Shadowing


Early this week, I had the idea of shadowing the English teachers at the high school where I will be working part-time as an English teacher. My students will be in the advanced English classes. I wrote to one of the teachers on Monday to propose the idea, but her week was so busy that it was Wednesday before she responded.  She proposed next Monday. That was okay, I have curriculum for my Spring courses to plan, so one week is as good as the next now that I have marked all of the papers from the Fall term and submitted my grades. On Thursday evening, just before going to bed, I received an email from another of the English teachers, asking if I could shadow her the next day. She apologized for giving such short notice. It required getting up a little earlier than I've been getting up, but I was excited to comply with her request.

On Friday morning, a little before 8 am, I waited for the teacher on a corner about three blocks from where I live. We walked together to the school, which is not too far away. As we walked she briefed me on her first class, the one that I will be teaching in January. We did a simulation on intercultural communication. I facilitated half the class for the first 10 minutes while we learned our roles; she facilitated the other. It was a cool class, not only in subject material, but in the students as well.  I also accompanied the teacher to two other classes, where we discussed Christmas jokes and she had a worksheet for them about Christmas idioms. 

After the first class, we ran into the secretary, who had a paper for the teacher to sign and a contract for me to sign (in quadruplicate). It is official. I will begin working at the high school the first of January. 

The teachers seem tickled that I asked to shadow their classes. No one else had ever asked to do such a thing. While I was there, another invited me to shadow her classes next week on Tuesday or Wednesday. A fourth asked me to shadow her on one of the days during the first week of the new year. 

I like the collaborative spirit among the teachers at the high school. I think I will have fun teaching there.

On Monday afternoon, I returned to the school to shadow my friend. She put me to work talking about my experience with Chrismas around the world. We also talked about the first Christmas. She had some games to play as well. The students told me about the special things I should do for Christmas and some special food I should try. While in the teachers' room, I scheduled my shadowing of the other two teachers who teach the advanced English classes. .




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