In serious danger of liking my life in Hanoi
And I scoffed those who told me how intense this CELTA program is!!!!
To be fair, its not that any particular component of the class course if stressful in itself, but when you have to pay SUCH close attention from 9am to 5pm and then go home and prepare for teaching the next day or study the zillion things you learned that day, ITS INTENSE.
Nevertheless I am insanely glad that I am taking this class. My teaching hasnt really changed all that much yet, but I know what teaching habits I am carrying over from teaching in Taiwan a few years ago, and of those, which would be best to tweak to teach adults and which skills can carry right over. Thank goddess.
Truth be told, I am not as bad of a teacher as I thought, but I will probably never be fully comfortable standing in front of a group of folks explaining anything. It’s just not who I am innately. Observing, digging, analyzing; there are ME at the core. The hair of my personality that likes to communicate and clarify (and entertain) is helping me with teaching. The thing I like about this class on how to teach ESL to adult learners is that we are exposed to learning theory and many different aspects of language theories also. I may very well just keep going with this train of learning if I like teaching adults. We shall see. The fact that I was as intrigued as I was with our pronunciation lecture this morning made me think that this may be the reason why I kept signing up for this class and yet cancelling before beginning, until now.
Still trying to settle in here, thus the lack of posts about Vietnam. Trust me, I have oodles to write about. Oodles. I could easily live here for 3-6 months, even with the pollution, noise and heat. Have kidnapped a friends computer for a day to catch up on a few class related as well as personal things online, so I hope to get some photos and more posted on here sooner than later. Internet access is plentiful in Hanoi, and cheap, but I have not found an amazingly high speed connection in a quiet, productive environment yet. Truthfully, I havent really tried. Been super busy with walking the first few days and then this class. I am sure there are such places here and once I find them I can get back on track.
But then there is a part of me that DOESNT want to tell you about how interesting this place is. Keep it closer to a secret, so to speak. But I am a blabber mouth, so that wont work. Damn.
Anyway, its been a long day of classes and teaching practice followed by an “oh my god, we survived the first week” dinner and drinks with my classmates, who ROCK in so many ways. Since leaving the restaurant I have been online already 3 hours trying to sort through things I have been ignoring since I arrived, is it 10 days ago now? Holy shit, it is! A personal thanks to Nancy for helping me with the mail issue, you’re an angel chica!
Tags: Celta, Hanoi
