24/8/21

The shower has been clogged for three days. My bedsheet tore two days ago. Today I flipped the light switch and it fell out of the wall. I’m not a very good house guest.

The first day of divided Spanish lessons went well. We reviewed some more difficult verb patterns and I was able to talk with the Tayde in more detail about my motivations for coming and about the history of Milwaukee. It felt like a big step up from previous classes and I think I will start progressing more rapidly now.

Beginner class was difficult. The buttons on Zoom don’t have the same labels when your default language is Spanish, so I was unable to explain to the kids how to draw or write on the online whiteboard. A lot of blank stares. They’re really funny when they share their thoughts in Spanish, but right now they struggle to say much in English. We spent the day drawing foods (in part because it’s fun, and in part because I think its best to introduce new vocabulary without directly translating every word. Better to just use pictures with English labels).

Advanced and Conversation classes went well. These are significantly easier to teach because the students are a bit older and know enough English to understand instructions and share opinions. We need to give assessments this Friday, so I am having students prepare to give a short presentation of one of their hobbies or interests. No idea yet how I will assess the beginner class.

After classes I finally found a pizza shop. And ate too much pizza. Now I feel sluggish, and I’m sitting in the dark because I broke the light switch. Probably headed to bed soon. I was contacted at 9:30pm-ish and instructed to make some sort of placement test for the students by noon tomorrow, but the instructions are so unclear that I’m just going to wait until my lessons tomorrow to ask about it.