Polyvalente Louis-Mailloux - les premiers jours!

This week was my first week at Polyvalente Louis-Mailloux. 

Some things right off the bat about this school:

-They have a cafeteria and I ate at it. This was exciting for me.

-The school colours are green and gold just like PHSS and UNBC.

-They have a medium sized school bus (not a short bus!) for the sports team which is painted green and gold.

-There are murals painted by students all throughout the school.

-I'm not sure how many staff members there actually are but I've counted over 30 in the staff room at once.

-The school loves Survivor and all the English classes watch it on Fridays!

Anyways, being in the school has been a huge challenge/confusing thus far, but each day is better than the last. It's challenging and confusing because there are four English teachers that I'm working with/for, and it's hard to understand who expects what of me when. Also, while I only speak English with the students, I am expected to converse in French with staff and I am having a difficult time understanding and communicating well! I have been speaking in English with the English teachers so far.

I have a schedule now though, I have a different assigned teacher for Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. So on those days I'll be doing activities with their English classes. On Mondays and Fridays I will do prep work and mock interviews with the students. Oh, I also feel very important because I have my very own desk in the English department room!

This week I got the opportunity to sit in on some of the classes I'll be working in. I am working with grades 9-12. They are further separated into A-, and B-track (bilingual) classes. So far the students seem interested in learning and practicing English. There are intensive English programs for the grade 9 students. They take English for 2 hours a day. One of these intensive programs is paired with an art class which I think is pretty cool!

In one of the grade 10 classes the teacher introduced me to the class. One boy in the front row couldn't even look at me as he said to his teacher, "What is her name? Her name is Cah-sahhn-drahh? My dog is named Cah-sahhn-drah!". Then the entire class and myself started laughing, and the teacher was like "Well, your dog has a person's name, she does not have a dog's name!". I'm not sure why it was so funny but it sure was! 

The students all have very lovely names and I'm working hard to learn them, as well as learn the pronounciation. Many of the names are spelt the same as names I am familiar with, yet here they are pronounced completely differently.

Next week I will be doing presentations to the class on myself so that they can get an idea of who I am. I'll also be beginning to do activities with them this upcoming week! I hope they're able to understand me.

At home I have started "watching", well just having the TV turned on, to try and better understand French. So far my favourite thing to watch is Dora la Exploratrice! She talks in French and teaches English. It's very amusing and I understand it. I think I need to watch something a bit more challenging!