

And then to finish up with this group, we switched gears to explaining the regular American school day because we got into a little discussion about how many days we get off for Thanksgiving... and the kids realized that American children go to school 5 days a week instead of 4 on a regular basis. Murielle was appalled that we only got 30 minutes for lunch. The kids thought it was so cool that American children get to bring their lunch to school (one kid even shouted out, "It's like a picnic!"). And even though the kids in America get much less break time during school hours, my French students thought it would be pretty awesome to end the day so early (they don't finish until 4:30 here, but granted they do get a 2 hour lunch break and 2 recesses).

At lunchtime, Murielle showed me all around the maternelle (pre-k classrooms), which becomes part of the after school childcare. She said that children start here in preschool as early as 2 and a half! She also explained that her own kids (she has 3 ranging in age from 2-6) have to go to the babysitters until 6:30 or 7pm because she gets paid to stay much later than the other teachers... which lead us to talking about if I was ever free to babysit (which obviously I said yes). So we'll see if she ever needs me, but I've already met her kids and it would be so much fun if I got to babysit them. I'd even work for free, if there was some sort of French meal involved of course:)

Besides the tour of the maternelle, I thought lunch was much less awkward than usual. Even though I mumbled through a few comments, I was at least involved in the conversation, as opposed to just pretending to understand what was going on. I also shared some of my pumpkin bread with them... which got them talking about all the things they were going to make for me:) What a great idea it was to share such an American delicacy: Pillsbury Quick Pumpkin Bread Mix. Yumz!

And now I'm home... I don't want to go back out to make more copies of my very important documents, but I need 2 more for tomorrow, just to be safe. Ugh, I can't wait until this darn visa process is over!

Reste cool mes amis:)