Last Monday (September 14th), I had my first
official day of school—the “work” part of my Fulbright experience officially
began.
And now, how to describe it? Even after a week, it’s still
hard to find the words. There was just
so much to take in and do and learn and see and process.
Whirlwind.
That’s the closest I can get. It was an absolute whirlwind being in school this last week. A wonderful whirlwind,
but a whirlwind nonetheless.
A bit of an overview of the way this school system
works. In the 1920’s, Athens College was
founded by some well-to-do, enlightened Greek visionaries in partnership with
some like-minded Americans. They sought
to make a school that would “provide, by international standards, the highest
quality education … and to cultivate in its students those habits of mind,
body, and spirit necessary for responsible citizenship in Greece and the world;
moral courage, intellectual discipline, compassion, and an unswerving devotion
to justice and truth…” and etc. And thus
Athens College was born under the umbrella of the Hellenic American Education
Foundation (HAEF). In 1980, Athens
College’s sister school, Psychico College, was formed. While most of the significant differences
between Athens College and Psychico College have been ironed out over the
years to the point that their missions and curriculum are fairly similar now, Athens
College is traditionally the more traditional of the two schools in terms of
what and how it teaches its students.
So now under the umbrella of HAEF we have two high schools
(10-12), two junior high schools (7-9), two elementary schools (1-6), and one
kindergarten, newly formed, shaped like a fish, the crowning jewel of the
college right now. Fulbright fellows
have been spread out among these different schools. The high schools, junior highs, and
kindergarten are all located on the main campus in Psychico (a “suburb” of
Athens), which is where 10 of the 13 fellows live. There is a library and an athletic facility
and a chapel and the president’s house (and a few other buildings dotting the
landscape) that all share this space which roughly equates to the size of Carthage
College.
My placement is at the Psychico Elementary about a 20-30 minute bus ride from campus. This coming year, I will be working in the
English department, bouncing around and helping the teachers with the various
grades (1-6). In the English department,
there are about 12 teachers (all of whom were extremely welcoming when we
arrived last week!). The students come
for roughly 45 minutes of English each day (fewer days for the younger grades),
and they come by grades (so all the sixth graders come for block one, all the fifth graders for block two, and etc.). Students are broken up into
levels based on their acquisition of English: EFL (English as Foreign
Language), ELL (English Language Learners), ESL (English as a Second Language),
and ENL (English as Native Language).
The teachers each take a section—so essentially, each teacher teaches
every grade. In many ways, especially in
the older grades and more advanced sections, classes look much like the
Reading/Language Arts classes look in the U.S. (they even use some of the same
materials—i.e./ Journeys). Some of the middle levels look similar to
what I have known taking French classes in high school. Younger grades are taught phonics/letters,
then letter sounds/word families, and writing instruction doesn’t really start until 3rd
grade. There is an after-school, English
immersion club twice a week for first and second graders to help jumpstart
their English acquisition. And from what
I have heard from the other fellows, the junior and high school sections run
very much like a typical American English classroom—they read/analyze short
stories and novels, and the like.
There’s definitely a lot going on here and this is just a
brief snapshot of the program. We are
still getting acclimated to everything. Because although there are some similarities,
so much is different and new and will take some getting used to.
We ride the bus to school, which is, shall we say, an
adventure (and probably worthy of its own blog post somewhere down the
line). We eat lunch at the same time as
the kids, and lunchtime is truly a different (better) experience than what I’ve
seen/known in the U.S. (another potential blog post).
So far we have just been observing different classes and lending a hand
here and there. In the next week or two
we will get a more concrete schedule and start helping specific teachers,
pulling out groups of kids to work with, and etc.
But the kids are really great. Some of them know more English than others,
and it’s certainly been an adjustment trying to communicate with them, seeking
to get on their level to help and also learn (which is really difficult when
you have kids who don’t know English and you don’t know Greek!). Some of them are better behaved than others,
but that’s pretty typical of any school.
Some of them are more, shall we say, blunt than others (one girl said to
me last week, “You have a baby in your tummy!”—guess I need to lay off the
souvlaki!), but that just adds to their charm and arms you with more interesting stories to
tell. But almost all of them are eager
to learn and that’s why we are here.
These students are why we are here.
To help them learn while also learning from them.
See? There’s a lot to try and take in—and this small portrait really only
barely scratches the surface, but it’s a decent overview for now. It’s definitely a different kind of
experience—but it will be a good learning experience.
Tomorrow, back for round two of the whirlwind. Brace yourself J
obligatory first day of school pic :p
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